This is what it looks like today, after my latest upgrade, new flooring.
The flooring is from Swisstrax, the premier supplier of snap-together plastic garage flooring. I designed the color scheme, working within their limited set of colors. I wanted to delineate the parking spaces from the work area and I figured it wouldn't hurt in getting the boss' approval if I made the entire thing Ohio State themed (she graduated from OSU and has forced me to watch college football for decades). The two big Os work for my purposes, but I knew I had enough red, black, and silver to change up the pattern if they lose to Michigan again. The tiles are easy to pull up and rearrange and I have always liked how red pops against black and gray.
I have been frustrated with the floor in my garage. It has a few minor cracks and lots of stains, but the worst part is that anytime I kneel down, I get dusted. When I work on the floor, my navy coveralls turn gray thanks to the dust that never goes away, no matter how much I clean. I also had several carpet runners in front of the work benches because standing on the concrete can be brutal. While the Swisstrax isn't exactly an anti-fatigue mat, it is much more comfortable under my old feet. Those carpet runners also got in the way of rolling the toolbox, the jack, or my creeper. The dirt from the concrete floor also seemed to make the wheels gritty. Now everything rolls smooth.
Swisstrax Pro tiles, and many competitive products, have an open mesh. Liquids will drain through the tiles and there are channels underneath that allow the liquids to flow to whatever drainage exists. This means that pulling a snow covered car into the garage won't result in puddles. The puddles will still be there, but they will be under the floor. In my climate, things tend to dry pretty quickly, and my floor mostly leans toward the garage doors, but the floor often remains damp to the touch in the winter and spring as the slab gets cold enough to inhibit evaporation. This should make spring work a lot nicer. The other advantage of that open mesh is that automotive fluid spills don't require immediate cleanup. When I did the brake work on the Jaguar, I had a few big spills which slowly spread out on the floor space that I was trying to work from (nothing like brake fluid in your hair). Now cleanup can happen afterword, although it will require pulling up some tiles to get at the spill. The tiles are remarkably chemical and stain resistant.
The dirt and dust also drops through that open mesh. The standard Swisstrax product has no flat surfaces so the dust really does settle below the floor, keeping the surface relatively clean and only necessitating an occasional removal of the floor for a more thorough cleaning. I bought the smooth version of their tiles because things do roll better, it is a lot more comfortable to kneel on (or walk barefoot), but also because it is a lower profile tile and my man door was going to require significant adjustment to fit over the taller tiles. That smoother surface will hold some dirt, particularly footprints, but it can be easily cleaned with a rag or mop. I spent all day walking around on the floor as I installed it and the dusty footprints were really minor, only visible on the black tiles.
The tiles can easily support a lot of weight, but concentrated loads like jack stands and jacks with small wheels can deform the tiles. My jack has very large wheels so it won't likely damage the tiles, but I think I will buy some sheet metal to further distribute the load of the jack and my jack stands. There are jack stands with wide flat bases and those will have no impact on the tiles, but my existing set has the typical sharp-edged base that can cut into the tiles.
Installation was reasonably quick and easy. The floor really is just floating there and cutting tiles to finish to the edges should not be done with great precision as the tiles will expand with temperature. I was surprised at how square my garage is. The two sidewalls were almost perfectly parallel, but the back wall did have about 3/4" of angle over the 24 feet. I had most of the floor down before lunch, but cutting in the edges took a bit more time. I made a couple of strategic errors, but luckily I bought a few spare tiles.
This is an indulgent upgrade. It wasn't cheap, but I am not getting younger and having a nice work area matters to me. I did get a decent discount. If you use their design tool and then request a quote, they will give you a discount. They were also running a 10% off sale so the discount was on top of that. This stuff retails for about $5 per square foot, but I got it for about $4. So, happy birthday to me.
