panderson2414 - Contractor Talk - Professional Construction and Remodeling Forum

panderson2414 · 09-23-2009, 09:18 PM

Benny, you told me ask so I will. I have three grain tanks that are made up of bolted and galvanized steel. In the past I have used an immersion grade polyamide epoxy, series 66. The tanks I am about to coat need either caulk at the seems or a roof coating to bridge the gaps in the seems. I think I will caulk. How would I sell poly-urea to these guys if it was part of my company. I know it cost to get started, I don't want to by the pumps Gusmer or Graco I have heard to may horror stories. You have to make your case

painter213 · 09-24-2009, 04:12 AM

First question. What is the horror stories on the Gusmer Graco equipment have you been told?

panderson2414 · 09-25-2009, 06:55 PM

Benny, I have heard that this kind of equipment is hard to work with. I cant say I know this first hand. The pumps have to be set with absolute accuracy to insure correct mixing ratios. I have also heard that the lines need to be heated. I was not on the "big dig" but I had some friends that were. The large tunnels that were a part of that project were coated with polyurea. One bright yellow primer coat and one top coat. I have been told it was a mess. This could have been due to bad contracting or poor supervision. My tnemec guy thinks that polyurea has been over sold as a cure all to poor substates, i.e. punky concrete or poorly pre-pared or surface deficient steel. It has amazing surface tensile stregth but it further delays a real fix to on going problems. I also see the benefits quick return to service times, extreme elongation, and chemical resistance. The horror stories come form the people that have worked with the equipment and have not liked it. They have been the people I have heard from. I look at all angles of a story. I did think it was removable until I seen your videos. I need education on the subject and a rebutle from someone that believes in it.

painter213 · 09-25-2009, 08:29 PM

Well, with that being said. The equipment is not hard at all. It's just a pump, except it has more than one. There is no pumps that has to be adjusted to get both to work together. They are all fixed ratio's and when one moves one direction then the other pump moves in the opposite direction. The hoses has to be heated, but that is no problem. The people that has had or does have problems is the ones that does not know there equipment and really has no experiance with pumps at all. There is steps that has to be taken at every start-up and shut-down and when done, there is no problems. If you do not follow instructions, then you can expect problems. Tnemec will down play polyurea because they do not have one is all. Polyurea SHOULD NOT be applied over poorly prepared surfaces of any kind. It is a fix for not doing proper surface prep. Years ago it was promoted that way because most that was using it did not have any Industrial Coatings experiance at all. Most were truck bed liner shop owners that thought that it was a cure all for coatings and they wound up falling on there faces. What happened at the Big Dig was due to the contractor not following the directions of the material suppliers advice. I know this because I am good friends of the man that consulted on the job that has more polyurea experiance than anyone on the planet. He worked for Texaco Chemical and was a large part of the development of polyureas. Polyurea is not a replacement for all coatings. It has it's place and in some area's it should not be used. It is just another tool in the tool box to use to make your company more versed and needed. If you want to learn more, then I would suggest to become a member of the PDA. That is the Polyurea Development Association and then get in on a Applicator class. They have at least Three a year and they are held in Houston Texas. When I can I help teach the classes. I hope to be doing more with them after the first of the year. It is a small investment before spending a wad of money on equipment and material and to find out that it is not for you. What you would learn in the class is very valuable. Even if you do not go ahead and get into polyurea applications, you will know what it takes and you will come away with a slew of ideas that it can and is being used on today. The class is five days and there is hands on with spraying and equipment knowledge as well. I do not have a date for the 2010 class schedule as of yet, but when I do I will post something about it. Give me a call anytime man. Hope this helps.

panderson2414 · 09-25-2009, 08:59 PM

Benny, I dont know why you are on this site. Most people of your caliber would never consult with people like me. I know for a fact that you dont have to do this stuff at night. I have done well over the years and have found a niche to work in, you have inspired me to go above and beyond, I am comfortable where I am. You know so much, I did not think you would know that texaco was a part of the dig. I had some expirence with that project on the TBM'S. I was not part of the coating crews. Akkerman Manufacturing is a tbm manufacturer near my home and I seen some of the specs. I dont know if they supplied parts or helped with the underground directional boring. I am happy to know that one of the best 25 in the world is a part of our site, Thank you benny. pa

painter213 · 09-25-2009, 09:43 PM

Thanks Panderson. I come to this site because I LOVE my Job. I want to see more people doing there work the right way. So I love to teach. If people are willing to just stop and listen they can learn so much. I am always learning more myself. You can never stop learning in this trade. One thing on the Big Dig is a company I was working with back then was building all the Struts that went into the Big Dig. We was located in Bessemer Alabama. Give me a call anytime Panderson. I will be going on night shift in a few weeks so I will not be on at night as much, but I will stop by each day during the daytime before I head into work. Getting ready for the Outage here at Three Mile Island. The two steam genrerators will arrive at the end of the month and the plant will go silent on the 26th of Oct. Then a whole lot of work will be beginning. I will be working alot in the reactor building and will be doing coating survey's of the existing coatings and inspecting the new coatings as they are being applied. Have a good night and like I said. Call me anytime man.

panderson2414 · 09-25-2009, 10:07 PM

Benny, Thank you for GFG but phone calls are not my thing. Thanks pa

Betterblast · 09-25-2009, 11:07 PM

Paul, I happen to have a truck bed liner business. I don't know if you aware that you don't have to have any expensive complicated equipment at all. Look in to Quick liner. It is the same product as Ultraliner but comes in a two part cartridge system. You need only the three hundred dollar gun. That's it. It costs more per square foot than there larger system but then you have no start up costs. It might be a good way for you to experimen and learn about it. It will come out to about $33. per cartridge shipped and you get a pretty good coat at about 15 to 20 square feet per cartridge. It goes through a static mixing tube and begins to cure in about 7 seconds. Generaly once you start to spray you don't stop or it will harde in the mixing tube. You can however stop and then place a new three dollar tube on it if you have to. It comes out pretty fast you have to have a plan and keep moving. They also have it in an aliphatic which can take uv better but costs a little more.

painter213 · 09-26-2009, 05:50 AM

Sorry BetterBlast, but those cold spray cartridge systems need to stay in the truck bed liner buisness. Ultra Liner, Rhino Liner, Quick Liner, and Spray Max all need to stay in the truck bed liner buisness. The products are not very chemical resitant at all and just will not work in a industrial liner. Especially a tank liner. I know that they say it will, but I have seen the end results of many of these systems first hand and it's not good. There is a failed $20,000,000 job right now in Hawaii and the lawyers are on the job now and it will probably be a quick death to a polyurea supplier that has good product but they could of cared less who was applyiing there product and where. So now it is coming to bight them hard. There are so many companies out there pushing Polyurea to people that has no buisness being in the coatings world in the first place and that is what I am fighting to put a stop to. You have to pick the right system for the job. Cartridge systems is good for doing touch-up work and small area's where you you just cannot get the other equipment into. Sorry for the rant, but this is one area that I am very touchy about because I have been in the polyurea areana for over 14 years and I have seen a many get rich quick sceems come and go and I have seen so many people get hooked into a bad deal and I just hate seeing it happen. They want to sell you a protected area and specialized equipment and a dealers license and all the other bull crap and it just really get's to me is all. Bedliner coatings need to stay in bedliiners and has no buisness in tanks is all.

kell490 · 09-26-2009, 09:10 AM

What do you think about using these systems for garage floors does it stick to concrete? Would go along good with my blasting business could clean them and use this liner on the concrete. I already have the mobile air system I could use too. I found a website called spraymaxliners.

Betterblast · 09-26-2009, 03:08 PM

I guess it can be done but there is a fair amount of overspray. You would have to protect the entire garage. The hard part, even with trucks is getting enough money to do a nice job. Cars are heavy and turning wheels when you are not moving requires a heavy coat. You would need about $2000. to for a two car to come out with $700. or so. You would have to preasure wash and maybe acid etch first.

painter213 · 09-26-2009, 03:13 PM

These systems can be used on garage floors but you need to do more surface prep and you have to use a primer. Acid etching the concrete is not going to give you a good surface to coat and it involves putting water on the now open concrete and that is going to give you big problems. Plus the acid etching is not going to profile the concrete for these types of coating systems. You need to either blast track the floor, abrasive blast the floor or you can scarify the floor with a diamond grinder. You would apply to primer to seal the floor and give the polyurea something to bond to as well. Just be careful with who you go with for these systems. As far as garage floors, there are other coatings that will work just as good and cheaper to apply as well. So for the customer, it is all based on cost. One thing to consider with open air blasting in a home owners garage. Your going to make a big mess. Blast Tracking is the best option.

panderson2414 · 09-26-2009, 08:51 PM

Benny, I took off the day today made some saurekraut. 42 heads if cabbage and five hours later we had about 100lbs of the stuff. I should have worked but is life always about our companies? I even made plans for next saturday and the end of the season is comming!!! I must be out of my mind, or getting smarter.

kell490 · 09-26-2009, 11:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by painter213

These systems can be used on garage floors but you need to do more surface prep and you have to use a primer. Acid etching the concrete is not going to give you a good surface to coat and it involves putting water on the now open concrete and that is going to give you big problems. Plus the acid etching is not going to profile the concrete for these types of coating systems. You need to either blast track the floor, abrasive blast the floor or you can scarify the floor with a diamond grinder. You would apply to primer to seal the floor and give the polyurea something to bond to as well. Just be careful with who you go with for these systems. As far as garage floors, there are other coatings that will work just as good and cheaper to apply as well. So for the customer, it is all based on cost. One thing to consider with open air blasting in a home owners garage. Your going to make a big mess. Blast Tracking is the best option.

What about using water with abrasive blasting too keep the dust down I blasted my driveway with some maxstrip and I also tried some crushed glass but I would think even sand would work okay on a concrete? I saw this video of some guys spraying that stuff on a garage floor.

http://good-times.webshots.com/video...49193060luIShG

panderson2414 · 09-27-2009, 12:16 AM

kell you on

panderson2414 · 09-27-2009, 12:33 AM

kell, the jobs that benny works on above and beyond us. You can look up Jim halstrom or Kevin Grettamin, Kevin owns a company that distubutes Tnemec coatings, Benny has worked with the companies that make the minerals and materials that make up the coatings I work with, Imagine wall street or ben beranke or the top of the top thats benny. He is here with us now. I met Bill Shoup.... Benny is smarter, pa

panderson2414 · 09-27-2009, 12:35 AM

Dont get a big head benny

painter213 · 09-27-2009, 05:40 AM

Not a problem. I like Bill Shoup. Kell, the coating looks good, but I can tell you that I seen a lot in the video that is not right. One thing is the concrete looked too smooth, They did not use a primer, and the thickness is not very thick. 20 mils max from the looks of it. Not enough.

For coating concrete with a coating such as this, you have to have a properly prepared substrate. Acid Etching is not going to give you enough profile on the concrete and it will not open the concrete up enough to let the coating penetrate the substrate.

The purpose for using a primer is so the primer will penetrate into the concrete and increase the tensile strength of the top layer of concrete. Concrete only has a tensile strenght of about 400 pounds. So the primer soaks in and increases this.

Next the primer is used to give the polyurea something to bond to. You take a coating that dries in seven to 12 seconds like these polyureas that Spraymax uses and that dry time is not long enough to properly wet in the surface and to penetrate into the open pores of the concrete to get a good mechanical bond. So, you use a primer and then then the polyurea will bond to the primer giving you a very good bond strength.

The thickness that I seen them spraying at is not enough for a concrete floor at all that is going to have vehicular traffic parking on it. You really need at least 80 mils min. For the material that it looked like they had staged there, it was not enough. For that size area and I figured at least a 20' x 20', it could have been bigger but anyway, it would of at least have taken around 35 gallon or more to of put down enough thickness for the floor. Not including the primer, in which they did not use.

Now with that said, 35 gallon is a lot of coating to spray using a cartridge system. That is a lot of cartridge changes and with every change there is a tip and mix tube to replace as well. That is a lot.

Like I said, it has it's place in the industry and you can use it for a floor area like this. It will take longer to do, but to get a good job, IT HAS TO BE DONE RIGHT!!

The end job there looked good, but the real question is what does it look like now??????????????

kell490 · 09-27-2009, 09:26 AM

Thanks for the info