DID WE REALLY JUST SAVE £1OOK ON FLOORING! - Why Polished Concrete?

[@Danothebaldyheid]

People complaining about the detail - i very much appreciate it! Fascinating stuff, and really good to know the potential drawbacks, alternatives etc..

[@anthonyreed2228]

Just to give you the benefit of our small amount of experience, all of this you probably already know but just in case. We have had the benefit of underfloor heating for about 16 or 17 years, firstly we had partial install in a screed on the kitchen floor and then 3 years ago after a flood we had 100m2 installed in a concrete slab over insulation very similarly to your application. In brief: 1, be very careful when you turn on the heat, you must start very slowly and raise the temperature gently over a long period of time to avoid cracks, when you think it’s dry…it isn’t!. 2, carpets kill it. Decent but not too thick rugs are the answer ( we finally have a very efficient and very warm house with little energy input after getting rid of the carpets. 3, dry it before you seal it , this may be obvious but we have installed 50 and then 100m2 of slate which we then sealed, we then flooded the first time and the sealed slate held the water in the slab. So ripped it all up and started again, once the “sealed” slate was up the concrete then dried with dehumidifiers. Remember that any moisture in the slab when you seal it is there to stay. Not trying to show a granny how to suck eggs but every day is a school day for me. 😊

[@davidleworthy1847]

Keep the content as you want. Always great to watch.

[@Renovation-Dan]

I love a polished concrete floor, can’t wait to see the finished results!

[@mandyleeson1]

Good choice. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished product.

[@jackmeadows8859]

Bravo, seriously good. Standing ovation. 👏👏👏

[@jamest5149]

Just a note, here in Australia, polished concrete is very common, it scratches so some care is needed when using the space. Luckily a re polish is relatively quick and easier to do then reseal.

[@hjc355]

Great video. Remember when you have an industrial scale building as a home, who cares if you have a crack or two. It's part of the story. Enjoy. Ive learned a thing or two now for what I want for my build, especially the garage. So for that, thanks a lot. You are helping many many people.

[@peterwalton1502]

I’ve been with you from the start and it is starting to look good. Enjoyed the explanation about the pros & cons of the concrete 👏👏👏

[@williamwales6619]

Cracks in the concrete!!! Bloody hell. What's Joe got to say about that one. Love to be a fly on the wall when that chat takes place. Woohoo! That aside good job so far.🤣

[@alanreeves459]

Another great video 👍 Interesting to hear the comparison between your costs and that of the "professionals".

[@terrymorton9941]

If it is severley laminated, you could always resin the floor give it a different feel.

[@bernardkerrison9701]

I am a bit older than you, so maybe my comment is 30 years early, but walking on concrete floors gets to be pretty hard on your legs. Fine at work in an office, OK at Tesco or Costco, but living on a stone or concrete floor will hurt your legs when you get older. I suggest you invest in some in-house slippers, or at worst keep a pile of Crocs by the door! Love the channel - envy you the project Enjoy!

[@livingoffgridinscotland]

Just don’t underestimate how long concrete both takes to fully cure, and to fully dry… Really need to be wind and water tight and get some sort of heat and dehumidifiers in the building De-lamination doesn’t just happen when polishing the concrete, I’ve seen it happen a lot in concrete driveways where the “cap” de-laminates after 10-15 years Only option then is to do a resin drive over the top….. Hopefully yours will last longer than that if not exposed to the elements or heavy machinery

[@andrewhall9581]

Maybe lay some pennies or interesting objects and epoxy resin over the delamination section. Lean into the mistake and make it a feature

[@robertfield5036]

I had a quote to repair leaks in 2 bathrooms on a rental house I owned, the quote was £12,000! I fixed it all myself for £137 😂😂😂😂

[@richardclarke9966]

IYCDIY

[@Gman0116]

So the UFH heating has to get through a minimum of 150mm concrete slab? Interesting.

[@WoutRikkerink]

Working with concrete is a complex skill. We did almost the same floor setup here at my house (garage, office and garden room). Power floated finish but I'll coat it with 2K epoxy. What about acoustics? In our kitchen and living room all the fibers in the concrete decided to show up like goose bumps when we were pouring the 2k PU floor. It is heartbreaking knowing all the effort and money already put in...

[@Tomm9y]

The specialist services would subcontract the work, they have just found a niche were they can sell at those prices. There are lots of industries where this happens. The patch can be easily fixed. It is a great floor, a good colour choice, low maintenance, durable. Will be interested see to how it looks when polished and in clear light.

[@angelinaklineburgess5286]

Really nice ! One question, how slick will it be? Our garage wasn’t broomed and isn’t as finished as yours. Nonetheless, any moisture and it’s worse than an ice rink .

[@Dannyp8038]

Do you think they over priced it, knowing that no sane person would pay it because they just didn’t want to do the project?

[@TheRestorationCouple]

I think polished concrete is generally over £150m2 so by the time you account for the increased thickness, colouring and travel I wouldn't be surprised if it's about average, especially as all three quotes were similar.

[@TheFarmingEngineerUK]

Interesting video thanks. I must say, fibres are never a good idea with a polished floor. And ultimately unnecessary if you have steel mesh reinforcement because that provides enough crack control in most circumstances. Overall if you use concrete as a finished material, you should be prepared to accept the occasional defect that you wouldn't even think about in a shed. As they say, there are two types of concrete: concrete that has cracked and concrete which is going to crack! This is why screeds and finishing plasters exist - to hide the underlying imperfections. In some styles it is embraced, for example if you shutter with planks so you get the wood grain pattern left in the concrete face, so viewing the shrinkage cracks as a patina is definitely the better and positive way.

[@Woodchip1865]

Any thoughts / concerns about your decesion to have a deeper slab above the insulation re: underfloor heating ?

[@TheRestorationCouple]

Not really, we don't really need the UFH as heat demand is so low, therefore I think the stable low temp slab should be fine.

[@RikJohnston]

Great video, pity about the delamination. Sorry if you've mentioned it in a previous video but is the final finish going to be quite resistant to spills and such? As concrete is quite porous

[@TheRestorationCouple]

By the time all the polishing and sealing is done it should be pretty resilient but we’ll see.

[@JurassicJungle]

Not sure what your floor area is, we have about 165m so much smaller but an LVT finish is going to be £10k. What are you using as a heat source? 150mm slab is much deeper than we have used with a 50mm chemscreed. that went down very well but we have a couple of cracks. We have no rebar or fibre. We did look at polished concrete but we could not get anyone intersted in quoting for it. I considering doing it myself but felt if I owned part of the process and something went wrong it was all down to me. I asked my contractor to do a floated floor for my garage and he made a complete mess of that. It should have been a nice level smooth floor and what I got was like a royal iced Christmas cake.

[@JohnnyMotel99]

I like LVT, very hardwearing, I have dropped cups on mine and they don't break.

[@JurassicJungle]

@@JohnnyMotel99 100%! Ceramic tiles would be better for our UFH but in our experience they can get chips and as you suggest if you drop something it will probably smash

[@Langy3366]

Think Tim said 540 square metres (21.5k + colour and fibres, £37 per sq m)

[@JurassicJungle]

@@Langy3366 Thats one hell of a house!

[@carlnewton1126]

Looks great. Can’t you put the colouring in the mix before you pour like you do for concrete countertops to stop any potential delaminating?

[@TheRestorationCouple]

Yes you can however that could be very costly based on the quantity. It would be needed if you were grinding deeper to expose aggregate though.

[@Woodchip1865]

@TheRestorationCouple maybe a repair for the delaminated area with a mix of floor leveling compound + some of the colouring powder ? 🤔

[@saudilass]

Those prices from companies are completely mind blowing????😣😱😱

[@gingerelvis]

Can't help but think you were getting the no thank you prices (to put it politely) on those quotes. Literally what I paid for my house just before the pandemic 😂 my concern is if (when) you chip it being a finished floor how do you repair it without it staring you in the face?

[@JohnnyMotel99]

Those quotes sound like effoff quotes, as in we don't want the job quotes.

[@StephenBoyd21]

Have you painted the walls? They were not orange before... were they?

[@Florin_Bolocan]

Uuuuuuuuu nice!

[@louisleflick]

I think they did a fantastic job. I’ve seen worse on 3 bed houses. At the end of the day it had to go down so might as well have the best finish you can. Who knows you might come across a wood floor being ripped up somewhere that you can repurpose. Don’t get the negativity as my old gran used to say if you can’t say anything nice. 😂

[@philipelliott5821]

As your kids grow up they will be bringing Pigs and Goats into the house so that floor finish will be fine. 😅😅

[@craigwilliams6734]

Tim, don’t hate me but you WILL need carpet down in the living areas, definitely

[@richardstevenson2727]

👊👍

[@craigwilliams6734]

Tim, don’t hate me but you WILL need carpet down in the living areas, definitely. If I was being brutally honest, I preferred the workshop project and the mobile home construction! But KUTGW

[@BIBIWCICC]

Next time just use clothes dye, way cheaper and easier to put Ito the whole mix.

[@andrewbarry7877]

Hi, I’ve been following your project, it’s been really interesting. Just out of curiosity, what colour harder did you use?

[@TheRestorationCouple]

PICS Stone Buff from Hat Crete

[@beverlyoberholzer17225]

😀😃😄😁😆😊😉🫠🙃🙂

[@asquithea]

Sounds like you have a bit of regret over the fibres.

[@TheRestorationCouple]

If they reduce the risk of cracking I’ll put up with the odd fibre sized defect I guess.

[@Yaketyyak21]

Jasus Tim,you take a long time to get to the point😂

[@christianbeccy]

Out of interest. why not Microcement? Cost?

[@pb4012]

I’m sure many won’t agree and you’re doing a much better job than I ever could but as a bit of feedback, I find myself skipping through a lot of your videos on this project, as it’s getting a little waffly and irrelevant to the standard DIYer. No disrespect intended. I’ve been a subscriber long before this project and always value your knowledge and clear explanations. I’m just being honest about my waning interest…. 🙈

[@garytaylor2914]

I do tend to agree. I always watch these vids and have done so for years. However, I’m a basic DIYer and much of this is just talk. Really lots of waffle. I’ll still subscribe cos I like him g much, but now the video for me is 5 mins

[@philthewriter]

To be fair, I think it disappeared off the general scope of DIY for most people once they started making a football pitch-sized barn 😂. I came here for a flat roof years ago, stayed for the entertainment. Plenty of other channels for DIY advice.

[@pumpkinhead456]

Really tricky keeping such a big build interesting. Finding the balance between DIY and cracking on to keep it interesting must be tricky!

[@pb4012]

@ 😂 yes true! Although when I say I’m a DIYer I’ve completely renovated a couple of houses - this is all just too specific/unique for me. I feel it’s gone a little away from being an educational channel to one of convenience whilst they build their dream home. I’ll stay subscribed because as another commenter said, I do like Tim and I’m still curious to see how this project turns out.

[@neilroberts8357]

Respectfully agree

[@oskarsmillers]

you saved lots of money . even with slab and tile over would be i think cheaper, as polished floor companies quotes.if we take £40m2 slab.and as example £60m2 tiles and labour. would be roughly 100quid m2. so 60k tiled vs 100k+ polished🤷‍♂️

[@TheRestorationCouple]

Yeah I think it was worth trying even if we decided to tile or floor a few rooms in the future. 👍