Any suggestions on how to make a laminate floor less slick?

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Got the floor down in the shop yesterday. It's laminate I got on clearance at Lumber Liquidators for a good price. Looks great but it's too slick. Anyone have any experience making laminate safer and a bit less slippery?

Cliff

[Jamie Buxton]

Wear stickier shoes? Basketball shoes, for instance.

[Chris Padilla]

If you have some leftover pieces, try sanding them with various grits. Maybe etching it with muriatic acid?? Dump soda all over it?! hahaha :)

[Lee Schierer]

Laminate flooring and sawdust don't mix well. Even rubber soled shoes will slip if there is a coating of sawdust on top of the floor. My suggestion is to keep the floor as clean as possible and don't make any sudden changes in direction.

[Rick Potter]

Like Lee says.
One suggestion I will make is to put rubber mats in front of your TS, etc. I cannot help but picture you leaning over your saw, with feet starting to slide slooowly.

Second thought....perhaps a light sanding with a floor sander to take off the gloss, but not go through the facing? You could maybe try a small area somewhere, and cover it up with a mat if it doesn't work??

Sorry to seem negative. I know this is not what you want to hear, but ..........

Rick P

[Wayne Jolly]

What about spreading some sand around, pressing it into the surface of the floor somehow, and then vacuum up the sand?

Wayne

[Ole Anderson]

Pictures, man, pictures! :D

Slipperiness may be in the feet of the beholder, or something like that. Sawdust on smooth surfaces can be a real issue. I put a mid-priced Pergo on my basement floor, including the shop. Yes it can get slippery, but it is actually much better than I thought it would be. I usually wear sneakers in the shop, I guess that helps. No real issue here, but I do keep my floor fairly clean. Nice thing about laminate, it is very easy to sweep with a horsehair push broom, much easier than old concrete.

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Pictures, man, pictures! :D

As requested...

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It's not quite done yet. Have to finish closing up the back wall and upper ends, then do all the trim molding. Once I bring in the rest of the machines I can put the floor mats back down and see what else I need to do to the floor. I gave it a couple of sweepings and that helped the slickness a lot. May give it one of the floor traction treatments. Will have to see.

Cliff

[Chris Padilla]

Take some leftover sample and try different kinds of abrasives on them. Maybe cleanser or TSP might etch/dull it some? There is bound to be something out there that you might "accidentally dump" on your floor that will take away the gloss. You're actually looking to slightly damage the floor, so to speak.

[johnny means]

We used to spray a spritz ofcontact cement on slick spots. It would add just enough grip and wasn't permanent.

[Ben Hatcher]

I tried those foam mats on mine and they slip just as much. Tractor Supply sells rubber horse stall mats for $40 that are thick, heavy, and don't slip as long as the floor is clean when you put them down.

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Picked up one of those years ago. Cut it into 3 2x4 mats. They're in storage until I get the new shop finished. Hopefully won't be long now.

Cliff

[Rick Potter]

By the way, Cliff,

I do have to say, that floor sure looks good.

RP

[Ole Anderson]

Cliff, please get back to us again after you have had a chance to use it a while. I found that the floor works very well and isn't as bad as one would assume. I'll bet you will find you don't need to do anything other than keep it relatively swept up, which I say, is really easy to do with a smooth floor.

By the way, are you sure you have enough electrical outlets along the walls? :D Good looking shop my man! Wish I had half that space.

[Justin Jump]

Track shoes I have found work the best. I bought a cheap pair to wear around my shop, I too have Lumber Liquidators laminate that was fairly inexpensive, hence the choice. The track shoes with the voids and spaces on the soles and bottom, I guess, allow for the dust??

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Ole,

I actually cut out a few of the circuits I was originally going to put in the rafters so I wouldn't completely fill the 100 amp box.

I've been planning this shop for quite a while. Here's what I've been working out of before this...
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There was barely enough room to walk between the machines, kind of. And power was done by an extension cord down each wall I had wired multiple outlet boxes into. This was my last and only chance to put together someplace where I want to spend my retirement which is starting no later than the end of the year.

When I got remarried a bit ago and we started looking for a house that was ours, rather than mine or hers, the requirements were no stairs for her and a shop for me. Looked all over for 3 car garages (I get 2 bays and her car gets 1) and weren't finding anything we both liked. Stumbled across the listing for this place and when I saw it had a separate 20x24 building in the back yard just begging to be converted it looked perfect. Luckily the house was one we both really liked. And my wife (bless her heart and all the rest of her as well) keeps telling me to get what I want and don't hold back.

Been working on putting this together since last fall. The shop was a blank canvas, just bare stud walls and a roof so it needed power, heat, insulation, a sidewalk out to it, etc. etc. Unfortunately I have a lot of things eating my time at the moment but I hope to have it to the point I can move in the rest of the machines and stuff by the end of the month. My wife wants the attached garage emptied out of woodworking stuff so she can finally park inside again. She's had to park outside since we got married.

Cliff

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Track shoes I have found work the best. I bought a cheap pair to wear around my shop, I too have Lumber Liquidators laminate that was fairly inexpensive, hence the choice. The track shoes with the voids and spaces on the soles and bottom, I guess, allow for the dust??

Justin,

That's worth looking in to. How is the padding in them? I have diabetic feet so I need lots of padding in the soles. Up until now I've been using an old beat up pair of New Balance trainers that seem to help.

Cliff

[Justin Jump]

Not too bad, but I did add a different insert, I have that arch thing, and too many hours on my feet and they arch gets sore, but not too bad. I bought a pair of Ascis (sp?) at a local sporting goods for $29, then a $10 pair of inserts. Works well for me. On weekends, I can sometimes spend 8-10 hours in the shop, usually building or helping a friend that has no money and pays with a case of beer, that he then turns around and drinks half of!!

[Ole Anderson]

Track shoes I have found work the best. I bought a cheap pair to wear around my shop, I too have Lumber Liquidators laminate that was fairly inexpensive, hence the choice. The track shoes with the voids and spaces on the soles and bottom, I guess, allow for the dust??

Hmm, last time I ran track, ok just one year in 1964, track shoes still had steel spikes, yea, I guess those would grip pretty well...:)

[Peter Kelly]

Buy a roll of skateboard grip tape and stick pieces down where you walk/stand most? Sorta like those flower things people used to put in bathtubs.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41mXXA-BZCL.jpg

http://www.amazon.com/Jessup-Skateboard-Grip-Tape-60-Feet/dp/B0039ZDVIG

[johnny means]

Hmm, last time I ran track, ok just one year in 1964, track shoes still had steel spikes, yea, I guess those would grip pretty well...:)

I was thinking the same thing. My track shoes came with several sets of steel spikes. You would change the spike length according to track material/conditions.

[Jason White]

Yep -- Rent a floor buffer with one of those large, round abrasive pads (the ones like scotch-brite pads, not sandpaper) and scuff up the finish enough to make it not slippery anymore. It might look a little scratched up when you're done but not too bad. It's what flooring contractors use to scuff in-between coats of poly.


Got the floor down in the shop yesterday. It's laminate I got on clearance at Lumber Liquidators for a good price. Looks great but it's too slick. Anyone have any experience making laminate safer and a bit less slippery?

Cliff