Replacement Gym Floor

[Incognito]

New construction in 2002. Immediate failure......eventual complete replacement in 2007. Now we're replacing the whole 11.5K square feet.

6.5MM cushioned sports vinyl flooring

Koster moisture epoxy + Koster patch

 

[Floorist]

And then? and then?

 

[Incognito]

The donkeys have been out there doing the demo, shot blasting, clean up and moisture retarder.

I just started today with the prep.

and then.........we pull off for a week so the electricians can run scizzor lifts and replace all the lighting in the gym.


and then.......we put the new flooring over a "slip sheet".......something similar to Vershield or Altro Everlay, but a different brand.

 

[Incognito]

and then.............

more progress photos

time to get the Q-tip out for the camera lens

those suckers aren't too compatible with construction sites

and then............

about 150-200 10lbs bags of patch 2-3 coats depending on the conditions over the entire slab

I don't LOVE the patch but it's OK. I'll push for Ardex on the final coat. Not my call.

 

[Ernesto]

Your braver than I. Koster is the top shelf stuff. But in that arena I would need a mixer/pump. Doing that size area in buckets is crazy.

 

[Incognito]

Your braver than I. Koster is the top shelf stuff. But in that arena I would need a mixer/pump. Doing that size area in buckets is crazy.

Agreed. My boss insists this is MUCH cheaper than self leveling.
Its nutz but so far I'm swinging the 10' screed and 8' level around and after 2 coats of mud it's a damn nice slab for 6.5MM cushioned vinyl. This is the same (2-3 coats of patch) we've been using for every Koster job. SO far that's mostly been Mondo rubber. It's possible to make it decent for a heavy material in 2 coats. Something like .080 gauge homogeneous vinyl will always get 3 coats. We plan to sand the 2 coats of patch and skim the whole thing with a 3rd coat.
Only difference is we've always used the Ardex Feather Finish. It's a little easier to trowel out---------just a nicer consistency but this Koster patch isn't as bad as all the other that SAY they're the same as FF.

material costs by my estimate here for floating/skimming are around $0.35 a square foot------excluding the Koster primer which I qould include in the moisture retarder costs. On large areas like this there's a lot of efficiency as far as getting the labor costs down as well. You have some cheap labor sanding, sweeping, mixing, fetching water and scrubbing buckets and trowels and I can smear out the mud pretty damn fast--------GOOD too. I got enough practice by now, about ten zillion football fields worth!!

 

[Incognito]

They pulled us off for nearly a month for other trades to work in the gym. So when I left the whole floor had 2 coats of the Koster patch. We sanded that yesterday, rough Kleen swept that dust and spent a lot of time on the vollyball and badminton court pole recesses that have a new ring we have to flush out to the new floor. Today we primed with heavily diluted Ardex primer and tossed a real quick 3rd coat with Feather Finish. SWEET. About half of that was a fairly light skim and half was fairly heavy floating.

I'd rather OVER prep and worry about the boss pissing his pants. He can piss and moan all he wants. MY standards are WHY he gets these quarter million dollar jobs thrown in his lap and he knows it full well-----after he calms down and thinks about it.

I tell the apprentices and younger journeyman. They WILL not only argue and complain with you about OVER prepping the floor but they WILL set you down on the bench when they think some other donkey will do it faster.

But that donkey that does everything they tell him crashes and burns. His jobs are rejected. He gets fired and will NEVER work at this shop again. So in that regard you can't win. I'd rather then complain up front in my face about my excessive prep expenses than have a failure on MY reputation that they would be telling everyone about every time my name was mentioned. That's the sucky part about our work.

We'll be installing Monday. The fun part.

We're 95% done with prep. Total Koster patch was 198 bags. So far we used 50 bags of Feather Finish and I expect we'll use 5-10 more for the areas we couldn't finish today.

 

[Incognito]

Finally done with prep. Started kicking out the goods, trimming seams and setting up the free throw lanes, center court and perimeter. I was real happy with the 3rd coat of prep. They're gonna have a nice gym floor here finally........eventually. I'm trying to capture THAT image in some of these photos where we look from a low angle into the most unforgiving low angle lighting. There's a roll here and there but you really have to be looking out for it.

 

[happyhours]

WOW, heck of a job right there. Pretty work. What brand flooring is that Tarkett ?

 

[Incognito]

WOW, heck of a job right there. Pretty work. What brand flooring is that Tarkett ?

Yes, thanks. It's a nice project and it is the Omnisport 6.5MM

 

[Nick]

Nice In.

 

[Floorist]

Always wanted to try something like that. Doubt that I could have done that good of job. Looks really good.

 

[Incognito]

Always wanted to try something like that. Doubt that I could have done that good of job. Looks really good.

It's not a one man show Rusty. There's a lot of teamwork.......communication, trust and effort.

No one does stuff like this by themselves.

 

[Incognito]

Nice In.

It's nice when things fall in place. Thanks Nick.

 

[Incognito]

and then...........

I had to go to job meeting in Ventura with the guy helping me run this gym floor job to secure a $4M contract.

and then........
since the guys gluing down what we laid out seemed to be OK I got sent on a little cove restaurant repair that took 10.5 hours on a FRIDAY.

and then....
I had to work SATURDAY to get back on track so they could start constructing the bleachers on Wed. Typical BS after being slow for weeks I have to run around like a chicken with his head cut off to do a couple months work in a few days.

Everyone here knows THAT story.

 

[DarisMulkin]

Just wondering, who gets to pick up and deliver all the bricks?

Daris

 

[Incognito]

Just wondering, who gets to pick up and deliver all the bricks?

Daris

Truck driver's been humping the bricks to and from the sites. But he usually just stacks them just outside the gym doors where the apprentices or laborers bring them in to the seams or designs. We're usually well manned up on such projects but journeymen and foreman still have to move bricks if there's nothing else to do or the time frame requires.

It's good exercise for your triceps..........I think that's the one. Then you're, lifting, walking and bending with the loads so all around it's good for you. It's a lot healthier than when we're stuck coving a lot of small rooms/areas and we're hunched under toe kicks putting cap metal, cove stick or welding.

I just find it nutz that we NEED to use bricks. It's a 19th century technology that doesn't makes sense to me------they can't find a flooring and adhesive that can lay flat and stick firmly in an hour or so. SURE, I can see a few sandbags or bricks here and there. But you shouldn't HAVE to brick every inch of every seam. It's ridiculous.