Just bought a "new" house and the basement is a bit dingy. As the first part of improving it, I was looking for something both cheap and easy to slap down on the concrete flooring. The biggest issue is that the previous owners had carpet. The sump pump backed up and the carpet was removed, but it left a thin layer of glue on the concrete. From what I could tell, epoxy floors aren't too hard to put in and are not expensive - especially for a self install - but they don't work well with glue. Unfortunately, getting the glue itself off seems to not be easy. Suggestions were everywhere from getting a small scraper to manually scrape it off to belt sanders to grind it off. Meh to all that. Is it really a bad thing to just cover all that with epoxy? Or is there something else I could put down without needing to strip the glue?
I don't really have any answers as to gettung stuff up, but I can tell you that I just built a house with a 1400+ Sq ft basement , and had pretty good flooring put in for a fair price. Primo home brand vinyl planks. They float, so they aren't actually sealed down. Apparently, that's the preferred way to do it in a basement.
What's your plan with the basement? Mine's fully finished and I have carpet. The carpet is nice because you don't have the worry about the floor being cold.
I have your solution man. My basement flooded about a month ago carpet etc from a sump pump failure! What I did was remove all the excess crap glue whatever you have and laid down vinyl plank flooring I was able to get it from Home Depot (not sure you have them) as in in stock item 1.99 SF. I needed 700 SF to cover my area. Cost less than 2k and that’s with a decent sound proofing vapor barrier (also makes it softer I guess you would say) anyway just finished it up got the coastal oak grey plank and painted the walls and I love it. Will probably toss an area rug in the game section under my chairs but it was cheap looks and feels good 100% waterproof and click lock install so it’s fast and simple. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Home-De...ank-Flooring-24-74-sq-ft-case-03918/300253426 Comes in like 8 shades it’s More gray than they show
It's pretty small, mostly we plan to use for storage, maybe some exercise equipment. Doubt we will do anything fancy. I wouldn't mind carpet but basements and water are like Apple pie and Ice Cream. At least the first time it was an easy fix on the sump rather than foundation. The floating plank floor is something I'll check into. We wanted something cheap and easy.
I had very little glue, but what I did have a scrapped off with a snow shovel as crazy as that sounds! It got the top thick layer off and so put the vapor barrier on top it worked to hold it in place as long as it’s not massive the flooring will lay over it without issue. The barrier will protect it from sticking to your flooring
I'm not a pro on this topic by any means, but I'm going to grab you a photo tomorrow from my gym (PM me if I don't post it...that means I forgot). It's concrete floors that they painted grey and then slapped some random red splatters in.....it literally looks like they put some paint on a brush and waved it around a little. Then they clear-coated the whole thing and it looks freaking incredible! I bet they did the whole floor for a few hundred bucks max and it looks like a $10k floor in an art museum or something. Every time I see it, I think that I want to do that somewhere...someday. Maybe my garage floor just to make it spiffy. Again, remind me to get pics if I forget! It would save you big money and look better than anything you could lay down!