You roughen such a floor by etching it with muriatic acid.
Etching concrete floor with muriatic acid.
Muriatic hydrochloric acid is typically used for concrete etching.
Muriactic acid is one of the most dangerous chemicals you can buy for home use and it can damage nearly everything it touches.
Both will remove rust from your concrete.
Muriatic acid acts like liquid sandpaper by roughening the surface of the concrete.
These sorts of products give the concrete a professional looking sheen and also resist water grease oil and other common spills making the floor easy to maintain.
A smooth concrete floor must be roughened before paint will stick to it.
Phosphoric acid which is a mineral acid works almost as well and isn t as dangerous to work with but it is harder to find and more expensive.
It also reduces the surface alkalinity of the concrete that can cause some paints to adhere poorly.
It also works at emulsifying oils something that muriatic acid will not do.
These solutions are for etching the concrete.
Some homeowners shy away from acid etching of their concrete floors for fear of the harmful effects of using and handling muriatic acid the main component of acid etch flooring.
Eco friendly products are available as well which are biodegradable and easier to dispose of in most communities.
Acid etching is the process of applying hydrochloric muriatic or buffered phosphoric acid to a slab then rinsing it off with water.
If you don t like the idea of working with acid you can read about some safer alternatives to acid etching here.
Many acid etching projects are carried out to prepare a concrete floor for the application of a synthetic epoxy or sealant.
If you re just removing mineral deposits efflorescence use a much weaker mix 10 1 or 16 1 for muriatic acid.
The good thing is that there are safer alternatives that are just as effective available in the market today.
