# non-slip clear coating for porch/floor paint?



## smorgan (Jun 30, 2009)

I used Behr porch and floor paint (100% Acrylic) bought at the Orange Store throughout the house to faux a concrete stain look over old asbestos tile glue. It came out great! As I was moving furniture back into place, it scratched all of my hard work. I've searched the net and this site, but I'm not getting an answer on what type of clear coat to use to protect the paint. 

Does anyone have suggestions?


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## Nestor_Kelebay (Jun 30, 2009)

Smorgan:

     Really, the problem is that the paint you used isn't really hard enough to provide good service on a working surface like a floor.  And, it's simply never a good idea to put a hard coating over a softer one because the harder top coat is more prone to "chipping" when it gets hit or scratched or whatever because of lack of support from the weak and soft film under it.

     Ideally, it would have been better to use a hard coating like a polyurethane floor paint on your floor right from the start.  Then, you wouldn't need to cover your latex paint with a harder clear coat.

     Almost certainly the Behr Porch & Floor Enamel you put on uses something called a "cross linking acrylic resin" as it's binder.  That means that the floor paint will form a film by coalescence just like an ordinary latex paint.  However, over the next month or so after the latex paint film forms there will be cross links forming both within and between the latex resins in your floor paint.  The formation of these cross links will gradually cause it to become harder.  It's never gonna be as hard as a hardwood polyurethane, but it'll be harder than it is now.

So, baby the paint you have on your floor for the next month or so as it cures to it's final hardness.  Walk on your floor with only stocking or bare feet; don't slide any furniture across it; treat it like a very soft film so as not to cause any further damage to it over the next 4 weeks or so.

If, after a month, you're still not happy with the durability of the paint, then I would use a paint roller sleeve and a pole to paint a coat of this stuff over your floor:  (Clean the floor before top coating with the water based hardwood floor finish or you'll just be burying dirt under that hard clear film.)

RustOleum.com

The above will provide the clear coat and hard film you're looking for, but it's not meant to be a "non-slip" flooring.  Any floor paint will be slippery when wet.  So, pop into a Sherwin Williams retail paint store and buy some "Shark Bite" traction grit that you can use with the Diamond Finish in wet areas like your laundry room.

I've never used a traction grit, so I can't answer any questions on how you use it, but the people at Sherwin Williams should be able to advise you on that.


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