Garage / Gym Floor

kitkat9933 · 30 Jun 2021 at 20:31

Looking to put something down on the garage floor to stop the concrete dust coming up etc as well as provide a base for home gym.

Looking at the foam floor matts due to cost as I’ve got about 24 m2 to do.

Anyone see any issues with it? If I do, should I put anything down first?

Also, I’m looking to put some heavy duty shelves up etc, would these cause any issues being on top of foam tiles rather than rubber ones?

Mr.Cookie · 30 Jun 2021 at 20:37

We've got foam ones in our log cabin gym, they're ok but I would prefer rubber. Also I'd paint the garage floor first.

Ps ours came from halfords

Matt-Page · 30 Jun 2021 at 21:04

If your using it as a gym I'd want something hard/rubber you can drop the weights onto without fear of damaging the weights/garage concrete floor. Rubber horse mats are good for this.

kitkat9933 · 30 Jun 2021 at 21:23

Perhaps I should just epoxy the whole floor abs then just rubber mat some specific areas

Kaka · 30 Jun 2021 at 21:32

I've used the foam matts in the past for deadlifts without any damage to the floor or any of the plates. Obviously if you're chucking the weights around or doing olympic lifts then that might change things. The only issue I had really is that because the foam matts are not that rigid, they did tend to come loose and separate at the joints. If I had the choice I would go for the more durable rubber matts.

Cadder · 30 Jun 2021 at 21:36

We painted our garage floor and brick walls to stop the dust. We have foam interlocking mats for the gym area while the shelving and workbench stand directly on the painted concrete.

JRJ · 30 Jun 2021 at 21:40

Stable mats are your best solution and work out cheaper than "gym matting" but are essentially the same thing.

Scrutinize · 30 Jun 2021 at 22:41

Halfords work out best value.

I bought a load for my home gym, next day delivery too.

Double up depth in the section if you are dropping weights and/or have an additional area of heavy duty rubber matting on top.

Better quality matting is available but not even close to the price of these.

https://www.halfords.com/tools/gara...ack-floor-mat-set---120cm-x-180cm-336870.html

Derek W · 30 Jun 2021 at 23:40

@LiE is your man. I believe he's posted up a few images of his gym / garage with mats on the floor in GD before

Syla5 · 1 Jul 2021 at 09:04

18mm Amoebic Rubber Horse Mats, 6ftx4ft, work out great and easily cut to size using a Stanley knife. Use them for my Gym floor.

skyripper · 1 Jul 2021 at 09:17

PVA the concrete first to stop the dust. It's dead easy, mix 4 parts water to 1 PVA, then just slap it about with a big brush or roller tbh.

Psycho Sonny · 1 Jul 2021 at 14:57

Derek W said:
@LiE is your man. I believe he's posted up a few images of his gym / garage with mats on the floor in GD before

No he's not. His gym is in a thin log cabin not a garage.

Rubber mats is what he needs cheap foam is cheap for a reason it's for babies to stop themselves grazing their knees or hurting their heads, etc.

Weights require bare minimum 6mm rubber if you are a woman.

Heavy lifters then at least 8mm but the more the better.

Also not all rubber is created equal either I'm talking about decent stuff cheaper stuff will require doubling up.

200sols · 1 Jul 2021 at 16:03

I went for 20mm rubber mats, 1m square very good stuff. Garage gym room was fully insulated and heated as well, some people don't like rubber in cold rooms.

gort · 3 Jul 2021 at 10:29

I looked into the horse stable mats but apparently they really stink compare to the more expensive actual gym mats due to the bonding agent used. Would want to check for myself really as to how bad it actually is!

Ripper · 3 Jul 2021 at 19:23

gort said:
I looked into the horse stable mats but apparently they really stink compare to the more expensive actual gym mats due to the bonding agent used. Would want to check for myself really as to how bad it actually is!

Not at all. Might do to begin with (as all fresh rubber does), but goes away eventually.

Defo go for horse matting, got approx 20m2 of it in my garage, 18mm thick, works great.

Longbow · 5 Jul 2021 at 12:18

gort said:
I looked into the horse stable mats but apparently they really stink compare to the more expensive actual gym mats due to the bonding agent used. Would want to check for myself really as to how bad it actually is!

Natural rubber smells less, the problem with horse mats and other cheap rubber mats is they use a lot of recycled rubber with other binding chemicals that smell a lot. You might get away with horse mats, but they might be cheap recycled crap.

The original gym mats I bought I returned as they stank so much.

I ended up using https://www.arkmat.co.uk in the end, but I still left them outside in sun for 2 week before washing them and moving them inside.