Don't level your concrete floor until you watch this video! When I'm streaming it's over at: bit.ly/2FO2v7y Like & Sub & Bell & Comment & let me know what you like, didn't like, etc!
Very helpful video. Thanks for being honest about your mistakes. I'll be doing almost exactly the same thing and I hope it turns out at least as good as yours. Cheers.
I just got done doing about 1400 sq ft of basement space and wanted to pay it forward for anyone looking to do this as it was definitely a learning experience. As others have suggested in the comments, you don’t want to add more water than the package suggests. The mixing is critical to get right. It should be more syrupy in consistency and spread with a squeegee / gauge rake. I think he’s using the same stuff I used which is Mapei Self Leveler plus. This stuff worked decent for my needs. You also may not need perfect level. What you are really going for is flat so flooring and tile sits well. The mistakes I made I found to be related to not having enough material in the right places so it could find level. Now that the floor is down I can feel some soft spots in a couple areas in the largest room I did. It’s not major because they will be hidden under the couch but it’s because I didn’t have enough material. Similar to what was used here with screws, I had purchased several plastic measuring sticky pads on Amazon. I placed several in different locations and measured each room to find the high and low spots. I marked the concrete with (H) or (L). If the differences are great from (H) to (L) you may need to cut the height in half if it requires too much material to find true level given the variations. Again, you are going for a consistent flat more than perfect level. Prep is key. I ended up pressure washing mine to get the dry wall mud off the ground as much as possible. Dust is the enemy of this stuff and it will clump up to it if you didn’t do well at cleaning. I did not grind as some might prefer. This stuff sets up fast. You only have 2 to 3 minutes of mixing and 15 minutes before that batch starts setting up. This will vary a bit by temperature but generally cold is better as it gives you more time. So make sure to use cold water. Make sure the bags are not warm. Store everything in a cool area. Prepare bags in advance by cutting the tops off with water already in the bucket. Try and do 3 bags at once so you can lay more per run which means a larger barrel than you 5 gal buckets. Anything above that is too heavy for two people to shift around. Having a mixing helper is important as you need to be overlaying mixes slightly together to get a clean finish. Gauge rake or squeegee is used to move the material to the right spots. ITt’s not a true self level in that it will travel super far to find level. It needs to be in the right areas to do its job and worked a little but you can also overwork it so don’t get too crazy. With a spike roller it really helps at breaking up the surface tension, remove bubbles, and gets things looking better. It gives you more time too. Spike shoes are helpful at not messing up an area but you can just use boots for the first half of setting up with the self leveler finding level again where you boot marks are. Start with a small room as shown to get used to it before doing a larger area. Dump larger amounts in low spots and screed lightly with a squegee into high spots so you don’t make your high points higher than they need too. Then use the spike roller when things have settled a bit in the later half of that 15 min set time. With all that said you might still make some mistakes. If you need to add more, you have to add primer again and then throw more self leveler down in that spot.
If you don't thin it to the point where it's able to flow for self leveling, then you're just paying a lot to have slightly thinner than normal concrete. Thin as needed, it dries fine.
@@grayhalf1854 I finally just had someone do a wooden subfloor instead. It was going to cost a small fortune to level my very un-level basement (around 800 square feet).
@@lowwwery Thanks for your reply. I think you probably saved yourself a lot of grief tbh, getting a nice finish with self-levelling is much harder than the professionals make it look. (Same as with everything I guess...)
Thank you for the video. I'm planning on attempting to make my pour a finished floor by staining it. 2 questions, Do you think the ultra thin layer above the screws will crack or chip down the road? And what product would you recommend for the finished floor look? Thank you
I've never stained concrete so I can't help any there. I have a new video soon on a better way to do this leveling, could be worth checking out . I wouldn't recommend self-leveling for stain finish unless you get it trucked in, or really love a random finish colour 😄
When you put too much water you will have sand segregation and the thin set will not stick to your underlayment.your best bet is to get a floor rake where you can adjust the amount of self leveling is left behind.Much better results
I'm wondering how well a floor rake would work when the concrete below is very far from level, or flat ? It wasn't a ton more water, just enough to get some flow, trying to get the consistency the manufacturer shows in their videos 😄
Screw the first self-tapping screw into the floor, mark where the laser line is ON your gun using a tape all around. That way you don't need to take the gun out and put the tape measure back in to check if it's right every time, plus the adjustment. Good vid, thanks!
Intelligent man...big forehead...and great presentation. Difficult process which is flawed from the beginning due to liquid viscosity and natural adherence to solids...and gravity don’t really help too much so all together it’s down to a wet enough and thick enough liquid and get trowelling quickly using reference points. I like the insertion of screws in a pattern formation to help find them.
Thanks for your very helpful video, and I have one question: You put the screw in the ground so when you pour the concrete you just leveling to the high of the screw?
So why are you placing screws down? Is that to know you’re depth that you need?And so they end up with you burying them.I don’t have a clue but I’m doing a floor myself soon
Thanks for sharing. I'm preparing to do a similar project and appreciate the tips. It looks like you used a spike roller as well as the rubber squeegee. Did you find that essential? I've heard the spike roller can help a lot to break the surface tension of the levelling compound, which should help it lay flatter. I can't find any rollers locally, so I'm planning to order one online. Thanks.
I had to order mine from Amazon. as far as surface tension... meh? I'd have to test it side by side, but I don't think it did a lot. might help more if you use a thicker mix, I watered mine down a bit
@@MooseDoesStuff thanks for the quick reply. You also said you wished you put the screws in a more consistent pattern. Do you think a 3'x3' grid would be good?
I’m not a know-it-all saying you did something wrong, in fact I’m a don’t-know-it-at-all, that’s why I’m asking… why did you drill the screw starter hole so deep (looks like 7”)? Do you take the screws out afterward? (I’ve watch a lot of these, no one ever addresses that).
I drilled through the slab so the dust would fall out the bottom, instead of dealing with blowing it out. The screws stay in, the concrete flows around and they're not a problem
@@MooseDoesStuff yeah that penny dropped about 10 mins after I said it.but my floor only needs levelling 3mm to a corner that for some reason is higher than the rest of the floor
When you use primer T on concrete, you gotta dilute it 1:3 with water. If it goes over a wood subfloor, you don't need to dilute it. It says this on the instructions label. If you don't dilute it, the primer won't seep into the concrete. It'll become a thin layer on top that'll be easy to peel off.
@@MooseDoesStuff Actually, the reason for diluting it is to make the self leveling compound actually bond to the existing substrate. When you don't dilute it, you're actually preventing it from bonding to the substrate. I am a flooring professional and have seen floors installed over improperly primered substrates. I don't think you'll have a problem with your floors, but you will see what it does when you try replacing the floors later on. If you'll be taking up the tile in the future, the self leveling underlayment will be coming off as well.
everyone loves to say this, but forgets that it's a leveling compound, not structural concrete. all the strength you need comes from the existing subfloor before you level it
I like the screw idea. Having said that, Semantics matter when doing flooring and many people are confused when the term "levelling" is used because that's really NOT what's important, FLATNESS is important. You can have a floor that slopes (not level) say 1, or even 1 1/2 inches from one side of the room to the other over say 16 ft. but that matters not because as long as the span is FLAT then the "out of level condition" won't be seen by eye. Bedrooms and even living rooms and family room oftentimes have this condition. Stop referring to flooring preparation as "levelling". Most concrete slabs are not "level", but they are FLAT.
What if I put a 16ft aquarium on the floor, my fish would always be swimming up hill and down hill. What if there’s a fireplace on the low end of the flat floor, and Granpa is in his wheel chair at the high end of the floor… say Granpa nods off, loses his brakes, and rolls down the hill and ends up upside down in the fireplace… should I just not use my fireplace? What if somebody wants to play a game of marbles, how do you get them to stay in the circle? What about the Earth, if you poured enough self-leveler, would it be flat?
Yeah you keep talking but you're not showing how to level the floor you're the same you did that you're and with some screws you gotta be a little bit more detailed bro ill'd bro good Java than that
