I don't know a thing about making beer. But I can maybe add to this conversation a little. I put the tile in my garage. That was me hitting it with the 4-lb sledge hammer.
First, some things we ALL know to be true:
1) Tile is brittle and weak.
2) You could never roll a 500-pound engine across a tiled floor on the little steel roller wheel of a floor jack.
3) You could never aggressively hit floor tiles with a 4-lb sledge hammer and expect it to survive
4) You could never slide 800-pound steel cabinets over a tiled floor
5) You could never cover the surface of your automotive lift with tiles and have them directly contact a car they lift up in the air hundreds of times for year after year
6) And of course you could never drop a Wilton bench vise onto a tile floor, or dozens of other heavy tools, and not see terrible cracks
Right?
Well, except all of these statements are patently false. I've done everything on the list -- and then some.
So here are some TRUE things:
1) Ceramic tile is considerably stronger than the concrete it sits on.
2) I learned how to install my tile a decade ago by watching a few Youtube videos. It was pretty easy to do. So long as you don't leave voids under the tiles, you have an EXTREMELY durable surface.
3) Unlike epoxy coatings, I can spill a gallon of paint stripper on my floor and leave it sitting like that for a week and not have to worry about a thing.
The video of me hitting the tiles was made when I was trying to remove a bunch of them when I installed my car lift. It was a LOT harder to get those things up than I expected, and I'd installed the stuff with the basic Home Depot thinset and the cheapest grout I could find. I did not use a grout sealant or epoxy grout or anything like that. I used a dark color of grout so I would never have to clean it -- and I haven't.
I'll put the next part in bold, for the experts:
My tile cost 59 cents per square foot at Home Depot.
My all-in for the job was somewhere in the neighborhood of $350. But I'm going from memory on that, because it was 2007 or 2008 when I put the stuff in.
The picture above is pretty. But this is a working garage.
I dare you to drop a 2 pound sledge hammer on any ceramic floor tile and expect it not to break. Unless you are talking a LOT more than $3 per square foot.
My epoxy is still good over most of the floor except where the tires "sanded" it off. If I kept the sand out it would still be good.
Remember what I used is nowhere near as good as the coatings of today.
I can also recoat for 54 years and still pay less than it would cost to tile it once.
I paid .59 a tile. With thinset and grout and tools, it was $350 for the whole job.
My tires (and the underside of my car) have left no marks on the floor. Nothing marks it except welding slag, which leaves tiny pinhole burns if I'm not careful -- and I can say without hesitation that I am not careful.
I would like to see him hit the tile near the edge rather than in the middle. It IS impressive. I still bet that costs way more than $3 per square foot - installed.
As I said I can recoat my epoxy floor every 6 years for 54 years and not spend as much and that is with the cheaper epoxy of 10 years ago.
added: I just read a link that said people can find tiles at home improvement stores at less than $1.00 sq ft. I wonder????
Again, .59/tile at Home Depot.
I personally would not use any type of tile in my garage. Just my personal choice. First, the grout will be the weakest point. Pour any amount of used oil on those tiles. I don't care what you put on the grout it will wick into the grout and be there for ever. Secondly, I very much doubt that those tiles can take a dropped tool on the edges or a pointy tool like a screw driver. Which I have dropped in my house and it leaves a nice little chip. Not to mention that all it will take is one little hollow spot where the thin set didn't quite spread out and your replacing tiles. Third tile is slippery as hell when wet. I brew in my garage and could imagine brewing on wet tile. I'd hurt myself for sure.
I put an exterior concrete epoxy on my back patio 3 years ago. It still looks brand new. I put it on with a textured roller so it looks almost broom finished and is no-slip.
Ten years. Multiple engine drops. 800-pound cabinets that I dragged over it. I (literally) dropped an anvil on it once.
This is an amateur install on top of concrete that was poured in 1925 and subject to 84 ears of seismic activity here in southern California.
I used dark brown grout. My car needs 12-14 quarts of oil per change, and I've spilled gallons of the stuff. You would not be able to tell me where it spilled if you came to visit. Brake fluid; the same. Nasty transmission fluid? The same.
Tiles get three ratings from the manufacturer. One is their PEI rating for hardness (mine are a 4 on a scale of 1-5). Another is the water absorption rating, which tells you how the tile will do with freeze/thaw cycles. The final rating is a wet and dry coefficient of friction. My in .060 wet and dry, which meets the Los Angeles code for malls and outdoor public spaces.
Professionally installed and more than likely not your $1 Lowes product. I have dropped some of those tiles from about 6 inches high. Some broke in half and others chipped.
Just googled service garage floor and looked at images. 90% of the pictures show a coated floor (epoxy). I wonder why?
I'm not saying it can't be done. I started in response to a statement that epoxy couldn't be used because the concrete was old...... Not true.
I could go on. My pad had heaving issues, 84 years of oil stains -- I hit it with an inexpensive electric pressure washer, the basic thinset, and haven't had an issue in almost a decade.
I don't want to provoke the epoxy crowd. I've seen some great epoxy floors. But the list of people who are unhappy with their epoxy installs, from the high-end down to the el cheap Rustoleum kit, is very long. Manufacturers generally blame the installation or the concrete the stuff was put on. But you won't see that kind of volume of complaints in the world of ceramic and porcelain tiles.
