Tried a power trowel on my basement floor last week and got a rougher finish than hand floating

I've been hand floating for 12 years and finally rented a 36 inch power trowel for a 400 square foot basement slab in Omaha. Figured it would save me time but the finish came out wavy in spots and not as smooth as my hand work. Has anyone else had better luck with these things on smaller jobs?

2 comments

2 Comments

dylanh9729d ago

40 square feet is tiny for a power trowel, that thing would just be fighting you the whole time.Those machines need way more room to work without leaving wavy spots like you saw.Bet your hand finish looked just fine, that's definitely the move for small slabs like that.

wendygrant29d ago

Hang on, is a slightly wavy basement floor really that big of a deal though? Like @dylanh97 said, 400 feet is tiny for those machines. I'd be more worried about the finish looking bad if I was doing a garage slab for a customer, but for your own basement? I've seen way rougher trowel work that got covered up with epoxy paint and nobody cared. Maybe just hit those spots with a hand float while it was still green if it bothered you that much. Seems like a lot of hand wringing over something that probably looks fine once you mix up some sealer.