Concrete Finishes

You’ve probably noticed that concrete flooring has been used in industrial spaces for many years, but recently it has also become extremely popular in modern homes, retail spaces and offices. Polished concrete from McGinn Concrete is versatile, durable and easy to maintain and comes in a variety of finishes making it the perfect choice for decorative flooring.

There are many benefits to polished concrete flooring for homes, retails spaces and offices including:

• making rooms more spacious as it allows light to reflect off the shining surface.
• easy to clean and maintain – naturally, dirt and dust won’t stick to the polished concrete flooring, making it easy to clean and with no need to use harmful chemicals on your floor. This is also particularly good news for asthma and allergy sufferers.

• extremely durable and long lasting.

As polished concrete can be used as decorative flooring as well as a structural surface, there are specific placement and finishing techniques required to ensure a quality finished project. Because of this, McGinn Concrete have a team of experienced tradespeople specialising in the placement, polishing and sealing of polished concrete flooring.

McGinn Concrete works in partnership with Boral Concrete, Excel Group, Hanson and CCS to give our customers the widest choice possible in creating their special design. These companies have display stands in our showroom in Kingston, so please come and marry up some samples to start creating your dream design. Alternatively, you can download the product brochure of each company by clicking on the company name above.

For a look at the complete range of polished concrete and to find the combinations you want to complete your project, talk to a member of our skilled showroom team to custom create your very own mix design!

Exposed aggregate concrete refers to the various types of aggregates (materials) that appear in the concreting mix to create unique looks and styles, perfect for any interior or exterior project. Exposed aggregates appear in both polished concreting, adding texture and style to the polished look, and outdoor concreting, with its attractive slip-resistant texture ideal for pool surrounds, paths and driveways.

What is Exposed Aggregate?

Aggregates are various types of crushed rocks that, when mixed with cement, produces many great looks and styles. The term is also used for the smaller particles that are commonly called sand. They are still crushed or worn down rock. The average concrete that is used in house construction has very specific aggregate mixes; it will have a certain percentage of rocks that just pass through a certain size sieve.

Exposed Aggregate – Outdoors

McGinn Concrete can provide you with a stylish, exposed aggregate concrete finish on all your outdoor areas that will give you a maintenance-free, weed-free, and contemporary surface.  Exposed Aggregate is perfect for:

• Private and public driveways;
• Concrete slabs;
• Swimming pools and swimming pool surrounds;
• Landscaping and pathways;
• Parks and gardens;
• Outdoor entertainment areas; and
• Community areas.

McGinn Concrete exposed aggregate finishes are well priced, and have an unmatched range of amazing styles and colours that will match or enhance any area around your residence or commercial property.

Polished Exposed Aggregate – Finishes

There are various ways of producing an exposed aggregate concrete finish including; water washing, abrasive blasting, acid etching & stencil blasting.

McGinn Concrete suggests that the most common technique for producing exposed aggregate concrete finishes is via the “water wash off technique”. This technique removes the cement matrix at the surface of the concrete slab using brushing & flushing of the surface with water soon after the poured concrete has stiffened. All you have to do to clean and enhance the appearance of McGinn Concrete exposed aggregate is to use an acid wash and concrete sealer to protect the exposed aggregate concrete from stains. It’s that easy!

You can also choose a number of aggregate types to complete your customised look.

McGinn Concrete partner with Boral, so to view Boral’s range of aggregates, visit their product range here.

Did you know?

• Concrete is usually described by its strength and then by the size of the largest aggregate used.
• Usually, for structural concrete in home building, the maximum aggregate size is 20mm. We use 10mm concrete mixes for more specific jobs like block-work core fill or paving slabs.
• The aggregates can vary in size and texture from smooth river worn pebbles that are ideal for barefoot traffic around pool areas to the sharp crushed rocks for driveways.
• The colour can vary from white quartz through to almost black basalt. It can often be combinations of different colours of aggregates.

 The material itself may also vary, especially with seeded surfaces. For example, crushed glass is not uncommon.

To create an even more unique look, you can add the aggregates to white cement rather than the standard grey and can also add liquid dyes or powdered ochres to the mix to create more contrasts in the concrete. The team are happy to show you some different options and recommend some looks for your project, so call us today.

Honed and Sealed Concrete – non-slip and great for outdoors

Imagine having a beautiful floor that flows seamlessly from your interior floors and outside to your entertainment area. If you love the look of a contemporary, designer floor that is hard wearing and can match into your interior spaces, talk to the team at McGinn Concrete about the versatile honed concrete finish.

Honed and Sealed Concrete is best suited to outdoor areas, paths, driveways and pool surrounds where a non-slip finish is required. The main difference compared to the HiPERFLOOR™ is that we only grind to 60 Grit for exterior use and if a Honed & Sealed finish is required for an interior we would grind to 120 Grit. This compares to the many thousands of grit that we use when creating a HiPERFLOOR™. The other main difference is that the floor is sealed once the grinding process is finished.

For exterior finished Honed and Sealed Concrete we recommend using ACS Street Scape Seal WB which is a water based, environmentally friendly Silane penetrating sealer specifically designed to meet the requirements of the Green Building Control of Australia’s “Green Star” building code. Treated surfaces are effectively protected from the ingress of water based, oil and organic stains.

For interior Honed & Sealed Concrete, we grind to 120 Grit and grout the surface to improve the overall shine of the floor. We recommend using 2 base coats of IBS LD1000 acrylic water-based sealer to enhance the colours within the floor. We then apply 3 coats of IBS stainless acrylic water-based sealer which prevents any stain penetration. To finish the floor we then add 3 coats of high gloss IBS premier sealer, giving the floor a high shine.

McGinn Concrete recommends honed concrete, a slip-resistant concrete finish, for not only entertaining areas but your patios, around the pool or even on driveways. Because our honed concrete is ground to a course cut allowing for slip resistance, this concrete finish is also suitable for industrial and commercial use, for walkways, commercial foyers, and all public access areas.

Contact McGinn Concrete for more information or for a free quote on your project.