Anyone using garage tiles under their heavy Rivian?

[CrazyOne]

Thanks for the physics lesson, as a 46 year aerospace design engineer I know how to calculate stress! That said, who would put rigid tiles directly on a wonky surface and then be surprised that they crack?
The 'total weight' needed clarification, thanks for that. It translated nicely into "don't do dumb stuff and expect it to work".

How do you get aerospace level support for tiles?

I have never seen flat thinset I der tiles. It's always grooved to allow levelling. You are not a civil engineer.

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[1stPlace]

Going back to the tiles. Does water go under them in the winter and then freeze and push them up? I am worried about mold too because of so much moisture always sitting under them. Anyone have those issues?

No issues like this that I have experienced. I don't have a drain in my garage either. I got these tiles in part actually because a very shallow puddle or two forms every year due to the leveling of concrete in my detached garage, and I don't want to step in water every time I'm plugging in my car.

 

[SDH]

We have had the Snaplock Tiles for 3 years now, no issues whatsoever, from hot summers to cold winters in Utah. We had the epoxy but decided we preferred the look of the Snaplock.

That upsets my OCD that you didn't reverse it in (and then you wouldn't have to stretch the charging cord)!

love the garage tho.

 

[OUTAGAS]

This is wrong in this context, because weight distribution is precisely what matters in it's effect on specific materials placed between the vehicle and garage floor. The floor material needs to support 48 psi, the more or less flexible tile needs to support that precise same pressure. If you still disagree, then please elaborate!

You're right. And as one poster mentioned, toolboxes and such are a more severe load. Consider this: I weigh 250 pounds and wear a size 13 shoe. My footprint is about 1/2 a square foot, so when I'm walking across the floor, I impart 500 psi on the floor.

The comment about total weight applies if the point load were evenly distributed across the floor at that high value. 500 psi evenly distributed across 400 square feet would impart a total load of 200,000 pounds, which does not bother the 3,000 psi-rated concrete, but would likely cause the foundation to fail.

 

[electruck]

Tiles usually crack because the support underneath isn't perfect. Idk about construction techniques for garage, and if something can be done to make them perfectly supported by cement?

When support isn't perfect, the tile will hold a certain weight before cracking. Extreme, example below. I don't think this will crack any tile, but the psi is very high.

To get PSI (pounds per square inch), the key thing we need is the contact area of the screwdriver tip. The weight alone isn’t enough — pressure = force ÷ area.
Step 1: Force from 1 kg
1 kg of mass exerts a force due to gravity:
1 kg ≈ 9.8 newtons
9.8 N ≈ 2.2 pounds-force (lbf)
So the force is about 2.2 lbf.
Step 2: Pressure formula
Step 3: Example pressures (typical screwdriver tips)
Here are realistic examples depending on tip size:
Small flathead or Phillips tip
Contact area ≈ 1 mm²
1 mm² = 0.00155 in²
PSI ≈ 2.2 ÷ 0.00155 ≈ 1,420 PSI
Very sharp / worn tip
Contact area ≈ 0.5 mm²
PSI ≈ 2,800 PSI
Larger flathead tip
Contact area ≈ 3 mm²
PSI ≈ 470 PSI
Big takeaway
Even just 1 kg on a screwdriver tip can produce hundreds to thousands of PSI because the contact area is so small.

nice hypothetical but not sure what your point is relative to a tire's contact patch. A tire is not rigid like a screwdriver and the contact patch will spread out as pressure drops (under the same load).

A tire inflated to 48 psi and supporting 1700 lbs will have a contact patch of just over 35 sq in. At 46 psi, the contact patch expands to about 37 sq in. Regardless, for the case of the floor tile, given that the area of the tile supporting the vehicle is the same as the contact patch of the tire and that the force on the tile must exactly balance the force on the tire, the tire's inflation psi must also be exactly the same as the psi exerted on the tile.

 

[Fezzik]

That upsets my OCD that you didn't reverse it in (and then you wouldn't have to stretch the charging cord)!

love the garage tho.

haha, I load my truck every day with packages and the tailgate would not open correctly for me to access the bed if I backed it in , otherwise I definitely would have

 

[riverie]

I have Race Deck tiles in the part of my garage where I work on stuff.
Today I worked on adding running boards to my R1S. '
First step is to raise the vehicle to its highest suspension setting.
I learned that doing this brings the wheels closer together, buckling the floor.

It straightened itself out when I drove off the tiles. Lesson learned.

 

[mkhuffman]

I have Race Deck tiles in the part of my garage where I work on stuff.
Today I worked on adding running boards to my R1S. '
First step is to raise the vehicle to its highest suspension setting.
I learned that doing this brings the wheels closer together, buckling the floor.

It straightened itself out when I drove off the tiles. Lesson learned.

Yeah, no. This isn't for me. I am going with epoxy.

Thanks for sharing your experience. It is very helpful for those of us still trying to make our garage look as nice as yours.

 

[1stPlace]

I have never experienced this. I don't go to highest in my garage because of clearance, but I switch between sport lowest and all-purpose standard height often.

Garage tiles are more for show and looks than as a mechanics workspace floor. If you are going to be jacking up a lot of weight, it probably is better to do on concrete not because the tiles can't handle the weight, but as illustrated above, there is an added element of "slip".

 

[Eeyore]

I thought of epoxy, but it leads to micro plastics. I am in a similar place to you OP, would prefer tiles, but don't know if they are durable.

You don't have to sprinkle the colored flakes on the wet epoxy. My friend had his garage epoxy coated and told the guy skip the flakes. Having a solid light gray color makes it easier to find little things when you drop them.

 

[SANZC02]

…. Having a solid light gray color makes it easier to find little things when you drop them.

Where’s the fun in that…

 

[CrazyOne]

You don't have to sprinkle the colored flakes on the wet epoxy. My friend had his garage epoxy coated and told the guy skip the flakes. Having a solid light gray color makes it easier to find little things when you drop them.

Epoxy is a type of plastic and since garage floor gets abused a lot, it becomes dust very easily. I have some very old epoxy from a long time back on the garage floors. The parts where tires drive over are fully worn out.

 

[1stPlace]

Both epoxy and common garage tiles like RaceDeck are plastics...good luck identifying the long term worse environmental impact. RaceDeck (polypropylene) might be recyclable but how many buyers are ensuring they are recycled?

 

[mkhuffman]

You don't have to sprinkle the colored flakes on the wet epoxy. My friend had his garage epoxy coated and told the guy skip the flakes. Having a solid light gray color makes it easier to find little things when you drop them.

Good point. I am not a fan of sparkles anyway. Plain epoxy for me!

 

[Revin]

I installed Swisstrax eco tiles 7 years ago, and have had my r1t on them for 3 years. I have had no issues at all and they are amazing. Best mod I have done in the garage since everything drains perfecty under them and it always looks clean. Especially in our Vermont winters. The eco ones I have are lower strength and I can only see some slight groves now, but replacing where the tires drive would be very inexpensive. They have flat tops and everything rolls nice on them. I have had my truck on stands dozens of times and they don't move or dent at all. It is important to use stands with a wide base and an off road jack to distribute the weight. But that is the case with any car I lift.

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