Countertop Epoxy Project, March 6, 7, 11, 17, 2020


Before diving in to the actual kitchen counter, I HAD to familiarize myself with the epoxy material. 

Below is the first sample. It turned out WAY darker and gray-er than what we wanted, but I tried my hand at a number of techniques I had seen on Stone Coat Countertop's YouTube channel just to play around. You can't see the effects of chrome and metallic spray paints in the picture, but they're very neat! Randy's going to cut it in half and use it for shelving in his shop. 😁



Below are 2 separate square feet or so of the second round of samples. The bottom one was closER to what we were aiming for the countertop, so we went for it, bearing in mind a couple changes to make for the real thing (still too much color, especially the copper-orange).






You can watch a sweet video that our friend Brent put together of the "color pour" here. It's about 16 minutes long, but you can also skip through and get an idea of it.




The island was the second of the 3 "stages" of the kitchen pour that night. It is by far my favorite section of all the counter-tops, and it gets used the most now, too!




My favorite area of my favorite section of a great counter-top in my favorite kitchen in my favorite house...




This is a close-up of the results from spraying the 91% isopropyl alcohol mixed with metallic powder, and then it "flows" and looks kinda like metallic lace or spiderweb overlay. You can only see it when kitchen lights are on, but it definitely adds a nice dimension.




After playing with samples, I wrote the steps and techniques I thought I would be using on the whiteboard, where I could see from the kitchen. It didn't go exactly like this, but close.




We finally learned (after doing 4 or 5 epoxy pours) that it's better to do a pour in the morning or mid-day, so that you're awake for the 3 hours of "flow" afterwards and can periodically wipe drips from the underside, or check it for bugs that may have gotten stuck while still sticky. Most of the counter pieces had tape on the bottom that we could pull off in the morning, but the tape didn't stick under the island for some reason. We just carried it outside and Randy used his angle grinder to sand the bumps smooth.



Working color into the first coat typically doesn't leave the surface very smooth (even with self-leveling epoxy). Therefore, 24 hours after the color coat, another coat of plain, clear epoxy is poured on.  The epoxy takes 30 days to fully cure, but we installed the sink 3 days after the clear coat and we were lightly using counters at 7 days. If something hot or very warm sits on the counter for a minute, there's definitely a "stick" when I pick it up again, to this day. I imagine that will either keep curing over time, or be something we have to live with!
Below: gently using the counter 4 days after the pour, for important things.


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