Janesville Epoxy Flooring installs commercial kitchen flooring in Janesville, WI, serving surrounding cities including Milton, Edgerton, Beloit, South Beloit and Evansville. A restaurant or food service kitchen is one of the hardest places a floor can live, with boiling water, hot oil, grease, food acids, harsh sanitizers and staff on their feet in a hurry. In more than 20 years of coating concrete, we have learned that kitchen floors fail when they are treated like any other commercial floor.
Restaurant floors in Janesville are planned around Rock County Public Health Department inspection under the Wisconsin Food Code, including coved floor and wall junctures where the code calls for them. We build seamless systems that drain properly, resist the conditions of a working kitchen and leave nowhere for water and bacteria to collect. And we schedule the work so your kitchen is closed for as little time as possible.
Our proposals name the system for each area, the finished thickness, the cove height and the schedule, so you can check what went down against what was quoted. The slab is ground, repaired and moisture tested first, every time. Here is what a kitchen floor has to handle and how we build one.
What a Kitchen Floor Has to Handle
Hot Water, Steam and Thermal Shock
Kitchens are washed down with hot water, cleaned with steam and hit with hot spills followed by cold rinse water. Those rapid temperature swings, called thermal shock, make rigid coatings expand and contract faster than the concrete beneath them. Over time, standard epoxy can crack, soften or let go.
That is why we design kitchen floors around temperature first. Choosing a system that tolerates hot washdown is the single biggest factor in how long the floor lasts.
Grease, Fats and Food Acids
Fryer oil, animal fats, vinegar, citrus, dairy and sugar all attack floors in different ways, and some soak into bare concrete and break it down. Sanitizers and degreasers add another layer of chemical exposure. A kitchen floor needs a surface that resists all of them and can be scrubbed hard every night.
We ask what your kitchen cooks and cleans with, then choose materials rated for those exposures. A bakery, a fryer-heavy kitchen and a brewery each present different challenges.
Slip Resistance in Wet, Greasy Areas
Kitchen floors are rarely dry, and grease makes water even more slippery. We broadcast aggregate into the system to build in texture, with more aggressive grip at the fry line and dish station and a finer texture where floors need to be easy to mop. Texture is part of the floor, not a mat laid on top.
We show samples so your team can feel the difference. Getting texture right balances safety with how easily the floor cleans at the end of a shift.
Inspection and the Food Code
Rock County Public Health and the Wisconsin Food Code
Licensed restaurant and retail food kitchens in Janesville answer to the Rock County Public Health Department, which acts for the State under the Wisconsin Food Code, based on the amended 2013 FDA model. Floors in food areas need to be smooth, durable, nonabsorbent and easily cleanable. We plan our work so the finished floor supports a clean inspection.
Before recoating a licensed kitchen, we recommend checking with the department about any requirements for the project. We can help you gather the product information they may ask for.
Coved Floor and Wall Junctures
Section 6-201.13 of the FDA Food Code calls for floor and wall junctures to be coved and closed, or sealed, in areas subject to moisture and in certain other situations. A cove is a curved transition that lets the floor run up the wall without a seam where water and grime can collect. We build integral coves from the same system as the floor.
Cove height is set in the proposal. Seamless coves are easier to clean than a separate base and do not separate from the wall over time.
Floor Drains, Floor Sinks and Slope
Kitchen floors must carry water to drains and floor sinks, not leave it pooling under equipment. We preserve or improve the slope to drains when we build the floor, and detail the edges of drains and floor sinks so the coating seals tightly around them. Poorly detailed drains are a common source of failure.
Where existing slope is poor, we discuss building it up with a sloped mortar system. Correcting drainage at installation prevents standing water for years afterward.
Kitchen Floor Systems
Urethane Cement for Cooking and Dish Areas
Urethane cement is our usual choice for cooking lines, dish rooms and other wet, hot areas. It tolerates hot water, steam cleaning and thermal shock, resists many food acids and chemicals, and can be applied thick for durability. It also tolerates more slab moisture than many standard coatings.
It can be broadcast with aggregate for slip resistance and finished with coved bases. For most commercial kitchens, it is the material that holds up where epoxy would not.
Epoxy for Dry Storage and Service Areas
Dry storage rooms, offices, service corridors and some front-of-house areas do not face the same heat and washdown, and a durable epoxy system serves them well at lower cost. Using the right material in each area keeps the budget where it matters. Walk-in coolers and freezers need systems suited to cold temperatures.
We map each area of the kitchen and assign a system to it in the proposal. Transitions between systems are detailed so they do not become weak points.
Replacing Quarry Tile and Grout
Many older kitchens have quarry tile with cracked tiles and eroded grout lines that hold water, grease and bacteria. We remove the tile and bedding, repair the slab beneath, and install a seamless system in its place. The result is easier to clean and has no grout to maintain.
Tile removal adds time and is planned into the schedule. Slope to drains is checked and corrected while the slab is exposed.
Scheduling a Kitchen Floor
Working Around Service Hours
Plant, kitchen and shop floors are scheduled around the hours the building has to keep running, including overnight and weekend windows. For restaurants, that often means a weekend closure, a closed day of the week or a phased project that keeps part of the kitchen running. Fast-returning urethane cement systems help shorten closures.
We coordinate equipment moves with your staff and service providers. The written schedule tells you when equipment can go back and when the kitchen can reopen.
Degreasing, Grinding and Moisture Testing
Kitchen slabs are often saturated with grease that prevents bonding, so we degrease thoroughly before grinding to an open profile. We do not acid etch. Cracks are repaired, and moisture testing confirms the slab is ready for the chosen system.
Grinding dust and slurry are collected on site and never washed toward a floor drain, street drain or the Rock River. Your kitchen is left clean and ready for equipment to return.
- 20+ Years in Concrete Coatings
- Moisture Testing in Every Scope
- Free Written Estimates