Basement floor options

[tjhickey]

Apologies for the long post.

We have a 100-year-old two-flat that was, for many years, divided up into several (illegal) apartments.

The basement had nasty carpeting laid and cruddy wood paneling. I tore up the carpeting and padding, knowing that I'd find concrete, but didn't expect it to be so beat-up and uneven (see photos #1 and #2 below).

One small section in the very front seems to actually be completely loose (photo #3). It's slightly sunken and you can tap your foot on it and hear a hollow sound. I think this may have been caused by seepage in the past but believe they made some improvements since then and in 6 years we've never had any water down here.

My current plan is to remove the paneling and then, once that's cleared out of the way, I'd like to level the floor and then put up new walls.

Questions:

1) should I repair that loose spot before doing anything? Just sledgehammer it out and patch with more concrete?
2) looks like old paint on the floor along with glue from the carpet padding. Can I assume all of that should be scraped off before leveling?
3) would I use self-leveling concrete for this? Is it possible to do that sort of job with one person? It's about 500 sq. feet.
4) what would you recommend for the floor after leveling? I want to do it cheap, so I'm thinking just painting it and laying down some sort of stamp pattern.

Thanks for any advice.
TJH

#1

#2

#3

 

[scottl]

I would clean out that crack with a diamond blade on a 4.5 grinder, vacuum it out and fill it with epoxy until full. 12 hour dry time. Get a grinder and grind off all that paint. You can do it with a 7" grinder with a diamond segment cup wheel but it will take you a long time. You can rent a 12" grinder. You'll want a vacuum attached. You can get a cheap Dust Deputy and use a shop vac for that job. But a shop vac alone will clog up pretty quickly. Once the concrete is bare, the self-leveling cement will adhere to it tremendously better. Good luck.