# flooring for training



## Tammy St. Louis (Feb 17, 2010)

I just bought a vacant Church , for a dog training building, I have been using it for the past 2 yrs and it is really great, Lots of room and so on , 
Right now I have 2 floors, top floor which i use has carpeting, with plastic film and then anti fatigue matting on top to cover the whole floor, 
this works great, BUT i do alot of classes, pet dog ob training is mostly what is consists of, and seem to get alot of accidents on the flooring, which is fine if they pee on the matting but seems to be some dogs now are deciding to pee in the carpeting also 
we clean with good cleaning stuff but its a matter of time before the building starts to smell like pee , WHICH I DONT WANT ,, 

so i am going to have to pull the carpet, 
wondering what kind of flooring you guys have in training buildings you work your dogs in , has to be waterproof, but not slippery , we also do agility in there
hopefully not super expensice, its 4000 sq feet one level 

basement is all flooring, so slippery , but i am debating moving my ob classes down there, easier to clean, 
any suggestions on flooring you guys use or have seen , easy to clean also


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

Tammy St. Louis said:


> I just bought a vacant Church , for a dog training building, I have been using it for the past 2 yrs and it is really great, Lots of room and so on ,
> Right now I have 2 floors, top floor which i use has carpeting, with plastic film and then anti fatigue matting on top to cover the whole floor,
> this works great, BUT i do alot of classes, pet dog ob training is mostly what is consists of, and seem to get alot of accidents on the flooring, which is fine if they pee on the matting but seems to be some dogs now are deciding to pee in the carpeting also
> we clean with good cleaning stuff but its a matter of time before the building starts to smell like pee , WHICH I DONT WANT ,,
> ...


rubber...

or EPOXY...


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## Jerry Lyda (Apr 4, 2006)

I'm with Joby.


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## Brian Anderson (Dec 2, 2010)

Those rubber pads that interlock work great Tammy and they are reasonable. I have them in my shop where we train indoors. They are anti fatigue mats originally. They sell them in a pack of like four or five and I think they are 4 square feet a panel.


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## Tammy St. Louis (Feb 17, 2010)

where do you get rubber, that covers that amount of space?


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

Tammy St. Louis said:


> where do you get rubber, that covers that amount of space?


from people that sell rubbing flooring...


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## Tammy St. Louis (Feb 17, 2010)

oh yes yes , THOSE people , who sell the rubber flooring,,


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## Marta Wajngarten (Jul 30, 2006)

Duuh, Rubber Flooring R' Us! Don't you have one up there?

Do you have a farm supply store around? You could use stall matts, or they might have some sort of a modular rubber flooring system. Otherwise, order online or find a manufacturer you like and look for a Canadian dealer to ship to you.


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

there is a wonderful thing called the internet these days...

there is this thing called google...

People have all different types of rubber flooring in training places, from mats, to interlocking squares, to big sheets, to rolls..hmmm where did these 1000's of places get them from?

Probably from 100's of different suppliers...

Seriously GOOGLE it...
Rubber Flooring..

epoxy is great for cleanup and will last a lifetime..if you dont need soft and cushy...

epoxy flooring is sometimes what you seen in vets offices, hosptials, and meat packing places LOL...


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## Brian Anderson (Dec 2, 2010)

The ones Im talking about came from Lowes Tammy...most of your home type centers will have them. They are interlocking anti fatigue mats.


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## Tanith Wheeler (Jun 5, 2009)

Pet obedience is fine on slippery floors, everywhere I have ever used has slippy floors and the dogs adapt.

Maybe put your young dogs down in the basement and more advanced dogs / agility on the carpet - those dogs are less likely to wee.

Try it and see before you buy.


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## Lynn Cheffins (Jul 11, 2006)

I've seen inustrial rubber flooring also that comes in tiles.


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## Geoff Empey (Jan 8, 2008)

Tammy St. Louis said:


> oh yes yes , THOSE people , who sell the rubber flooring,,


Yeah these people! :lol: http://www.horsematscanada.com/stall/interlocking/ I'd recommend the interlocking stuff vs the squares as the squares can shift and maybe even shrink so that gaps appear in the cracks. Which is a danger to dogs doing agility, flyball, bite work etc as nails and toes can get caught with the usual injuries.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

One of the first places I ever trained was indoors at an ice hockey ring. The mats were for the purpose of skaters being able to walk around with out their blades dulling or cutting up the floor. 
It was very similar to mats that I have in my woodworking shop but much, much larger.


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## Marta Wajngarten (Jul 30, 2006)

oh and btw don't buy the super shock absorbing agility stuff, one of our local agility halls got them and they are SHREDDED already only a year or so after opening.


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## Rik Wolterbeek (Jul 19, 2009)

Don't know if this helps but I have on the concrete (sliipery) floor in my building a square made from rolls of roofing material, the stuff used for flat roofs. It holds up surpisingly well after 1 year of use. I use it for dogs that are not yet completely comfortable on slick floors.


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## Jennifer Coulter (Sep 18, 2007)

At ski resorts and the lodge I work at they have some rubber flooring I see used all the time, mostly places people will be walking in ski boots. I think it would be great for dog training.

I have a few scrap pieces I use in kennels and such and it is really durable.

I have seen it in interlocking like this:
http://www.dinoflex.com/172/
This interlocking system is way better than the foam interlocking packs of four tiles you can get at Crappy Tire. They fit together very well.

There are also tiles with no interlocking, that would have to be glued to something, and also rolls of it. On a google search I came up with this, but if you started calling around flooring places they might get you on the right local road. If you have anywhere that does industrial flooring they would have a distributor for sure. Not sure if you could find a distributor that would just sell to you and avoid retail....
http://www.rubberflooringdirect.com/rubber-floor-tiles.html


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## Aaron Myracle (May 2, 2011)

Costco used to sell the interlocking rubber mats. Dunno if they still do. A guy in my club bought a whole bunch at Costco and lined his truck bed with 'em. I think it was $20 to line a standard truck bed; someone better at math can work out how that would translate to an entire training area.


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## Tammy St. Louis (Feb 17, 2010)

i would think with the interlocking pads, that pee would leek in the cracks ? and be hard to clean , ?


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## Geoff Empey (Jan 8, 2008)

Tammy St. Louis said:


> i would think with the interlocking pads, that pee would leek in the cracks ? and be hard to clean , ?



Sure it would be .. but unlike a permanent installation like carpet, you could take them apart if need be take them outside and hose them and mop and disinfect the hard floor under. 

What ever you are going to be looking at for a permanent installation it is going to be expensive if you want safe for the dogs and easy to clean. 

It would be nice to have one big sheet of rubber matting with with some built in drains just so you could hose it and use a squeegee, but I bet that would blow the budget right out of the water. 

The widest stuff I see that is used in fitness centers and the like http://www.rubberflooring.ca/energy.html is 4 feet so you are always going to have a seam or a crack. I really don't think you are going to get away from seams. Unless you can use some sort of epoxy rubber spray on product like this. No real shock absorbing qualities though. http://www.ecosafetyproducts.com/Rubberized-Non-Skid-Coating-s/62.htm I don't think that is what you are looking for, right? 

Idea: Why don't you have pissing and crapping 'fines' to encourage people to potty their dogs outside before training. To me there is no reason a young dog even a pup that has been house trained should soil inside anywhere if the owner potties the dog before entry. I'm of the opinion it is not a dog issue it is a people laziness issue. But I guess that is not within the scope of this thread.


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## Marta Wajngarten (Jul 30, 2006)

Tammy St. Louis said:


> i would think with the interlocking pads, that pee would leek in the cracks ? and be hard to clean , ?


It's a compromise, you either want some thing that is rubber and cushy, or you want something that is pee proof. You can't have both. All rubber flooring has seems and is porous. Accidents will have to be cleaned up asap and there will always be a chance that some pee got through the cracks and leaked under the floor. On occasion if it's a floating floor you can peel up portions of it and clean up the underside and subfloor if necessary. That would be one benefit of going with a square tile, you can easily and cheaply replace one or a few if need be. 

If you want some thing that stands up to pee, won't stain or hold odours, your best bet would be concrete covered with epoxy. Then there are no seams or subfloor for the pee to get into. It would actually be very durable too although might be slippery for the dogs. A few strategically placed rubber runners would help there. 

You don't need athletic flooring for pet obedience, I would consider having the rubber flooring area exclusively for agility training (or maybe advanced ob if you're doing jumps) to minimize the chanced of it getting peed on.


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

Marta Haus said:


> It's a compromise, you either want some thing that is rubber and cushy, or you want something that is pee proof. You can't have both. All rubber flooring has seems and is porous. Accidents will have to be cleaned up asap and there will always be a chance that some pee got through the cracks and leaked under the floor. On occasion if it's a floating floor you can peel up portions of it and clean up the underside and subfloor if necessary. That would be one benefit of going with a square tile, you can easily and cheaply replace one or a few if need be.
> 
> If you want some thing that stands up to pee, won't stain or hold odours, your best bet would be concrete covered with epoxy. Then there are no seams or subfloor for the pee to get into. It would actually be very durable too although might be slippery for the dogs. A few strategically placed rubber runners would help there.
> 
> You don't need athletic flooring for pet obedience, I would consider having the rubber flooring area exclusively for agility training (or maybe advanced ob if you're doing jumps) to minimize the chanced of it getting peed on.


just to add this, a floor does NOT have to be concrete to do an epoxy floor, I worked installing epoxy floors for while..those floors will outlast the houses they were put in..


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## Marta Wajngarten (Jul 30, 2006)

Joby Becker said:


> just to add this, a floor does NOT have to be concrete to do an epoxy floor, I worked installing epoxy floors for while..those floors will outlast the houses they were put in..


do say more! What other floors would work, old hardwood??


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

Marta Haus said:


> do say more! What other floors would work, old hardwood??


You can apply epoxy over wood subfloor and also hardwoods,I would not do it over laminate. You might have to have the floor prepared, or primed.

Some epoxy we did was over 1/2 inch thick. Depending on the applications, like my bosses house LOL...

The basic requirements are having a floor with NO flex..thick subfloor 3/4 inch, with floor joists that are spaced correctly to have a sturdy base..

I would not recommend doing it yourself in most cases...


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## amadolabonte (Aug 21, 2021)

Tammy St. Louis said:


> I just bought a vacant Church , for a dog training building, I have been using it for the past 2 yrs and it is really great, Lots of room and so on ,
> Right now I have 2 floors, top floor which i use has carpeting, with plastic film and then anti fatigue matting on top to cover the whole floor,
> this works great, BUT i do alot of classes, pet dog ob training is mostly what is consists of, and seem to get alot of accidents on the flooring, which is fine if they pee on the matting but seems to be some dogs now are deciding to pee in the carpeting also
> we clean with good cleaning stuff but its a matter of time before the building starts to smell like pee , WHICH I DONT WANT ,,
> ...


I would like to buy some training mats for my house (I will probably have to keep them outside) Anybody have any suggestions on where and what to buy?


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## Bentwings (2 mo ago)

Almost every indoor training center I’ve attended has had quite thick rubber mats usually about 3 feet square . You can lift a corner to get Uber them to clean up messes and there usually was a heavy duty cart somewhere to load many of them up so the under floor could be cleaned occasionally these allow a non slip surface and soften sounds some. Early on the local club had a school gym with wood floor it was terrible dogs slipped people slipped at in point someone donated a carpet but it got mark quickly and smelled terrible . Hard floors make already bad accustoms really bad . I have worked in a couple places that had dirt ground , horse barns . Not too bad if kept clean .


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