Snowy/Wet Car Parking in Garage (No drip?)

Before we start, I do not want this is spiral into a giant argument/discussion about how it IS or ISNT a good idea to park a car inside the garage during the winter and how it will or will not rot in a week.

Its my wifes car. She parks on one side of the garage. I want her car there. This wont change. 

I will have a fan to help dry the drips and slush and the like.

However, is there a GRM solution to keeping the inevitable pool of water contained?

I see there are some products out there for $100-150 but was hoping not to go that high end.

Some internet lore suggests outlining the car with expanding foam will work then just peel off in the spring. I like this idea but I just sealed the garage floors and I worry it might not be a good mix chemically (foam + sealer = bad?) I can test it though.

I was thinking a tarp or rubber commercial roofing membrane (cast offs from vendors?) and this might work., but will I invite molds/ strange growth under the tarp over the winter?

Just looking for ideas or suggestions.

Thanks to all 

I park inside all winter in Ottawa, we tend to get a lot of snow. It only takes a minute or so to back the car out in the morning, hop out and push out any accumulation with the broom. It's worked well for me. 

Radiant floor heating.

But seriously, are you trying to eliminate stepping in standing water before entering the car or the house? If so, get some rubber backed carpets. Drain the water off every so often.

rustybugkiller, I am trying to eliminate water all over the garage.  We do not have a garage drain and the car drips and the water just seems to go EVERYWHERE. It mostly me trying to contain a nuisance. 

I've never seen that as a real problem- we've had salty water melt off our cars for almost 20 years now, and other than having to blow out salt in the spring, I've never seen a problem with it.  My other cars that live in the garage don't seem to mind.

That being said, at most of the box hardware stores, you can get mat type covers for the garage floor- most of which will have channels that will direct the water to to someplace- like the door.  That looked like a decent option when I was thinking about this a long time ago- just never went farther than that.

Surround car with pigs?

https://www.newpig.com/pig-original-absorbent-sock/p/404

In reply to CarKid1989 :

Living up here in the frozen Tundra melting snow is a serious issue. 
My garage has a drain.  Not only does it handle snow run off, I can also wash my cars, wax my cars, etc. Yes it's kept at the same temp as the house.  The drains have oil traps to deal with any oil. But have never had to.  When an oops occurs I first surround the drain with oil absorbent and then start cleaning up from the drain to the source.  

I had the same problem years ago and came up with a solution that works well for me. I have a plow truck that’s kept in a garage at our big commercial building. It does that property, my parents house, our house and both her parents house. It gets a lot of road miles so the snow and ice get caked on underneath the truck, on the plowing mount and back of the plow. I do my best to knock it all off before backing it in to the garage but when it’s below zero out, it’s difficult to get all but the big stuff off. I purchase the previously mentioned “Pig Mats”, the tube type. They come in 10’ lengths and I make a simple perimeter around the truck. I keep a floor squeegee handy and the key is keeping a dehumidifier running 24/7. I have it mounted up high on a shelf and run the drain hose about 50’ to a slop sink. The garage is kept at 41* because the building has sprinklers, so the heat helps melt the snow and ice, so an occasional trip over to that garage to sweep/squeegee the water out the door helps immensely. I found the absorbent tubes at a local petroleum supplier and they were very reasonable.

Here's what I put down in my garage:

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/articles/project-backyard-shop-solving-our-storage-problem/

It handles water so well that I empty coolers inside. No snow here in Florida, though. 

This is why you wear boots in the winter. I am failing to understand your plight.

A grooved parking mat is the easy button, but they don't really come close to the budget criteria. 

A drain in the garage would be nice, but hard to add after the fact and in many locations against code.

Knocking most of the snow off, before driving into the garage, works for me. Never had more than a small puddle behind each wheel, the next morning. Sweep /squeegee takes care of it. 

I bought my dad a containment mat a couple years ago for his F150.  It holds the melted snow and salt drip pretty well and keeps the rest of his 30x40 garage nice and dry. There's smaller sizes as well.

Linky

The one advantage of an uninsulated garage is that if the snow doesn't melt outside the garage, it doesn't melt inside either

I have been parking in my attached garage since 1968. Never lost a car.

 Always brush off excess snow .   If you do it in the garage be sure to push/shovel the snow out

A lot depends on the temperature of the garage.   Mine is usually above freezing. So the slop melts off.

Some of you that don't see the problem might not have a sealed garage floor. Our garage floor is sealed and water can stand on it for days. An unsealed floor it'll gradually soak in.

RossD said:

This is why you wear boots in the winter. I am failing to understand your plight.

Here's an example.:

My wife pulls her car in the garage and it melts and gets water everywhere. My garage is heated but no drain. It's not just "brush the snow off" when it's -5 and the snow is packed on the underside of the car, every drive home for 5 months of the year.

Anything on the garage floor that you don't want to get wet needs to be moved and if you want to go throw away the trash or get the laundry, putting boots on is kind of a pain.

I like the containment mat that was posted above for this issue for sure. 

You need a squeegee.

In reply to crankwalk :

I guess it never bothered me enough to ever even consider it problem. Every few days just shovel out the garage.

-Ross from Northern Wisconsin

In reply to crankwalk :

THIS.

This is the exact thing I had in mind and trying to avoid when I wrote up this thread. You can kick off the snow by the wheel wells and bumpers but the amount that will still fall off and melt is mind blowing.  Everything gets wet.  Everything that gets lucky enough to stay out of the water path gets wet because you end up stepping in water and draggin it to the dry spot. Now everything is wet. The humidity in the garage sky rockets. Watch out tools. AND the whole floor is salty.  Then if your lucky it dries and the whole garage has the look of a balding salt flat. Now that needs to be vacuumed up, not swept or you create a salt dust that lands everywhere.

First world problems. I understand. Just hoping to avoid some of this hassle this year

dculberson said:

Some of you that don't see the problem might not have a sealed garage floor. Our garage floor is sealed and water can stand on it for days. An unsealed floor it'll gradually soak in.

It's super slippery too

I feel your pain! In our garage, the floor is pitched away from the door, so all the water drains towards the front of the garage, which makes a mess. I have to make sure that anything in front of the cars is waterproof, or it gets ruined.

Not necessarily. Coated and sealed floors get a bad rap but if you choose good product the slippery condition can be avoided or at least minimized.

Also, the finish on the garage floor will play into how slippery it will get.

Our has a "sealer" of sorts on it and it seems ok thus far.

RossD said:

In reply to crankwalk :

I guess it never bothered me enough to ever even consider it problem. Every few days just shovel out the garage.

-Ross from Northern Wisconsin

I guess to point out the obvious, not everybody's garage is the same as yours so the problem might be different than what you experience.

I have a very similar situation as the OP.   I hate working on my motorcycles in puddles and having baseboards and cardboard boxes ruined.  It thaws all night and by the time its done ,the runoff goes under the washer.dryer, all my shelving, tool boxes, bicycles etc. so you can't "just squeegee it out.  It is a first world problem but it's annoying and I get why the OP asked. Those containment mats look like a good option and I'm glad they were posted. It's a simple thing but i didn't really know they existed.

-Jay in Southcentral Alaska (Hopefully geographical location makes my opinion as valid as yours)

I often buy old area rugs from garage sales and thrift shops. I pressure wash em in the driveway when they get too nasty. It is usually enough to trap light amounts of water and evaporate it quicker.

Large amounts are still an issue and make puddles. I tried making a diaper out of plastic sheet for one, but it just trapped the moisture and wore thru eventually. 

This will trap moisture against your floor for a while before it gets wicked away, so be sure it can shrug that off. 

They make nice containment mats, but I never did try one, so I can't comment on their effectiveness. I kinda want to try the sprayfoam method now...