MANUFACTURING PROCESS OF CERAMIC

Ceramic is the technology of making objects from clay and similar materials treated by firing. Quality ceramic company limited used to specialize in the production of quality ceramic tiles and sanctuary wares. Quality Ceramics Company limited is student in Itu local government of Akwa Ibom State. Itu local government is known for richness in clay which is the main raw material used in the production of ceramic tiles and sanctuary waves.

Raw Materials Used in Production

The raw material used to form the tile consist of clay mineral mined from earth’s crust such as kyanite etc. Other raw materials are stone, Iron Oxide and aluminium.

The raw materials must be pulvenzed and classified according to particlesize. Primary crushers are used to reduce large lumps of materias e.g. Jaw caslver secondary crushing reduces smaller lumps to particles e.g hammer or muller mills are glen used. A thirf particle size reduction step may be necessary before screening to separate out particles in a specific size range.

A glaze is a glass material designed to melt onto the surface of the tile during fining, and which then adheres to the tile surface to provide moisture resistance and decorations as they can be coloured or can produce special textures.

The Manufacturing Process

Once the raw materials are processed a number of steps take place to obtain the finished product. They steps include batching, mixing and grinding, spray-drying, farming, drying, glazing and firing.

Batching

For many ceramic products, including tiles, the main composition is determined by the amount and type of raw materials. The raw materials also determine the colour of the tile body, depending on the amount of iron containing raw materials used.

 Mixing and Grinding

Once the ingredients are weighed, they are added together into a shell mixer, ribbon mixer or intensive mixer. This step further grinds the ingredients resulting in a finer particle size that improves the subsequent firming process sometimes it is necessary to add water to improve the mixing of a multiple ingredient batch as we ll as to achieve fine grinding. This process is called wet milling and is often performed using a ball mill.

Spray Drying

If wet milling is first used, the excess water is usually removed via spray drying. This involves pumping the shirry to an atomizer tile bodies can also be prepared by dry grinning followed by Granulation. Granulation uses a machine in which the mixture of previously day-ground material is mixed with water in order to form the particles  into granules, which again form a powder ready for firming.

Farming

Most tiles is firmed by dry passing. In this method, the free flowing powder-containg organic binder or a low percentage of moisture flows from a hopper into the firming die. Another process called pressure glazing has recently been developed. This process combines glazing and shaping simultaneously by pressing the glaze directly in the die filled into the tile body powder. Advantage include the elimination of glazing line, as well as the glazing water material (slidge) that is produced into the conventional method.

Drying

Ceramic tiles usually must bednid cat high relative humidity after firming, especially if a wet method is used. Drying which can take several days, removes the water at a slow enough rate to prevent shrinkage creks.

  Glazing

To prepare the glaze similar methods are used as for the tile body. After a batch for mulatin is calculated, the raw materials are weighed, mixed and dry or wet method. The milled glazes are then applied using one of the many methods available.

Firing

After glazing, the tile must be heared intensly to strength it and give it the desired porosity. Wall tile are tile that is prepaid by dry grinding instead of wet milling usually requires a two step process.

In this process, the tile give through a low tem firing called bisquefiring before glazing. This step removes the volatiles before glazing. This step removes the the volatiles from the material and mojor or all of the shrinkage. The body and glaze are then fired together in a procurs called glost firing. Firing in a tunnel, wet firing tem around 23720oF (1300oC) for tiles that requires a single firing usually tile that is prepared by milling-wler kilns are generally.

After firing and testing, the tile is ready to be packaged and shaped.