Ceramics - How it's made | Ceramic Tiles

 

MAKING FLOOR TILES AND MOSAICS

Before dealing with the question of firing we will pause to consider the making of our products other than glazed tiles. The first to claim our attention are floor tiles, under which head come also mosaics. 
Floor tiles (unlike quarries, which are made direct from crude unwashed clay) are made by a process substantially the same as that already described. The different colours are obtained by the use of different clays – mainly of local origin – with the addition, in the majority of cases, of certain stains such as oxides of manganese and cobalt. Where a vitreous, or non-porous, tile is required, felspar – a rock substance which fuses during firing and fills the minute voids between the more refractory materials with a glass-like bond – is added to the body mixture. Both floor tiles and mosaics are made in presses from carefully prepared dust in the same way as wall tiles. Some of the mosaic presses are particularly powerful, producing in one operation as many as 64 pieces, whose total area, however, since they are ¾" squares, is only equal to that of one six-inch tile. 

 

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From: "A Century of Progress 1837-1937" a publication to commemorate The Centenary of Richards Tiles Ltd.