EFFECT OF MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY ON QUALITY OF CERAMIC FLOOR TILES

Products manufactured for the building industry undergo inspection thanks to which they achieve better and better quality. However, there are situations in which inspection as stipulated in a standard provides incomplete information. The currently presented example of ceramic tiles pressed from the ‘dry’ input material illustrates the circumstance of poor matching between the standard inspection method and evaluation of actual product quality. It has been shown by the example of an industrial floor under regular operating conditions destroyed quite quickly even though the tiles were regarded by the inspecting persons as the items of the very good quality. In order to examine the homogeneity of material in tiles ultrasound method has been used. It allowed to prove that the quality of these products differs significantly from the standard evaluation which assessed them with respect to flexural strength in only one, middle cross-section. Pressing technology doesn’t ensure uniform input concentration along the entire surface and the standard inspection method provides an answer about its repeatability in only one cross-section. The ultrasound inspection of a large number of tiles enables immediate response to and correction of any variances in pressing technology. In case of a stationary inspection with workstation based on the ultrasound method, even segregation of manufactured tiles into various classes characterized by the different quality would be possible. Highest quality tiles could be used in structures with the higher loads, and tiles of relatively lower quality, but sufficient strength in other ones.