Chapter II: Preface

The substance of this little work was first published as a series of articles in the _British Clayworker_, in 1895–96, and I am indebted to the courtesy of the Proprietor of that Journal for permission to reproduce them.

An attempt is here made to furnish some information of an elementary character on a special branch of technical education which has been seriously neglected in this country. But the reader will understand that it is only an elementary treatise. Its publication in serial form, where each article must, more or less, be complete in itself, has to a large extent determined the method of handling the subject, and I am fully cognisant of the drawbacks of the work in that respect.

At the same time, it is hoped that the book will be useful to the more advanced class of brickmakers and clayworkers generally, many of whom have expressed a desire to see the articles in this form.

GEO. F. HARRIS.

Birkbeck Institution,
Bream’s Buildings, Chancery Lane, E.C.
1st February, 1897.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER. PAGE.

I. FLUVIATILE BRICK-EARTHS 1

II. LACUSTRINE AND FLUVIATILE BRICK-EARTHS 17

III. MARINE BRICK-EARTHS 22

IV. THE MINERAL CONSTITUTION OF BRICK-EARTHS 28

V. MINERALS: THEIR BEHAVIOUR IN THE KILN 39

VI. MINERALS: THEIR BEHAVIOUR IN THE KILN (_Contd_) 49

VII. THE CHEMISTRY OF BRICK-EARTHS 58

VIII. THE CHEMISTRY OF BRICK-EARTHS (_Continued_) 75

IX. DRYING AND BURNING 94

X. THE DURABILITY OF BRICKS 103

XI. THE MICRO-STRUCTURE OF BRICKS 118

XII. THE MICRO-STRUCTURE OF BRICKS (_Continued_) 128

XIII. ABSORPTION 132

XIV. STRENGTH OF BRICKS 136

XV. ABRASION, SPECIFIC GRAVITY 146

THE SCIENCE

OF

BRICKMAKING.