Oolitic Middle School

Industrial Technology
The Story of Bricks

INTRODUCTION | WINNING | PREPARATION | MOLDING | DRYING | FIRING | MODERN BRICKS | SUMMARY

Words to know:
adobe, architecture, cavity, clinker, compression, course, cycle, die, exterior, extrusion, firing,
green, interior, kiln, laminated, manual, oxide, porosity, pug mill, vitrify

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Introduction
It has been said that the study of bricks is the study of civilization.
Bricks made of mud and straw have been used for thousands of years.
Some bricks over 10,000 years old have been discovered. One of the
first building materials created by man, bricks are still a highly desired
choice to this day. Some of the newest homes and modern buildings
use bricks in their construction. The simple brick has maintained its
reputation as a superior building product longer than perhaps any
other product in the modern world.

Plain mud bricks like the ones pictured on the left are called
'adobe' or sometimes 'slump bricks.' Examples of adobe bricks have
survived throughout history and are found
in many ancient buildings. Adobe was
used in the ziggurat temples of
Mesopotamia and by the emperors of
ancient Rome. Since trees were scarce in
the Old Southwest, the American Indians
and the pioneer settlers alike chose adobe brick as the logical material
for buildings. Adobe bricks are still used in certain parts of the world
today.
 The cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde, Colorado
were built with adobe bricks around 1200 A.D.

Adobe bricks are made from a mixture of mud and small pieces of
straw or reeds. The bricks are formed by hand and left in the sun to
dry. But there is a problem with plain mud bricks. Over time, rain
water will dissolve them and cause them to crumble and break apart.
 Early brick makers eventually learned that if they would "burn" the
bricks by baking them in a very hot oven called a kiln, the bricks
would become very hard and durable.
The basic brick making process has survived for thousands of
years. To better understand the complete story, let's take a look back
into history and discover how the brick making process evolved into
the modern brick making industry of today.

There are five basic steps to making bricks.

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1. MINING. The first step is called mining or "winning" the clay.

 The original color of clay does little to indicate the color of the
finished brick. The color of a finished brick is generally
determined by how much iron mineral is in the clay. Clay with a
high iron content will produce a deep red brick after firing (See
step 5). Clay with less iron produces a buff or light brown
colored brick.
The early brick makers relied on their own experience when
they chose their clay. They chose it primarily by it's color and
texture. They didn't have the use of sophisticated laboratories to
analyze the clay back then. Because the steam shovel was not
invented until 1879, early brick makers had to dig for the clay
with hand shovels. They obviously wanted to find their clay just
under the topsoil in order to minimize much of the hard
digging.
The digging was usually done in the autumn. That way, the
clay could be left exposed to
the freeze-thaw cycles of the
coming winter. A cycle is a
series of events that happen
over and over again. The
freezing and thawing over and
over again would help break
down the clay. That made the
clay softer and easier to work
by hand in the Spring.
The winter exposure not only made the clay soft but also
removed unwanted oxides. Oxides are minerals that have
combined with oxygen and are considered undesirable
impurities in brick making.
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2. PREPARATION. The second step

is preparation of the clay
By spring the clay was suitable to
be worked by hand. It was sometimes ground into a powder and
sifted through a screen to remove stones. Sometimes the clay
was placed into a soaking pit where it was mixed with water to
obtain the proper consistency for molding.

A horse driven pug

mill. This was a
great improvement
over doing this
process by hands
and feet.
Next, the
clay was kneaded with the hands and feet to mix all the
elements together. This step was called tempering or pugging
and was the hardest work of all. In the mid-1800's horse driven
pug mills (above) were invented to make this task easier. Pug
mills are still used today, but of course they are now powered by
huge electric motors instead of horses.
The clay was then removed from the soaking pit or pug mill
by a temperer who carried it to the molding table to begin the
next step in the process.

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3. MOLDING. The third step is molding.

The assistant brick molder was called the clot molder. That
job was to prepare a lump of clay (a clot) and give it to the brick
molder.
The brick molder was the key to the operation and the head
of the team. He or she would stand and work at the molding
table for twelve to fourteen hours a day. With the help of the
assistants, a brick molder could make 3,500 to 5,000 bricks in a
day. They would take the clot of clay, roll it in sand and "dash" it
(toss it forcefully) into a mold. A mold is a wooden frame that is
the shape of a brick. The clay was then pressed into the mold
with the hands. The excess clay was scraped from the top of
the mold with a flat stick called a strike that had been soaking in
water. This excess clay was returned to the clot molder to be
reformed into later bricks.
 A single cavity wooden brick
A brick molding table
mold

Single, double, four, or six cavity brick molds were used. A

cavity is the hollow area inside the mold where the wet clay is
placed to form the shape of the brick. A single cavity brick mold
made one brick at a time, a double cavity mold made two bricks
at a time, and so on. Making one brick at a time had an
advantage since even a child could carry a single brick to the
drying area. Beech wood was the preferred material for
constructing the mold because it was believed that the clay
would not stick to it. The top of the mold was often laminated
(covered by a thin layer) with iron to prevent wear. The mold
was also coated each time with sand so the bricks would slide
out easily. These types of bricks are referred to as "sand struck
bricks."
The next person on the team was called the off-bearer. The
off-bearer's job was to move the filled mold from the molding
table to the drying area using either a pallet or a wheelbarrow.
There it would be placed on a level bed of sand. The off-bearer
would remove the brick from the mold, stack the brick to dry,
then return the empty mold to the brick molding table. At the
molding table he or she would wet the mold and coat it again
with sand. It was now ready for the brick molder to form the
next brick.

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4. DRYING. The fourth step is drying.

 Bricks being wheeled to the hackstead and stacked for drying.
Notice the color of the bricks at this stage.

The bricks were left stacked in the drying area for a few
days. After about two days they were turned over. This was
done to facilitate uniform drying and to prevent warping. During
this time tools called dressers or clappers were used to
straighten any crooked bricks and to obtain a smooth surface.
After about four days in dry, hot weather the bricks were
sufficiently hard to allow them to be stacked on end. A finger's
width space was left between each one to allow air to flow
between them. This helped them dry faster. The stacking area
was called a hack or a hackstead. The bricks were covered by
a roof or with straw to protect them from the rain or harsh sun.
After about two weeks the bricks were ready to be fired.
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5. FIRING. The fifth step is firing, or burning.

Simply heating bricks by placing them in an open fire is not
sufficient for firing bricks. They would not get hot enough. In
order to obtain the required temperature they must be baked in
a kiln. Since early brick making usually took place on the site
where the clay was mined, a kiln had to be constructed each
time a batch of bricks was made. If fired bricks were left over
from a previous batch, they were used to construct the outer
walls of the next kiln. The surface was daubed (sealed by
smearing over the cracks) with mud to help hold in the heat.
If no previously fired bricks were available, the kiln was
constructed entirely of green bricks. Green bricks are raw,
unbaked bricks. The bricks were stacked in such a way that
they acted as their own kiln. Wood and coal were used for fuel.
Stacking and firing the kiln was part of the
"art" of brickmaking. Green bricks were used
to construct the kiln shown above. The holes
in the walls are the fire holes. The green
bricks were then stacked inside, about a
finger's width apart so the heat would flow
between them easily.
After the structure was daubed and sealed
with clay, wood or coal was placed in the fire
holes, and the fires were lit. The fires were
kept low for the first 24-48 hours until the
bricks were completely dry. When the steam
from the bricks cleared, the intensity of the
fire was increased.
The fires burned for about six days – day and
night. The brick makers remained on site
during the entire burn period, getting little
sleep and keeping the fires burning. Near the
end of the burn, the kiln reached a
temperature of approximately 1,850 degrees
Fahrenheit.

Even after drying for more than two weeks in the air, the
green bricks still contained 9-15% water. For this reason the
fires were kept low for the first 24-48 hours while the bricks
continued to dry. During this time steam would rise from the top
of the kiln in huge white clouds. They called this steam "water
smoke."
 When the steam gases finally cleared it was the signal to increase
the intensity of the fires. If this was done too early, steam would
form inside the bricks and cause them to explode. The brick shown
below on an old school house in Leesville, Indiana is an example of
this condition. This brick was fired too green and the internal gasses
caused it to burst open.

Intense fires were maintained in the fire holes around the

clock for about a week. It took that long to reach the required
temperature of around 1,850 degrees F.
Reaching the correct temperature was very important.
When a brick reaches the correct temperature it begins to
'vitrify.' Vitrification happens when sand and other materials in
clay melt and fuse together. This changes the clay into a glass-
like material.
Properly fired bricks are very strong in compression
strength. Compression is the squeezing force on a material. In
the case of bricks, most of the compression force comes from
their own weight on top of each other. Bricks that do not get hot
enough during firing are weak in compression strength and will
crumble under load. Bricks that become too hot will become
too glass-like and brittle. The trick for the early brick maker was
to get them just right. The correct temperature was just at the
point when the vitrification process began.
Since thermometers were not available in those days, the
brick maker had to rely on his knowledge and experience to
guess when the bricks were done. At that time the fire was put
out, the fireholes of the kiln were bricked over, thus ending the
firing process. It then took more than a week for the kiln to cool
down sufficiently to remove the bricks.

Medora Brick Plant

A 50-man workforce once produced 54,000 handmade bricks a day at the
Medora Brick Plant in nearby Jackson County, Indiana. The plant opened in 1906.
The round "beehive" shaped buildings in the picture are nine of the twelve
kilns that were used. The low tin-roofed buildings in the center of the picture are the
hack-steads.
With its aging brick making technology, the old plant became unable to compete
with more modern plants. The Medora Brick Plant closed on January 31,
1992. Almost all brick that was used in this area before 1992 came from this brick
plant. When cool,
the kiln was disassembled and the sorting process begun. If
green bricks had been used to make the kiln, those bricks from
the outermost walls were saved to be fired again in the next
kiln.
Some bricks which were closest to the fire received a natural
wood ash glaze from the sand that fell into the fires, became
vaporized, and deposited on the bricks. These bricks were
used in the interior (inside) courses of the walls because of
their attractive, slick and shiny appearance. A course is one
row of laid bricks.
Bricks that were severely over-burned,
cracked, or warped were called 'clinkers'
and were occasionally used for garden
walls or garden paths. They were
probably called clinkers because of the
clinking sound they made when they were
struck together. They were too glassy and
much too brittle to be used in buildings.
Those that were only slightly under-fired had a salmon color
and early brick layers knew that the porosity (tiny air holes) in
these bricks would help to insulate a structure. These bricks
were placed on the innermost courses of a wall. This is an
example of a salmon colored brick.
Finally, the best bricks were chosen for the exterior (outside)
walls of buildings because they were the strongest and most
durable.
 A famous brick building from Colonial times:
Independence Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania was built
with hand made bricks. It was started in 1732 and completed in1753.

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Modern Brick Making

Of course, brick clay is no longer mined by hand. Huge trac-
hoes and other earth-moving equipment can now do in minutes
what it once took days to do with hand shovels and
wheelbarrows.
 Clay can now be transported
easily from the mining site to
permanent brick plants. There,
sophisticated testing labs, pug
mills, temperature controlled
kilns, and robotic equipment are
used to transform it into hundreds
of styles and textures of brick
products. The making of bricks
is no longer a guessing game
dependent upon the knowledge
and experience of only a few
people.
Modern high output brick factories have replaced the hand
molding process with a much faster method of forming bricks
from clay. Today's factories use what is referred to as the
extrusion process. A large machine called an extruder forces
a soft clay mixture through a small opening called a die. In this
case the die is a block of steel with an opening the size and
shape of a brick. This forms a long continuous rectangle of clay
which can then be cut into individual bricks.
The extrusion process can be illustrated by the cookie press
shown below. Soft cookie dough is extruded through one of the
dies shown on the left to form the desired shape of cookie. The
long 'extrusion' of dough is then cut off into individual cookie
sections.

A cookie extrusion press A brick extrusion press The brick

extruder being operated by the woman above right works on the
same principle. The long extrusion is first cut into about 6-foot
long sections called slugs. The slug next passes through a row
of wires that slices it into individual brick sections, creating
several bricks at a time. This process is obviously much faster
than the ancient method of molding bricks one by one by hand.

The extrusion process is used to form shapes in other

materials as well. Aluminum extrusions are quite common.
Aluminum is heated to make it soft so it can be extruded
through a die. Some familiar uses for aluminum extrusions are
in residential storm doors and storm windows. Those are
aluminum extrusions around the chalkboard in our classroom.
The Krispy-Kreme Donut Company uses the extrusion
process to make their popular donuts. They would be unable to
keep up with the huge demand
otherwise. Cutting donuts from a flat
sheet of dough as most companies
do is much too slow. All of the
Krispy-Kreme stores together can
extrude a stack of donuts as high as
the Empire State Building in only 22
seconds.
Can you think of other products that are extruded?

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Summary
Bricks have been around since man first began building
structures. Some say architecture, the art and science of
designing and constructing buildings, began when the first two
bricks were laid together well.
 A robot handles
bricks in a
modern brick
plant.

The
history of the brick industry is a good example of the benefits of
mass production. Modern brick making uses at least some
variation of every one of the five original steps we have
discussed. Today, much of the difficult, manual (hand) labor is
performed by high-tech machinery and computer controlled
robots. Laboratories ensure consistent clay mixtures.
Temperature and atmospheric controlled kilns produce uniform,
high quality bricks in hundreds of varieties, shapes, and sizes.
The warm solid feeling of a brick house is greatly preferred by
a wide variety of home builders. Ask the Three Little Pigs!
Bricks are attractive and relatively inexpensive products with
good mechanical properties. The natural resource (clay) is
plentiful and readily available. These are necessary qualities of
any good building material.

Nevertheless, bricks are essentially just burnt clay. . . and,

they have been around for thousands of years. Amazingly,
they continue to serve as the backdrop of the modern age.
 We have all been taught since childhood to follow the yellow
brick road . . . to follow our dreams into the future. When we
do, we will no doubt discover that the age-old brick is still with
us when we get there. When it comes to bricks, perhaps
modern isn't as modern as we think it is.
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Copyright (c) 2005-07, Harley D. Brown, Oolitic Middle School, Oolitic, Indiana