What should be paid attention to when using slate as a countertop?

The author has been engaged in the processing and manufacturing of stone for nearly 30 years, and has been in contact with countless natural stone and artificial stone countertops. Even the countertops used for hot pot have never had a similar phenomenon.

There have been a lot of things about the cracking of slate countertops, which should arouse the attention of slate manufacturing enterprises and enterprises engaged in slate manufacturing furniture. Now some slate processing enterprises really regard slate as an omnipotent and omnipotent product, and dare to use slate to make any product, even if it is a product that cannot be made by slate.

If this ugly thing about the explosion of countertops continues to ferment, it is bound to have a major and malignant impact on the future development of slate, and may even destroy the slate industry.

As a layman of the slate manufacturing process, the author analyzes the reasons why the slate countertops burst and what kind of countertops the slate is suitable for with my own experience. I hope this article will promote the future development of slate countertops. .

1. No digging table top

Countertops without holes are usually TV countertops, coffee table tops, dining table tops, bedside countertops, etc. Since these countertops do not dig holes, there is no major damage to the stress of the rock slab. As long as the thickness meets the load-bearing requirements, almost all rock slabs can process these countertops. But the premise is that there must be a solid structure under the slate to support the slate, and the slate countertop cannot be suspended, otherwise the slate may crack or even break once under the action of external force.

The top of the round dining table in Figure 2 is about 10mm thick from the picture. The middle of the top is supported by a metal frame, and the range of support is at most 1/6 of the diameter. If there is no supporting structure to hold the countertop along the direction of the radius, the countertop in this case is subject to a large external force and is likely to crack or even break.

Figure 3 If there is no supporting plate in the middle part of the elongated dining table, or structural supports distributed along the length and width directions, even if such a thin slate is strong, the middle part will be easily cracked or broken by external force.

2. Digging table panel

Most of the countertops dug holes are sink tops, with basin holes dug and water hose holes drilled on them, as shown in Figure 4. This kind of countertop may face a lot of trouble if it is processed with a whole piece of slate, and the slate may crack from the four corners and round holes of the basin hole during use. This is because the internal stress of the slate is destroyed after the hole is opened, which breaks the balance of forces and causes the slate to crack. The breakage rate of this kind of countertop is relatively high during actual processing. Sometimes it cracks when opening a hole. For this kind of perforated table top, according to the characteristics of the product, the measures of part-processing are taken to reduce the form cracking and damage during processing and use.

When the length and width of the digging table are too large, it is not recommended to make a whole piece, it is better to divide it into pieces. Although the effect of parting is not as good as that of the whole piece, when the whole piece of the countertop is cracked or deformed, you will want to smash it when you see this situation.

There are many problems in the method of making the inner cavity of the countertop by gluing as shown in FIG. 4 and FIG. 5 . One is that the performance of the glue decreases or the board bonded after aging may fall off after a long time; the other is that the glue seam is affected by various external substances for a long time, and the glue seam will hide dirt and dirt, which not only affects the appearance of the product, but also the glue There may also be water seepage or water leakage at the seam, which is very troublesome when it occurs, and cannot be handled and solved by ordinary people. For these reasons, the stone industry will hardly make such products that the inner cavity of the washbasin is bonded with plates. The inner cavity of the sink should be processed with stone, and processed into a whole with blocks to avoid the occurrence of the above problems. If the slate processing company is still making this kind of board-bonded washbasin panel, please be careful!

3. Slate kitchen counter panel

Using slate as a kitchen countertop requires careful handling of the issues of digging the basin hole and the length of the countertop. In order to pursue the effect, the current countertop designers try to reduce the seam as much as possible. The advantage of this design is that the countertop is really good, but the downside is that drilling holes in such a long countertop may bring many hidden quality risks to the countertop. As we all know, slate is similar to ceramic tile and has a fatal problem - brittleness. The result of brittleness is that it is easy to break and self-explode when subjected to external force.

Anyone who has used kitchen counter panels knows that cracks will occur at the corners where the liquefied gas stove is installed for a long time, but it is only a matter of the length of time. There are two problems in this phenomenon, one is caused by stress concentration at the corners; the other is caused by the long-term thermal effect of the liquefied gas stove. Although the slate countertop has been tested by a temperature of more than 1,000 degrees, it is difficult to change this fate, and even this fate is more tragic and the cracking is more serious.

The use of slate as a kitchen counter panel should also take into account the issues of the countertop and the bottom support structure. If the structure is unreasonable, or the result is suspended, and the user does not understand the situation, the cracking of the rock slab is inevitable. Therefore, the processing enterprise of the kitchen countertop should have an instruction manual to guide the user how to use the slate kitchen countertop correctly and how to maintain the slate countertop. If the countertop enterprises of slate kitchen cabinets can't do this, no matter how good the slate kitchen countertops are, it will be in vain and face the fate of self-explosion and cracking.