Jade, as a building material, has good application and innovation in the field of architectural design. Today we will learn about several basic knowledge of jade building materials, which will help us better understand the presentation form of jade as a building material.
1. Jade’s concept
The Asian Gemstone Association (GIG) calls the jade used for building materials and handicrafts “calcite stone jade”, also known as “carbonate jade” or “Onyx jade”, and its English name is Onyx. Its Mohs hardness is 3, widely distributed in the southern foothills of the Himalayas and the Andes.
2. Jade hardness
3. Jade Formation
The formation of natural jade takes over a billion years. In the long months, after carbonate deposition, Diastrophism, magma dissolution at high temperature, alteration and crystallization, and then flowing water scouring, transportation, sedimentation, and gravel mixing, the final formation of jade deposits. Its colorful and ever-changing texture undergoes beautiful changes due to the different sand and gravel materials wrapped in it during natural formation, the varying degrees of crystallization, and the different directions of erosion. These textures are the unique and precious qualities of natural jade when applied in the field of decorative architecture.
4. Types of Jade Products
Waste materials
The newly mined jade material is called waste material. The raw materials of unprocessed building stones extracted from mines are calculated in cubic meters and priced by volume. Good jade waste materials have a large and square shape, high jade content, uniform and delicate color, and fewer impurities and pores. Poor jade and stone waste materials are the opposite.
Large board
The large plate is a semi-finished product, and the raw material is processed through a series of processes to form polished sheet-shaped plates with a length of over 1.2m and a width of over 0.6m, with a general thickness of 16-18mm. There are also 18 mm and 20 mm.
Whole body board
Full body board refers to the finished board made of pure jade board without any other materials after cutting and processing. The common specifications are as follows (unit: mm):
three hundred × three hundred × 16300 × six hundred × 16600 × six hundred × 16;
six hundred × eight hundred × 16600 × nine hundred × 16800 × eight hundred × sixteen
Composite board
Depending on the thickness, it also includes whole body composite (16mm thick) and split composite (3-6mm thick). The common media for composite boards are ceramic tiles with a thickness of 9mm, granite with a thickness of 12-15mm, glass with a thickness of 5-12mm, artificial stone with a thickness of 15mm, and aluminum honeycomb with a thickness of 5-20mm.
Both the whole board and the composite board have their own advantages and disadvantages. The whole board is warm and moist, with a strong sense of jade, rich texture, good transparency, and good authenticity of the decoration. However, it has poor stain resistance, large color difference, poor sound insulation, high cost, and is prone to breakage and damage. Composite panels are energy-saving and environmentally friendly, lightweight, have strong stain resistance, good resistance to breakage and damage, easy to control color difference, easy to install, and can be used for ceilings with good sound insulation effect. But empty drums, weak jade, thin veneer, and easy distortion.
Specification board
Specification board refers to the stone material processed into the required size according to the drawings (excluding other processing techniques such as edge making). That is to say, the specifications of jade materials need to be customized according to the actual situation and are not a unified standard. However, in practical applications, commonly used size specification boards are usually cut first for demand.
Common specification board size (unit: mm): 400 × 400800 × 400600 × 600900 × 600800 × 8001200 × six hundred
Jade material technology
The common techniques for cutting jade and building materials include water knife patchwork and Rubik’s cube bricks. Water knife mosaic is a high-pressure water flow cutting process in stone mosaic, ensuring that the cutting edge is flat and flush with the joint of the cutting tool.
Stone water knife patchwork is currently the most common water knife patchwork on the market. It is made by using a water knife to cut various colors of stone into the desired shapes and then splicing them with glue.
