Types of Walling Bricks – All You Need to Know

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A Wall in the Construction Industry

Structural or load-bearing walls need bricks with required strength to stay with estimated live & dead loads, horizontally as well as vertically. Application areas are: 

• Masonry walls
• Foundations
• Columns & Piers

Non-structural bricks usually server other purposes than load-bearing, such as: 

• Facing
• Veneers
• Siding
• Partition
• Insulation 

• Natural stones are the most ancient material used in brick making in human civilization. 
• With the advent of technologies, we can cut stones in required shapes, sizes, and surface smoothness.
• We can automate the process for speed & cost efficiency.
• Locally available stone types can prove the ideal materials for stone bricks. 
• However, limestone and sandstone bricks are standard everywhere.
• Natural stone bricks come with natural beauty, patterns, and styles. 
• So, it can improve the overall aesthetics of stone walls and offer amazing properties of natural stones.
• Moreover, give many unique advantages, including durability, extended lifespan, weatherproof, versatility, eco-friendliness, and complete load-bearing capabilities.

According to Wikipedia’s article on bricks, humans began the use of clay or mud in the production of symmetrical bricks before 7,000 BC.

• Sundried Clay Bricks – Required material molded in the shapes and left open under the heat of Sun for an extended period to get the required strength. In America, it was the Adobe making process that eventually leads to Sundried Brick manufacturing for mass production in a later stage.

• Fired Clay Bricks – Neolithic China around 4,400 BC has used locally available fuels, wood & mineral coal to achieve 600 °C Kiln temperature that causes the clay to shimmer with the color of molten gold or silver. Kiln-master quenches the kiln with water to produce the surface glaze.

Shaping Methods for Fired Bricks:

Molded Bricks:

• Raw clay mix with 25-30% sand to reduce shrinkage.
• Water added in the mixture and grounded to obtain desired consistency. 
• Now clay presses into steel molds with a (hydraulic) pressure to give it a shape.
• Finally, molded units burn at 900-1000 °C temperature to achieve the desired strength.

Dry-pressed Bricks:

• It is almost similar to the soft-mud molded method. 
• However, it begins with a much thicker mass of clay mixture to get sharp-edged bricks.
• It requires greater force to press and a longer heating period.
• These all add costs in the manufacturing process but yield an accurate dimension in the products.

Extruded Bricks:

• In the extrusion method, clay mixture forced through a die to shape a long cable of material in expected width and depth—the desired length achieved through cutting the cord of mixing using a wall of wires.
• Stiff extrusion needs 10-15% water in a clay mixture
• Soft extrusion demands 20-30% of the water in clay mixture.

Sand-lime Bricks

• It is also called as “Sand-Lime bricks or Calcium-Silicate bricks” because it has lime (Calcium) binding with sand (Silica) as the chief ingredients in [Lime to Sand = 1:10] proportion. 
• Apart from sand, it may have quartz, crushed siliceous rocks, or flint with colored minerals as other constituents.
• The mixture left for complete hydration of lime.
• Then, it pressed into molds.
• It cured in an autoclave for three to four hours to accomplish chemical hardening. 

Fly-ash Bricks

• It is also called as “FaL-G bricks” because it has fly-ash, lime, & gypsum as primary materials.
• It has to meet the criteria outlined in ASTM C73 – 10 Standard Specification.
• Fly-ash is a byproduct of the natural coal-burning process in coal-based electric power-producing units to eliminate environmental hazards due to the dispersion of mineral coal ash.
• Due to the presence of ash minerals, it remains lighter in weight and with grey to whitish shades.

Advantages:

• In the absence of intense heating, its color remains grey.
• You can get a smoother surface finish than other brick types. So, you can avoid plastering on it.
• Its shape found completely uniform with straight and precise edges. It makes construction easy and consumes less mortar.
• You can add minerals & pigments to obtain the required colors, texture, and appearance. It lets you use such bricks in ornamental or decorative purposes.

• A mixture of cement, sand, and concrete or stone aggregates/crushes in a set proportion used with water to form concrete masonry wall bricks.
• Finished brick blocks/units cure using low-pressure steam.
• The entire process is almost similar to create a pre-cast cement structure. 
• Standards BS 6073, EN 771-3, or ASTM C55 need to follow in concrete brick manufacturing.
• Modern trends are favoring concrete masonry bricks a lot due to various advantages, including versatility and customization.
• You can add required pigments, minerals, and chemical additives to make it as specialty bricks to serve the custom requirements. 
• It is eco-friendly material and processes against fired clay bricks. 
• Automation also establishes it as a cost-effective process.

There are two types of bricks based on their typical use: Common Bricks & Engineering Bricks. We know much about standard bricks. Now, let’s learn about engineering bricks at a glance.

According to Wikipedia on Engineering Bricks, a kind of hard & dense fired bricks with some specific properties to meet particular requirements are called engineering bricks. 

For instance, specific applications demand particular strength, porosity to gain water resistance, and chemical compositions to be acid-resistant. 

According to § 6.4.51 of British Standard BS ISO 6707-1;2014, we can classify engineering bricks into the following classes. 

Class-A Bricks

• Those are sturdy and less porous bricks.
• Engineering class-A bricks are blue in color due to relatively high kiln temperatures than standard fired bricks.
• Those have a strength of 125 N/mm2 (18,100 lbf/sq. in).
• And water absorption of less than 4.5%.

Class-B Bricks

• Engineering class-B bricks are Red in color due to relatively low kiln temperature than class-A bricks.
• Those have a strength of 75 N/mm2 (10,900 lbf/sq. in).
• And water absorption of less than 7.0%.
• Those have a semi-vitreous body.

Solid Bricks:

• Solid bricks are made with rectilinear dimensions & have solid mass with density and weight.
• No holes or frogs at all.
• Solid bricks are Ideal for structural/load-bearing purposes.

Frog Bricks:

• Have frogs up to 20% of the total brick mass.
• Acceptable in structural & non-structural purposes.

Core Holes Bricks:

• Have solid mass with holes up to 25% of the total brick mass.
• Acceptable in structural & non-structural purposes.

USA 

UK 

AU

IND

• Beds: Top & bottom surfaces.

• Headers: Ends or narrow surfaces.

• Stretcher: Sides or Width giving surfaces.

Horizontal Laying

Stretcher – A brick laid flat with its stretcher side open.

Header – A brick laid flat with its header side open.

Stretcher Face

Header Face

Vertical Laying

Soldier – A brick laid vertically with a stretcher face open.

Sailor – A brick laid vertically with bed face open.

Sailor Face

Soldier Face

Side-Lying

Rowlock – A brick laid on the side with a stretcher face open.

Shiner – A brick laid on the side with a bed face open.

Shiner Face

Row Lock Face