A tile is a manufactured piece of hard-wearing material such as ceramic, stone, metal, or even glass. Tiles are generally used for covering roofs, floors, walls, showers, or other objects such as tabletops. Alternatively, tile can sometimes refer to similar units made from lightweight materials such as perlite, wood, and mineral wool, typically used for wall and ceiling applications. In another sense, a tile is a construction tile or similar object
Tile types by application
1)Floor tiles
- Ceramic tiles
- Porcelain tiles
- Glazed Vitrified Tiles
- Polished Vitrified Tiles
- Vitrified Paving Tiles
- Digital tiles
2)Wall tiles
- Exterior wall tiles
- Digital wall tiles
- Highlighters
Ceramic tiles
“Ceramic” comes from the Greek term Keramos, meaning "a potter" or "pottery”. Since the infancy of ceramics, up to this very day, the process is still very much the same; for the creation of all ceramic materials, one needs to bake a mixture of clays at a very high temperature.A ceramic tile, therefore, is the resulting product, after a mixture of clays have been treated appropriately, pressed, fired at a high temperature and cut to size. A ceramic tile consists of two parts: the body, which is called the “bisque” and the surface, which is called the “glaze”.
Which sizes are available for ceramic tiles?
150x600mm, 445x445mm, 300x600mm, 300x300mm
Porcelain tiles
Porcelain tiles are made from a blend of fine-grain clays and other minerals to produce a very dense body, which makes them highly resistant to moisture, staining and wear. These tiles are more dense than ceramic tiles and have water absorption of >0.5% and <3%. Because porcelain tiles have low water absorption, they are usually frost resistant.
Porcelain tiles with special glazes fired at high temperature make the glazed surfaces very hard, and therefore, suitable for heavy traffic areas. Porcelain tiles are resistant to stains, scratches, frost and abrupt thermal changes.
Because of these features, porcelain tiles are able to withstand years of heavy foot traffic in both interior and various exterior locations. They are also able to maintain their color and beauty for a very long time.
Porcelain tiles with special glazes fired at high temperature make the glazed surfaces very hard, and therefore, suitable for heavy traffic areas. Porcelain tiles are resistant to stains, scratches, frost and abrupt thermal changes.
Because of these features, porcelain tiles are able to withstand years of heavy foot traffic in both interior and various exterior locations. They are also able to maintain their color and beauty for a very long time.
Vitrified Tiles
Vitrified tiles are non-glazed tiles. Their hardness and polish is achieved by virtue of the pressing together of very hard materials. Vitrified tiles are extremely strong and durable and processed in such a way that they allow for very little water absorption. Vitrified tiles have a water absorption of < 0.1%.
Vitrified tiles allow for a “full body” tile, which means that the design is not merely on the surface of the tile, but runs throughout the entire tile. The advantage of this is that the tiles become incredibly strong.
600 x 600 mm, 800 x 800 mm and 1000 x 1000mm
Paving Tiles
Interlocking concrete pavements or pavers are a special dry mix pre-cast piece of concrete commonly used in exterior hardscaping pavement applications. Unit Pavements or block paving, nicknamed pavers in the United States were developed prior to WWII by the Dutch and introduced into the United States in the early 1970s.
Interlocking paving stones are installed over a compacted stone sub-base and a leveling bed of sand. Concrete paving stones can be used for walkways, patios, pool decks and driveways and airport or loading docks.
Instead of connecting the pavers by pouring grout between the joints as one would with tiles, sand particles are spread over the pavers and tamped down. The sand stabilizes the interlocking pavers, yet allows for some flexibility. This type of pavement will absorb stress such as small earthquakes, freezes and thaws, and slight ground erosion by flexing. Therefore, they do not easily crack, break or buckle like poured asphalt or poured concrete.
Digital tiles
Printing techniques and digital manipulation of art and photography are used in what is known as "custom tile printing". Dye sublimation printers, inkjet printers and ceramic inks and toners permit printing on a variety of tile types yielding photographic-quality reproduction.[Using digital image capture via scanning or digital cameras, bitmap/raster images can be prepared in Photoshop and other photo editing software programs. Specialized custom-tile printing techniques permit transfer under heat and pressure or the use of high temperature kilns to fuse the picture to the tile substrate. This has become an increasingly popular method of producing custom tile murals for kitchens, showers, and commercial decoration in restaurants, hotels, and corporate lobbies.
Wall tiles
The tiles used for wall cladding is referred as wall tiles, used in both domestic and commercial purpose
Wall highlighters
These are used to highlight some portion in a wall majorly in bathrooms
