Compac Marble and Quartz – Marmol Compac

Who is who in the engineered stone business? Compac Quartz, Compac Marble and Marmol Compac are all sales brands of one of the biggest engineered stone manufacturers in Europe. 

Commonly known as Marmol Compac due to its origin, as this group began manufacturing engineered stone in 1975. Its engineered marble plant is located in Spain, just South of Valencia. In truth it still is the main headquarters for all operations, although, most of the production output and invoicing is generated in their Portuguese plant called Silicalia. Here they have a engineered quartz manufacturing plant with 4 production lines running and a fifth one bought (running market information). Silicalia is located in the central part of Portugal far from any major city, as also is known that they had several benefits from the local town to install their factory in their county. In terms of industrial expansion, they are planning to install an engineered marble plant near Baza, close to Almeria. Although due to market expectations they’ve only settled for a nice big sign next to a major motorway.

Silicalia was installed in Portugal due to contract limitations. Breton, the Italian manufacturers of the machinery and owner of the technology and  know-how, set up an exclusive agreement with Cosentino Group ( Silestone brand), giving them a manufacturing and know-how exclusive rights, this exclusivity is indexed to the quantity of quartz production lines bought, being two years for each one. Therefore, Cosentino started production in the 90s, and currently they have 11 production lines installed, so that’s 22 years of exclusive manufacturing. Nevertheless, Quarella also has an engineered quartz plant in the Northern part of Spain called Prestige, they’ve been excluded of such agreement, as they are the oldest engineered quartz plant operating in Spain.

So Marmol Compac, the original name, was given due to the engineered marble technology they bought a few decades ago. By accumulating engineered marble and engineered quartz in their core business, the name Marmol Compac was changed to Compac Marble and Quartz. Engineered stone companies producing both engineered marble and engineered quartz in Europe are few, being Marmol Compac in the top 5 positions regarding production capacity.

Compac Marble and Quartz is a family managed enterprise, that is based on a warehousing sales strategy, as most of their sales originate in Spain. They’ve set up an owned warehousing distribution units all over Spain, and have expanded this strategy to the United Kingdom. Although I did hear recently that the operation in the United Kingdom was in great difficulty and in the eminence of closing the warehousing units in this market. They also have their own US distribution system set up.

Compac Marble and Quartz have been one of the most innovative companies in this sector, they have a very good R&D team. They’ve created some very unique colours, one of my favorites is Silver, a grey colour with very light sparkles, in my opinion, it’s a great result of extensive R&D. I have a photo of it, although just looking at it you will not see how profound the colour is.

They’ve also have evolved in white colours and have currently on of the best pure white colours in the market. In marketing they’ve followed Silestones foot steps and have used VIPs in promoting their products, although still quite behind Silestone, but I’d give them a 2^nd place worldwide in marketing.

Compac Marble and Quartz has also innovated in distribution, they’ve opened two outlet type warehouses for second choice slabs, discontinued colours and other excess stock. The prices are really good, however you are limited to the existing stock.

Engineered Stone and Greenguard Certification

Currently we see many engineered stone brands that have several certificates, today's post we will be dealing specifically with the Greenguard certification program. Many industries have been coloring themselves green and engineered stone is clearly looking at every green certification and making sure their products are not left behind.

Why is Greenguard important?

People spend a great deal of time indoors, during the winter season, the time spent indoors can range over 90%. Although many of us have never looked at this in this perspective, truth is that, our home air has pollutants, and being home means you’re exposed to many airborne pollutants.

Deficient ventilation, humidity levels, temperature levels may have a negative effect on your home air quality, many products and materials which we use or have in our homes may release micro particles and volatile organic compounds (VOC) into the air, these may stand as great risks to human health. Allergies, asthma, cancer, reproductive and development problems, as well as annoying odors are some of the most common problems that poor indoor air may cause on humans.

It is said that indoor air pollution can be superior to outdoor air pollution, so it is considered a great health hazard to humans.

So what is a Greenguard Certificate?

Greenguard Environmental Institute is a non-profit organization, which provides special certification for building materials. Currently Greenguard Environmental Institute has three programs, for which building materials may qualify: Greenguard Indoor Air Quality Certification, Greenguard Children and Schools Certification and Greenguard Premier Certification. These three programs certify specifically building materials, however they also have a building  certification program, which is the Greenguard Building Construction Certification.

On the product side, namely building materials are tested and to qualify for their Greenguard certificate have to range as low emitting and non-toxic. To qualify for the certification the manufacturers have to voluntarily settle their products for Greenguard rigorous testing and continuous verification.  

The certification process insures that the building material is low emitting and non-toxic, as they are tested for thousands of nocive chemical agents. There is an annual re-certification process and quarterly quality monitoring which insures ongoing compliance with the Greenguard certification program.

Most engineered stone manufacturers have two certificates the Greenguard Air Quality Certificate and the Greenguard Children and Schools Certificate.The engineered stone industry is currently undergoing severe industrial changes to improve it's emission and toxicity, which will gradually improved usability and future certifications.

Green certificates are here to stay, manufacturers will use them aggressively in their marketing, and manufacturers who have not yet seen this current trend will soon have to certify their products or possibly their product may be rejected due to lack of certification.

Quality in Engineered Stone

Engineered stone like every other product has quality standards, although at the current moment the CE marking is not ready for engineered stone slabs. On this post I want to show you, common industrial problems with engineered stone, you will see things that should not arrive at your warehouse, let alone in someone's household.

Engineered stone being a man made stone or as some like to call it an artificial stone, it's rather complex to make a perfect piece of engineered stone, many little things may go wrong during production, warehousing and shipping.

Here is a list of the most common problems that may be visable on your engineered stone slab or tile:

1. White superficial dust/veins: this superficial white dust is due to bad formulation or uneven distribution of the mixture, what happened was that the mixture was not done correctly, being that in the mixture some dry unmixed quartz dust was incorporated into the slab. In the photo you will see a vein effect, after the dust is cleaned the tile will not have a perfect surface.
2. Cracking: you may receive pieces or even slabs with small tiny crack that you can barely see. These are due to an improper chemical reaction, normally the hardening process of resin is a very controlled chemical process, but many factors can either accelerate or slow down the reaction.
3. Tiny pin holes: Unfortunately the photos I have can't give you a correct idea of this, as the definition is not as good as I need to actually show you it. But basically it characterized by small pin holes on the slab surface, it's really difficult to see, and sometimes you may need the right lighting angle to correctly visualize it. These little pin holes with time will accumulate dirt, and the engineered stone will quickly look very awful, although in dark colours this negative may be hidden. In theory a slab by slab production process should be less porous than a block production process, so if you deal with engineered marble it may be a good thing to look out for. Some manufacturers end up resining the surface to hide this defect, but many times the defect is so small that even resin will have problems solving it.
4. Shade differences in the same slab: I had once a project where I learned a very painful lesson, we cut the counters from the same slab (dark blue with mirror chips), and so we did not worry about checking the shade, as we all did assume that the same slab would have an even mixture. Truth is that polishing also has an important effect on the surfaces shade. Applying those miraculous chemical products will improve the shade difference, but will not solve it.

   

   
   

5. Slab length: I've learned through experience not to believe in everything people tell me, so I usually do a visual inspection of my cargo, a handy measuring tape is essential, and don't be surprised if you find what I found (in the photo you may see that the slab has 303 cm, and I was paying 307).
6. Warped slabs: engineered quartz slabs is far from being plastic, as it has more than 90% natural stone, as everyone knows most materials warp if they are not warehoused properly. And engineered stone may warp slightly more than your common natural stones. So make sure to properly warehouse you engineered stone slab and tile.
7. Slab thickness: as I mentioned the length, the thickness may be a more common defect, everyone who has done some engineered quartz countertops, know that an uneven thickness in the same slab or between slabs, will cause adjustment problems. To actually measure the thickness of a slab, besides the measuring equipment, you also need to take the measurement of the slab in several points, 6 are just enough to conclude if the thickness is according to your tolerances.
8. Tile mitre is a common problem, a quick check can be made by facing two polished surfaces and trying to even out the sides, just by putting the tiles standing on a flat surface you will quickly figure out if the tiles are well cut. Avoid these problems before they get to difficult to handle, these types of controls are in some factories made automatically by machinery, but many factories use sampling methods to do such test. 
9. Engineered stone tile cut imperfection: equipment and tooling age rather quickly, if you have automatic cutting lines you may have several tiles to handle per minute, which in some factories may leave quality inspection to the side to deal with the current problem.
10. Engineered stone tile uneven bevelling: the correct way to bevel a tile and to guarantee a perfect bevel, is bevelling it with the polishes surface facing down. However most factories do bevel it with the polished surface facing up, which means any little deviation in thickness will be an imperfection in bevelling. It can be a possible problem in some cases where quality control is not taken seriously. 
11. Grey smudges: these occur more frequently in engineered marble than in engineered quartz, and is mainly due to the production process.
12. Surface scratches: you find several types of surface scratches, some due to bad packing others due to manufacturing. One thing for certain, it's easier to find scratched material on engineered marble, than engineered quartz, the hardness of marble is relatively low and can be scratched by many materials. Regarding packaging engineered marble and engineered quartz should be done with the polished surface facing each other. When dealing with engineered marble tiles, especially on long voyages, if their is not protection in between polished surface, micro scratches might appear on the end of the tiles. Packing has to be very well done to avoid these situations, the trepidation during transportation will gradually make friction between the tiles and any micro dust will become an abrasive. The other often situation, and common to engineered marble and engineered quartz are micro scratches on the polished surface, namely in dark colours. Very frequently small particles of sand/dust appear during the polishing process (in saturated water for example) and they create defects on the surface, which sometimes may not be effectiently detected by visual inspection.

Chinese quartz - Importing quartz slabs from China

Today's topic is Chinese quartz, if you are already importing quartz slabs from China, maybe some of the things I'm going to mention on this post is just a confirmation of your reality. Or maybe you have had a good experience with Chinese quartz imports. I must say that not everyone has had good experiences with quartz slab imported from China.

I figure that most of you are unaware of the size the Chinese manufacturers have currently in the engineered stone business. Their internal market is huge, their exports of quartz slabs and other engineered stone are still very little compared to their great potential. Currently there are more than 100 manufacturers in China alone, few use Breton Technology and most use Chinese Keda technology.

As I have mentioned a few times before, Chinese engineered stone  is unavoidable to the International markets. However, the main problem with Chinese engineered stone is quality.

You may find great pricing, excellent colours, but I advise you to be very careful, choose wisely your supplier and make sure you personally inspect the quality of your shipments prior to loading.

What may you encounter in quartz engineered stone from China?

•  Excess resin: while Breton plants have been using less than 10% of unsaturated polyester resin, Chinese manufacturers tend to use bigger quantities of resin.

• Raw materials: some Chinese manufacturers either use inadequate raw materials, or low quality materials, which have caused some International incidents with some customs

•  Inefficient Compaction: the Italian production lines does a better compaction, this means the product is more resistant and has a better performance.

•  Claims: you might have problems for your Chinese supplier to accept claims due to poor quality

• Delivery delay: most common in Chinese manufacturers, they either receive pre-payment or by L/C and delivery may take a while, emending L/Cs is common.

• CE Marking Compliance: most of the manufacturers are not complying with these terms yet;

•  Health and Safety Issues: while European and other Worldwide manufacturers are looking at these issues seriously due to local and regional legislation, namely they are far from VOC (Volatile Organic Compounds) certification of their products and production facilities.

Personally I have bought from China engineered stone, and I did have some of the above mentioned problems, namely:

• They didn’t comply with the last shipping date on my L/C, which I had to exchange, actually looking back this happened a few times.

• Due to the fact that I did not trust their quality, I had the slabs come in sawn, I did the final surface finish at my local factory, my quality index for first choice material was far from 100%, I actually had a lot or two which barely did 75%, so I ended up buying 75% first choice and 25% of problematic material;

• My claim was initially treated professionally, until they figured out that it was totally their poor quality that caused the whole mess, after that they didn’t actually give me a direct response on how I would be compensated, so time passed and until this day no compensation was given for those quality claims, nevertheless we did not import anymore from that supplier

• Non-existent CE Markings or even knowledge of the regulatory status

•  Laboratory testing, I asked them for their laboratory testing and they sent me a few pdf files in Chinese for me to translate, I ended up doing my own testing locally.

•  Price: I was importing a pure white fine grain which is very difficult to make, the price was good on a few thicknesses, although some thicknesses had an awkward pricing … a very non-proportional price, so I just avoided that thickness, although I did have a common and constant question coming from my clients: Why don’t you have 30mm slabs in this colour?

With this post I'm not saying you can't find good quality engineered stone in China, to find it you have to really look around and personally judge your supplier. But in time, I think it will be much easier to source engineered stone in China, but currently, be careful.

CE Markings for Engineered Stone ( Agglomerate Stone )

The CE markings for engineered stone (agglomerate stone) as of the begining of 2010 are mandatory for modular tiles sold in the European Union.  The JWG (Joint Working Group) n. 229/246 is responsible for setting standards for the agglomerate stone. The official designation of agglomerate stone represents all products which are manufactured by mixing mainly natural stone grit with a bonding agent. The natural stone grit may be of several sorts, marble, granite or other. The binder is said to be made of artificial components like unsaturated polyester resin or cement. The product group includes artificial stone and compacted marble.

The standards are not all complete, as the JWG is still working actively, however some standards have been approved and are actually already in use. The standards mentioned in the table relate to testing methods that are required for agglomerate stones. So basically when dealing with agglomerate stones, every laboratory should follow these procedures to guarantee comparability between agglomerate stones and the tolerance levels defined in the approved standards.

Until the end of 2010, 2 product standards have been approved and published, namely the UNI EN 15388 (voluntary standard) which specifies the requirements for kitchen and bathroom countertops, the other approved and mandatory standard is the UNI EN 15285 which defines the requirements for modular composite tiles. The UNI EN 15285 is effectively mandatory as of the 1^st of January 2010, and includes tiles size up to 600 mm x 600 mm and with a maximum thickness of 20 mm destined to be applied on flooring and stares.

Currently the JWG (Joint Work Group) is working on two standards: one for agglomerate stone slabs and the other one for agglomerate stone tiles used as interior or exterior wall cladding.

So currently if you are selling agglomerate stone modular tiles for flooring and stairs in Europe, you must comply with the European standard EN 15285. Besides complying with specification in the factories at shop floor level and labeling, your product (agglomerate stone) must be tested by a certified laboratory according to the standard EN 14617. And of course, the labeling with the CE mark means that your product is within the tolerance levels defined by the standard, if not you should not label it as CE, which in the future may mean that you may not sell it in Europe.

What is ASTA Europe?

I guess ASTA Europe has not had enough spotlight to be recognized Internationally by the industry, not only the agglomerate manufacturers, but by everyone in general. ASTA Europe is a European association of agglomerate stone manufacturers. It has currently 15 members, mostly Italian producers, but all the major European agglomerate manufacturers are already members.
This association aims to promote and protect it's members interest, and I figure that more than ever they'll need it. Personally, it sounds like a European Breton family meeting, but who am I to say such a thing. Truth is that they all have common interests, and the main one is protecting their product and their markets.
ASTA Europe was created in 2010, the members meet several times a year, the Marmomacc fair has been a traditional meeting ground for the members, it represents more than 80% of total European production. ASTA Europe has it's origins in the Italian association ANPLA, created about 10 years ago to establish and define standards for the agglomerate stone. ANPLA has been playing an important part in the CE marking for the agglomerate stone industry in Europe. So the Italian association, has overcome their national borders and is now named ASTA Europe, they've expanded membership to all European countries that obide by the references of the European Committee for Standardisation (or the Comité Européen de Normalisation (CEN)). So currently they've got members from Italy, Spain, Romania, Germany, Belgium, Turkey and the Czech Republic.
ASTA Europe wants to continue to play the main part in establishing European standards for the agglomerate stone industry. There are many hidden interests at stake, and most of the European manufacturers have many in common.
So basically I see three things that unite this very restricted group of companies:

• European standards : Participating actively in setting European standards that will protect their product against competition (Chinese mainly)
• Environmental issues: face the environmental issue regarding their industry
• Health and safety issues: face the health issues regarding their production, namely the usage of some health hazard products like resin, quartz, cristobalite and others.

How to polish cultured marble?

In today's post I'll be focusing on polishing cultured marble. So how do we polish cultured marble? Or better, what are the best polishing techniques and solutions for cultured marble. If you work frequently with cultured marble, you have by now dominated most of the particular aspects of polishing cultured marble. However if you don't work that frequently with cultured marble, I hope this post may help you accomplish a nice beautiful polish.

General things about polishing marble.
Before I get into some technical details, I just want to discuss some basic things about polishing marble in general. I figure that not all my readers may be familiar with the shop floor, machinery and tools used in polishing marble.
Polishing marble, using a slab polisher or even a small manual system, you'll use in the majority of the cases a Frankfurt system abrasive. What does this mean? The Frankfurt system is specially designed abrasive, it looks rather like a horse shoe and fits into to the slot in the polishing heads plate.
On our right you'll see a couple of Frankfurt abrasives, all Frankfurt are similar in shape, although some have a plastic base to fit into the machine. Normally the plastic base is for abrasives that break easily, when fitting them on the polisher, it needs a little bit of hardness to be able to secure itself onto the polishing plates.
The Frankfurt abrasive sequence is made up with different coloured abrasives, or even different type (configuration/moulding). Many manufacturers relate colour to grain size, so you'll be fitting into your polisher several grains of abrasives, from the lowest to the highest ... and at the end, you'll need gloss/shine abrasives. Polishing marble requires a chemical polish, so the yellow abrasives are normally the gloss/shine abrasives, these are very soft and the least resistant abrasives, although they have an important role in polishing marble.
I've mentioned slab polishing machines, well just to get you familiarized with them, there are several types, namely differing in width and in polishing heads. The width varies significantly, you will find machines that work 60 cm materials, 80, 100 and then you'll find 180 and 240 ... the width is very important as it limits the width of the material you are able to polish. I have a photo of a polisher for slabs:

 A marble slab polisher can weigh up to 30-40 tons, the more heads available will guarantee speed and quality to your polish. A machine like the one in the picture may use more than 90 frankfurt abrasives simultaneousely, which becomes a serious production problem to manage, as each type of abrasive has a different usage time, so constant set-up times are needed during the day. (I haven't mentioned the diamond based abrasives which last for a few thousand sqm and are better for production flow)

I also mentioned the manually polishing equipment, I've included a picture of a blue machine on the right, so basically it uses a dish on the end, which normally has 4 Frankfurt abrasives attached. To reduce set ups and other productivity issues, normally you'll have several dishes one for each abrasive grain in the approved sequence.



Why is polishing cultured marble such a big deal?
In truth, each type of texture and colour in cultured marble has their particular polishing sequence. So, unlike most marbles, you'll have several grain sequences and pressure defined for your cultured marble. One thing that is at the base of the polishing problem is the polyester resin from which the cultured stone is made with. The resin in the cultured stone is the main reason for many polishing problems regarding cultured stone. Some of the abrasives themselves also use polyester resin for their bonding which does not facilitate polishing cultured marble.
The cultured marble that uses fine grain in it's texture is more sensitive to polishing, a little too much pressure, or too little cleanliness of the water .... and you'll have shade problems and micro scratches.
Cultured marble should havea measured gloss between 70 and 85 points, when we relate to engineered quartz the numbers go lower and in most colours you'll have gloss index of 50-60 points.
Being cultured marble sensitive, shade problems sometimes can be hidden due to lighting, direct lighting on the polished cultured marble will not help you detect the polishing defects.
In my opinion, cultured stone shade varies significantly due to polishing, if you polish one slab using one abrasive sequence and particular machine parameters, to reproduce the same shade in future productions, you should maintain all these variables stable. 
Another typical problem, related to thickness of the slabs, especially regarding tiles, when the 10 mm or 12 mm slabs are polished, the machinery has to be top maintained to get a good job done. It has to be very well levelled and stable. Imagine the weight of the polishing heads, they are in constant movement, and the slab underneath being thin may have tendencies to react. (to check if a polisher is stable I usually use a coin a put it on it's side, when the machine is working it should maintain still, even with the bridge movement, that's how stable you need your polisher)
Now I'm on a roll here, another thing that may cause dreadful problems in non calibrated slabs, or warped slabs, you can imagine a warped slab being polished, it's almost impossible to get a top and even gloss on the whole surface, and frequently the slab will break.

Polishing cultured marble requires a lot of testing of different types of abrasives, and on the production floor abrasive sequences testing. Just a hint for my readers, you may need for some delicate textures soft abrasives, the Italian manufacturers classify them as T type or even TT. T for tender, and TT tender tender ... very soft. In most cases, the abrasive sequence is not standard, which means ... it gets complicated after the grain 400. And the gloss abrasives at the end, are the ones responsible for the shiny look of the cultured marble, these are very difficult to find (good quality at a good price).
Most European manufacturers of cultured stone will sell you polished slabs, which you can avoid most of the problems they have to deal with on a day to day basis, but you can buy blocks from some manufacturers and then you'll need to really look seriously at your machinery and production.

Reconstituted Stone or Engineered Stone : Health and Safety Hazards

Reconstituted stone or engineered stone have some health and safety issues to solve. By the end of 2011 the reconstituted stone and engineered stone industry will have solved the serious health and safety issues. Truth is that everyone knows the dangers the Styrene and BTEX can pose to health, nevertheless in 2010 most manufacturers have either invested in equipment or have evaluated it's effects.

What is Styrene?
Styrene is a chemical which is one of the main components of polyester resin, actually most resin manufacturers use it as a solvent, and can represent 30-40% of the mass of polyester resin. It's very volatile and is used to manage the viscosity levels of the resin, in theory the smaller the grain used to make the engineered stone the less viscosity is needed in the resin. This means it has to be more liquid to guarantee an even spread through the whole mixture, this is done by adding more styrene to the polyester resin, in the production of resin the last phase is actually setting the viscosity index, and this is done by adding styrene.

What is BTEX?
BTEX is really benzene, toluene ethyl-benzene and xylene's, active components found in resin.

Why is styrene and BTEX health hazards?
People who are exposed to styrene in it's original form may suffer serious health hazards, namely affecting the central nervous system, headaches, dizziness, fatigue and difficulty in concentrating may be some symptoms. Styrene has been classified by the IARC (International Agency for Research on Cancer) as a potential human carcinogen.
BTEX as Styrene is also considered a potential human carcinogen.
The health hazard can be minimized if the levels of Styrene and BTEX are reduced, the acceptable levels are <50mg/kg for Styrene and <6mg/kg for BTEX

So how are manufacturers dealing with this potential health hazard?
Their are two ways to actually solve this problem, the first is use eco resin which has low levels of Styrene and BTEX, although the resin is much more expensive, it will increase product costs to the end user.
The other way is to buy equipment to extract the Styrene and BTEX from the product. Actually the manufacturers have two problems to solve, as the final product carries Styrene and BTEX, but also the sludge has the same components.
Technically at 55ºC Styrene will evaporate, so basically the manufacturing plants will need to install staging warehouses at 55ºC for slabs and blocks. In addition they'll need special equipment to retreat the hazardous chemicals from the air and give it the proper disposal, a block may need up to 30 hours, although a slab may take fewer hours, nevertheless it is a big investment moneywise and space.

Regarding chinese manufacturers, I figure they're behind in this matter, most of them are just adapting to CE markings, next they'll have to face the Styrene and BTEX issue to survive in International markets. Being that in general the Chinese manufacturing systems use more resin in the composition of the engineered stone, this problem is more serious for them currently.

Solid Surfacing or Solid Surfaces

Solid Surfacing or solid surfaces can be a wide range of products. In the solid surfaces category we find many different types of man made stone, although solid surfaces implies a non-porous surface, which is on of the things that distinguish high quality products from no quality.
So what is the difference between solid surfaces and engineered stone?
None, in truth these products have appeared in the market about 30/40years ago, and basically they're are called by many names, here goes a list:

1. Solid surfaces
2. Engineered stone
3. Man made stone
4. Agglomerate Stone - used as the official definition in CE Markings
5. Conglomerate Stone
6. Cultured Stone
7. Compact Stone
8. Silestone - it's a brand but due to the strong marketing many people actually call the product silestone
9. Fake stone

So basically, we may be speaking of different products, but they have more or less the same objective, they imitate to certain perfection the natural stone.
These products are normally constituted by 3 relevant parts: the natural or un-natural grain, the binding agent and artificial colouring pigments. Most common products in this category are quartz based agglomerates, which are composed of quartz grain, bonded together with polyester resin.

StoneItaliana : World Leader in Innovation

This post about StoneItaliana, is part of a series about manufacturers. StoneItaliana in my opinion is the world leader in innovation, and in this industry this is essential to guarantee a long term survival of the product. Stone Italiana has been ahead of it's time in the agglomerate stone industry, it's known to practice high pricing strategy, but it also supplies high quality and innovative products as well.

Stone Italiana has been around since 1979 when it started off with a composite marble plant, in 1988 it initiates a new plant for granite composite slabs. Nevertheless, from the beginning it has been awarded several prizes for innovation, and has always strived in that direction.
It was the first plant to present relief surfaces with the Breton system, it has been the leader in introducing new materials to the industry, for these and much more reasons it's currently the top leading company in innovation.

They have launched continuously incredible products that really bring out the true creativity that the engineered stone can do, they really take it to the limit.
I enjoy particularly looking at the best examples and admiring their capability to get to that point and to continuously feed the market with truly imaginative and innovative products.
 If after all of what I just exposed you still have doubts about StoneItaliana being the most innovative company in the engineered stone business today, if you visited the International Shanghai EXPO 2010, the product used on these exhibition halls was a joint venture between StoneItaliana and another Italian company, they created and patented a product called Cottostone. Which was used on the facade below.

CE Marking for agglomerate stone

As every other product, as of 2010 the agglomerate stone industry has to comply with CE Markings for agglomerate stones, I must add that it's taken too much time to actually see these new rules in the market, as natural stone and the ceramic industry have been complying with CE markings for a while now. It's been a difficult task to provide the agglomerate stone industry with final CE Marking statements due to a conflict of interests between the solid surface industry based on Breton technology and all the other producers. Leading the Committee has been the Italian interest in making tough tolerances for the product, their main effort is to slow down the oriental competition, using the CE Markings as a tough standard to comply with, most International producers would need to invest in equipment and technology to overcome some limitations that they currently have.
As of 2010 the Agglomerated stone - Modular tiles for flooring and stairs (internal and external) have to comply with the CE Marking standards.
The document itself focuses on the following:

• Definition: What is a modular tile? 
• Size and shape: definition of tolerances regarding size and shape
• Surface finish 
• Requirements for flooring and stairs modular tiles made of agglomerated stones: Technical requirements that are defined for the product namely:
• Apparent density and water absorption
• Flexural strength
• Abrasion resistance
• Chemical resistance
• Visual appearance
• Reference sample, visual inspection and acceptance criteria
• Reaction to fire
• Slipperiness
• Thermal conductivity
• Thermal shock resistance
• Tactility/visibility
• Linear thermal expansion coefficient
• Electrical resistivity
• Impact resistance
• Frost resistance
• Dimensional stability

• Marking, labelling and packaging: defines what type of markings and documentation should follow the product
• Evaluation of conformity: defines testing types and frequency and Factory Production Control for the agglomerate stones

Engineered Stone: Shade

Engineered stone is technically known for a homogeneous shade, that is not entirely true. Engineered stone producers publicize that they guarantee same shade, however in big quantities I figure it's very unlikely, due to several factors that effect shade.
What factors may effect the shade of my engineered stone?

• Slab Production factors: during the daily production several batches of raw materials are mixed together, and when dealing with white or beige type colours, little changes may occur that can affect the colouring, namely:
• error in pigment quantity: I know this sounds awkward, but in reality to make a certain colour we normally mix several pigments together, and some are very concentrated and the quantity can be grams ... so being of by a few grams of concentrated blue, may turn your light grey into a light beige;
• exchange on the discharge sequence into the mixer: for those of you familiarized with these production facilities, mixing is one of the most important parts of the process, you may think that every producer has the pigment sequence made by machines .... what if I told you that some producers do it manually .... human error may occur
• raw material quality: in truth when you grind hundreds of tons of quartz, you'll surely have a few tons with a slightly different shade, when producing this factor may cause a slight shade difference between batch productions
• Cleanliness: image a big mixer which just ended a production of a black quartz .... the next step is cleaning, but it's done manually, so the next batch will certainly have some impurities from the batch before. 

• Polishing: people might not give it the importance it deserves, but in my opinion it's where most of the shade problems occur. It can be due to the following: 

• Change in the abrasive sequence between 2 productions: in truth great part of the shade variations arise from the different gloss points the material may have, this can cause uneven slabs, making the tiles cut from the same slab different in shade.
• Production variables: producing with different variables, namely water quantity or velocity of the production line
• Chemical enhancement: some production lines have a chemical applicator, the objective is to enhance the products physical properties and consequently may also affect  the gloss

It's more likely to have a shade problem with you supply when dealing with tiles, especially if the project is big and has to be produced with several batches. When dealing with countertops, it can also occur, depends on the attention the fabricator has regarding these issues, he can easily avoid them by using the same batch material for the job.

Slabs : Why do slabs size vary from manufacturer?

Slabs, namely engineered stone slabs vary due to the fact that it's made in a mould. Although moulds do vary, we have slab by slab moulds for quartz slab production lines, and block mould for marble based production lines. In reality the equipment was made to get an even 300 cm x 120 cm in the marble based material, and a 300 x 140 in the quartz.
In the agglomerate marble production lines the most common measure is 300x120, although in truth the block has a few more centimeters, so you'll probably be invoice for 306x123.
In the quartz agglomerate production lines the moulds can vary in size, technically the same production line can make 300x120 and 300x140 slabs. Regarding the exact size of the slabs, some manufacturers invoice 300x140, others 307x124 ... their is not really any limitation to it at the moment. The CE markings on slabs may shed some light on this issue. Nevertheless, be careful if you buy 300x140 and try to re-sale it with an add-on of a few cm, some manufacturers trim the edges with defect ... so before you send the slabs to the final destination make sure you take correct measurements of the whole load.
In recent years some manufacturers have bought bigger production lines and now sell different sizes than the ones I mentioned, however more than 80% of sales are still in these traditional measurements.

Quarella and the Evo Series

As I figure, Quarella is doing very hard material with the marble machinery, how? Well I can make an educated guess, feldspar, hard enough to be sawn in the traditional gangsaws ... Although to polish they'll need to use the granite lines to do the job...
Also, they are supplying 3000x780 mm material, so I guess they have done some restyling of their old gangsaws, so the block can be sawm in several ways, giving you different size slabs ...

Compact Marble the New Generation

To who normally follows the trends, in recent years little evolution has been made in the Compact Marble sector, mainly due to the brutal increase in Compact Quartz products. Therefore companies (who produce both products) have focussed all R&D budgets on the growing part of the company and have left the marble products in a stand still.

I believe in the following years, compact marble products will evolve, the technological out break will be huge, we just have to wait and see.

The colour trends have evolved so far, we see innovative products like these:

What is Engineered Stone?

What is engineered stone? It's a very common question, in truth several products may be fitted in to this description. Technically engineered stone is man made stone ... solid stone made up with natural aggregates. Normally bonded using polyester resin, concrete or other materials.

This man made stone uses high standards technology to give the final product a solid surface that looks and feels just like natural stone. Comparing this material to natural stone you have a few advantages, especially when decorating is involved, as you may create colourful, modern and innovative spaces.
Engineered stone may be made of several types of stone, it basically depends on the type of aggregates used in the filling. You'll find marble based and quartz based material, typically it may have the same usage as its base type of material, however it does have some technical problems regarding exterior use.
UV from sunlight is one of the things that most affect engineered stone negatively, especially the one that used polyester resin as the bonding agent. Even with UV inhibitors, I figure time will actually prevail, and the polyester will eventually be affected by it to a great extent.
Engineered stone, has, when polyester resin is used some different technical data from it's original stone material, in most cases it may even improve it's behaviour, unfortunately in other cases the product is affected by the bonding agents technical data.
But have no doubt that no product is perfect, fortunately engineered stone in my opinion has more to the positive end than to the negative one. It certainly is a product to look for while choosing interior decoration, engineered stone can be a colourful and unique product that will certainly differentiate your home.