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How abrasive machining affects surface characteristics of vitreous ceramic tile

Article in American Ceramic Society Bulletin · October 2003

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 The ground surfaces of ceramic tile are formed by brittle fracture and plastic deformation of the compositions that form
combinations of craters, fracture cracks and plastic deformation grooves. Maximum glossiness and minimum surface
roughness depend on the composition and microstructure of the materials and on the grinding conditions.
How Abrasive Machining
Affects Surface Characteristics of
Vitreous Ceramic Tile
P
orcelain tile, also called vitreous tile, is widely
used in the decoration of floors and walls for
hotel, office and family buildings.The raw mate
rials for making vitreous ceramic tile include
clay, feldspar and quartz or clay, feldspar, and talc,
with some color and glaze additives.These materials are
mixed and milled to fine powders, which are sprayed to
aggregate particles and pressed in molds with high pressure
to shape the tile. Finally, the tile are delivered to a roller
kiln and sintered at 1100–1300°C.
The tile can be provided as decorating materials after they
are edged, checked for quality and packaged. Ceramic tile
are produced in China according to Standard EN176.The
crystalline composition of vitreous ceramic tile typically
contains mullite, quartz, vitreous mass and pores.The bend-
ing strength and surface hardness of ceramic tile are >27
N/mm2 and Mhos scale 6, respectively.The wear resistance
is ~120–150 mm3.
Most vitreous tile are ground in grinding and polishing
machines to final products.These machines may be in a
grinding–polishing production line or a manual-polishing
machine.The grinding and polishing processes of vitreous
ceramic tile have many problems because of the special
properties of vitreous ceramic tile and machining condi-
tions, such as high hardness, wear resistance and brittleness
(thin piece, usually 5–8 mm in thickness), unfixed and with
large surface deflection.
C.Y.Wang,T.C. Kuang, Z. Qin and X.Wei
Institute of Manufacturing Technology, Guangdong University
of Technology, Guangzhou, China
©The American Ceramic Society American Ceramic Society Bulletin
Little research work has been done in the field of ceramic
tile machining. It has been reported that the grinding mech-
anism for ceramic tile is similar to that of other brittle
materials,1 which recently has been confirmed by the sur-
face analyses of sampled tile from an industrial tile-polishing
line.2 The manufacturing of grinding wheels and the actions
and optimization of grinding and polishing wheels for each
step, particularly for manual-polishing machines, also have
been studied.3 It has been found that the effects of quartz
and particle size are important to the wear rate and gloss
of porcelain tile.4
The reflection of light from the polished surface of brittle
materials—such as glass, granite, marble and ceramic tile,
which is defined as surface glossiness—is a major item of
quality-control data of these products. Some research in
the field of stone machining has shown that a thin damaged
layer exists on the surface detected using scanning electron
microscopy (SEM),5–7 X-ray diffractometry (XRD)7 and
transmission electron microscopy (TEM).5.6.8 The surface
layer shows only microcrystal materials with the same
structure as the original phase, but no chemical or physical
reaction in machining.5–7 It has been determined that the
structure of the SiO2 on granite surface is changed from α-
SiO2 to β-SiO2 structure.7 Some results also show that the
surface layer is of amorphous material or of microcrys-
talline and amorphous materials.8
In this article, the surface generation properties of
machined ceramic tile are characterized using several analy-
sis methods, including X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy
(XPS), XRD, SEM and polarized-light microscopy.The effects
of abrasive size on the material removal process, surface
glossiness and surface-damaged layer are analyzed.
www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9201
 How Abrasive Machining Affects …

Table I. Grinding Wheels and Grinding Parameters†

____________________________________________________________
Grain mesh Average grain Grinding
size No. size (µm) Abrasive Bond‡ step
THE EXPERIMENT ____________________________________________________________
100 325–400 SiC MOC Rough
A standard Vickers pyramid diamond indenter was 240 200–230 SiC MOC Rough
used as a single grit in the scratching test.The cutting 320 150–180 SiC MOC Semifinish
depths were 5, 10, 20, 30 and 50 µm, and the cutting 600 10–20 SiC MOC Semifinish
speeds were 0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 m/min.The tests 1000 3.5–7 SiC MOC Finish
were conducted using a computer numerically con- 1800 2.5–3.5 SiC MOC Finish
trolled (CNC) milling machine.The grinding process- Polishing wheel 200–230 Al2O3, etc. Resin
____________________________________________________________
Polish
es of a production line were simulated on a special †Grinding speed of 580 rpm ; grinding head diameter of 255 mm. ‡MOC is

manual machine for ceramic tile.The grinding wheels magnesium oxychloride cement.
and parameters are listed in Table I.The pressure was
adjusted by manually loading the handle of various
grinding wheels.The tile size was 400  400  5 mm. During the grinding
process, enough water was poured to cool the surface of the ceramic tile and
wash the grinding wheels and the tile.Three types of vitreous ceramic tile, listed
in Table II, were tested.

The machined sur-

Table II. Properties of Ceramic Tile faces of the ceramic
_____________________________________________________________________________
Ceramic Vickers Crystalline Mullite Quartz Vitreous tile were observed
Porosity Pore size
tile hardness grain size (µm) (vol%) (vol%) mass (vol%) (vol%) using SEM (Model
(µm)
_____________________________________________________________________________
A 661.0 10-30 32–40 15–18 35–40 3–5
XL30FEG).The
5–20
B 710.6 10-30 32–40 10–13 35–40 5–7 machined surfaces
3–50
C 614.2 10-30 12–15 10–13 35–40 3–5 and the original base
5–30
materials of the
ceramic tile also were
scanned using XRD (Model Y-4Q) with CuKα radiation and 2θ angles/steps of
2°–70°/0.1°/s and 24°–29.1°/0.02°/s.The changes of the electronic binding energy
of elements on the machined surfaces were detected using XPS (Model ES-300).

To study the surface-damaged layer, we fixed the ground ceramic-tile specimens

in resin and carefully ground their vertical cross sections.The cross sections were
observed using polarized-light microscopy (Model MeF3, Reichert-Jung) and SEM.
The ceramic tile surface reflection glossiness and roughness also were measured.

SCRATCHING USING A SINGLE DIAMOND

The ground grooves of ceramic tile appear as the combination of craters,
cracks, plastic deformation zones and pores, as shown in Fig. 1, which is similar to
that of abrasives machining of brittle materials, such as glass, ceramics and stone,
for example, marble scratch-
ing by single-point cutting
tools discussed in Ref. 9.The
plastic deformation and
fracture process are affected
by scratching parameters and
the properties of the brittle
materials.When an indenter
acts on brittle materials, the
crushed zone beneath the
indenter generates plastic
deformation.

The loading process also

causes media cracks and lat-
eral cracks. Media cracks are
perpendicular to the surface,
Fig. 1. Scratching grooves caused by various cutting depths in ceramic tile which exist as radial cracks or
A ((left to right) cutting depths of 5, 10 and 20 µm; cutting speed of 1
m/min). residual cracks under the

©The American Ceramic Society American Ceramic Society Bulletin www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9202

(a)
(b)
Fig. 2. Scratching groove with the
plastic deformation in ceramic tile
D: (a) groove and (b) magnification
of the area pointed by arrow in (a)
(cutting depth of 20 µm and cutting
speed of 0.5 m/min).
(a)
(b)
Fig. 4. Scratching groove with frac-
ture of (a) ceramic tile C (cutting
depth of 50 µm and cutting speed
of 1 m/min) and (b) ceramic tile A
(cutting depth of 20 µm and cutting
speed of 0.5 m/min).
©The American Ceramic Society
How Abrasive Machining Affects …
crushed zone.The lateral cracks may develop in arcs toward the surface,
which dominates the fracture breakage.The brittle material presents
plastic deformation when machining using a small cut depth and blunt
abrasive.These phenomena of ductile mode can be used to improve the
quality of grinding and polishing.9
In the ceramic tile scratching test, plastic deformation in the present test
is not obvious, because the cutting depths are not small enough.The
residual plastic formation zone occasionally can be observed at the
bottom of some scratching grooves, as shown in Figs. 2 and 3.The mate-
rials are crushed under the indenter to a relatively flat surface. Because
the grinding process involves cutting of many abrasive grains with a small
cutting depth, the plastic deformation in vitreous ceramic tile grinding
occurs more often than in the scratching process, which is important for
obtaining good grinding quality.
The deformation energy
releases in the unloading
process after the indenter
scratches across the sur-
face, which causes the cracks to gen-
erate in the loading process and fur-
ther develop unstably. Most lateral
cracks propagate to the surface and
result in chipping (Figs. 1–4). Some
cracks reach the surface, but they do
not chip, as shown at the right side of
Fig. 3.These cracks chip in the next
grinding process step or become the Fig. 3. Scratching groove in ceramic tile A showing (left) plastic
residual cracks in the tile. It is possible deformation and (right) residual cracks (cutting depth of 50
that these residual cracks mm and cutting speed of 1m/min).
result in the breakage of
ceramic tile when the tile are
ground under pressure, because their existence decreases the tile strength.
The objective of rough-grinding ceramic tile is to eliminate the surface
defaults efficiently.The limited development of cracks is necessary for
increasing the material removal rate.The chipping of the material must be
sufficient to flatten the surface, but it also must leave shallow grooves and
proper residual cracks to make the surface easy to grind in the succeeding
grinding processes.
EFFECTS OF THE PROPERTIES OF VITREOUS CERAMIC TILE
Some steps in the production of tile—such as drying, feldspar melting,
vitreous mass forming of sintered clay and mullite crystallization—create air
bubbles. As the air bubbles reach the surface, pores appear as microcraters.
Even if the porosity is controlled to increase the strength of ceramic tile
and to make the ceramic tile easy to be maintained, many pores remain on
the surface unless the tile have been glazed. Referring to the Griffith theory
in fracture mechanics, these pores act as the initial cracks in brittle fracture.
This means that the cracks are easily generated from the pores, develop and
even chip by the action of a stress field as load is added to the ceramic tile
surface.The chips and fracture craters of pores can be observed in Fig. 4.
In the sintering process of vitreous ceramic tile, the clay components are dissolved
in the melted feldspar to form mullite and spinel, with new crystalline structures, as
American Ceramic Society Bulletin www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9203
 How Abrasive Machining Affects …

well as cristobalite mixtures. Because the sintering temperature of vitreous

ceramic tile is normally 1100–1300°C and because the heat preservation at such
high temperature is not long enough, the crystal growth of mullite is usually not
complete.The solute in the vitreous mass, the interior and the boundary of
mullite grains are also the default sources of brittle fracture. Figure 4(b) shows
the fractures of glassy feldspar and pores with mullite.

The mullite and quartz grains have high mechanical strength, which is one of the
reasons that vitreous ceramic tile are difficult to be machined. Some initial cracks
also generate in the quartz boundary because of the transformation of the
quartz phase caused by the sintering temperature and cutting temperature.The
structure phase of quartz changes at 870°C.When the sintering temperature is
increased to 1000°C, the quartz is broken.

Melted feldspars and clays penetrate into the quartz cracks.The broken quartz is
dissolved in the mass vitreous material, and larger quartz grains and the result of
the mullite transformation remain in the tile. As ceramic tile are cooled to
573°C, transformation of the residual quartz phase causes shrinkage, which is
discussed below in detail.The cracks generate in the quartz grain boundary
because of different thermal expansion coefficients of the vitreous mass and the
quartz. During the machining process, material fracture and lost quartz grains
remain as craters in the machined surface.

EFFECTS OF CUTTING DEPTH AND SCRATCHING SPEED

With the increase of cutting depth, the plastic deformation decreases and the
brittle fracture increases.The degree of plastic deformation and brittle fracture
depends on the properties of the ceramic tile when the cutting parameters are
same. For example,
comparing the mor-
phographics of the (a) (b)
scratching grooves of
ceramic tile A and C,
some differences can
be found. Figure 5(b)
of ceramic tile C
shows some typical
large lateral crack
chips that regularly
occur in the groove
Fig. 5. Scratching grooves for various cutting speeds ((left to right) 2, 1.5 and 0.5 m/min and cutting depth
surface, resulting in of 20 µm) for (a) ceramic tile A and (b) ceramic tile C.
groove width variation.

On the other hand, the lateral cracks in ceramic tile A densely develop (Fig. 5
(a)), and the groove width varies slightly. In general, the width of the scratching
groove can be described as proportional to the cutting depth; it indicates that
material removal volume also is proportional to cutting depth or the penetrating
depth of the abrasive grains. Cutting depth can be considered as one of the
major factors for increasing the removal rate and improving the surface quality.

The scratching speed has no obvious effect on groove morphographics (Fig. 5).
The speeds tested here are changed in a small range, which is not large enough to
affect crack development. In the grinding process, as the cutting speed increases,
the effective cutting depth of a single abrasive grain decreases, and the grinding
times at the same point of the workpiece increase.The plastic deformation degree
increases correspondingly. In industrial production, the main spindle rotating speed
is always constant.

©The American Ceramic Society American Ceramic Society Bulletin www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9204
 How Abrasive Machining Affects …

(a) The relationships between the scratching process and the properties of the
ceramic tile—such as hardness, fracture toughness and microstructure—
under various scratching conditions remain unclear.

SURFACE MORPHOLOGY MACHINED BY ABRASIVE WHEELS

The results described in single diamond grit scratching tests are further
confirmed by the morphographics of ground surfaces using various grinding
wheels.There are different combinations of craters (pores), fracture cracks
and plastic deformation grooves on machined surfaces, as shown in Fig. 6.
(b) The plastic deformation or brittle fracture of the surface during the
grinding process depends on the grinding conditions, which include the
performances of grinding wheels, grain mesh size of grinding steps, feed
rate and grinding pressure.

With grain mesh size Nos. 34–280, the material of the workpiece must be
removed efficiently with high grinding pressure in rough grinding. Because of
large grinding pressure, the abrasive grains can penetrate deeply into the
tile surface to cause chipping.The abrasive grains are so coarse that they
can bear the heavy load. Macrochipping and microchipping, flatting and loss
(c) of abrasive grains are the main wear mechanism of the grinding wheels.The
sharp abrasive grains remove the materials by means of brittle fracture, and
many residual fracture grooves and craters remain on the surface.The worn
(blunt) abrasive grains, because they are pressured by high load, cause some
plastic deformation at the bottoms of grooves and induce lateral cracks
(see Fig. 6(a)).

In the semifinish grinding process (grain mesh size Nos. 320–800) and the
finish grinding process (grain mesh size Nos. 800–1800), the plastic
deformation grooves increase and the craters caused by brittle fracture
(d) decrease as the abrasive grain size decreases, as shown in Figs. 6(b)–(d).
The residual grooves become shallower, and the plastic deformation area
increases, resulting in the increase of glossiness because of the visualization
of the crystalline facets.The polished surface consists of small plastic
deformation grooves, pores and craters (Fig. 6(e)). In this case, the crystal
surfaces appear and are smooth.The residual pores and craters restrict
further increase of the surface glossiness.

SURFACE ROUGHNESS AND SURFACE GLOSSINESS

(e)
The relation curves of surface roughness Ra (µm) and surface glossiness
(degree) versus grain mesh No. of the grinding wheels are shown in
Fig. 7. In rough-
grinding processes,
most of the surface
consists of fracture
craters.These
craters scatter
light; therefore, the
surface glossiness
Fig. 6. Machined surfaces mor- values are almost
phologies caused by various grinding constant and at a low
wheels in ceramic tile A: grain mesh level. It is difficult to
size Nos. (a) 100, (b) 600, (c) 1000 improve the surface
and (d) 1800 and (e) by polishing.
glossiness during these
steps. After entering into
finish grinding steps, the
Fig. 7. Grain mesh size No. of grinding wheels versus surface roughness and
surface glossiness.

©The American Ceramic Society American Ceramic Society Bulletin www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9205
 How Abrasive Machining Affects …

light reflection of the surface increases, and the surface glossiness 200 µm
increases rapidly.The maximum glossiness and minimum surface
roughness of ceramic tile depend on the composition and
microstructure of the tile and on the grinding conditions.

The surface roughness Ra decrease rapidly as the grain mesh

sizes decrease. After the grain sizes decrease to a small range
(grain mesh size No. 1000 in Fig. 7), the surface roughness
decreases slightly, and the surface is almost flat. Even though the
(a)
glossiness increases after polishing, the values of surface rough-
ness decrease little. It means there is no obvious relationship 200 µm
between surface glossiness and roughness.

Surface roughness Ra and surface glossiness are two types of

measurement of the surface quality. Curves of surface roughness
and surface glossiness versus abrasive grain sizes of the grinding
wheels have a turning point in finish grinding. From these results,
we suggest that the surface roughness measurement can be used
to control semifinish grinding quality and the surface glossiness (b)
measurement to check the finish grinding and polishing quality.
200 µm
SURFACE-DAMAGED LAYER OBSERVATION USING
POLARIZED-LIGHT MICROSCOPY
When we observe machined surfaces, we find that the microc-
racks formed inside the crystal grain of ceramic tile during
machining are transparent and reflect light.Therefore, we can see
them clearly using stereomicroscopy.These cracks cannot be
found using SEM, because they are not on the surface. Using (c)
polarized-light microscopy, we have found the surface-damaged
layer, as shown in Fig. 8. 200 µm

The surface-damaged layers of two types of ceramic tile have

been observed from the rough-grinding step and the polishing
step.The thicknesses of the layers are not significiantly different.
The average thickness of the damaged layer is ~60 µm and varies
from near zero to a maximum value 193 µm.The values are
much higher than the damaged layer thickness of 3–5 µm of pol-
ished granite decribed in Ref. 5, in which we measure the trans- (d)
parent crystal layer as the damged layer.
200 µm
We have carefully observed the cross sections of the specimens,
but we cannot find the thin layer that is called surface glossiness
film in Refs. 5, 6 and 8. Referring to the surface observation
results by SEM in Fig. 6, we consider that the surface-damaged
layer consists only of broken mineral micrograins caused by mic-
ocracks and macrocracks formed during machining. However,
semifinishing and polishing only make the crystal surfaces appear
smooth and to reflect light.The thickness of the damaged layer is (e)
decided by the fracture on the bottom of the grooves formed in
previous machining steps. Fig. 8. Cross sections of ground sur-
face of (a), (b) and (c) ceramic tile
A; (d), (e) and (f) ceramic tile C. (a)
DETECTION BY XRD and (d) ground with grain mesh size
To study whether any new substances are formed or the structures of surface No. 100; (b) and (e) ground with
grain mesh size No. 1800; and (c)
materials are changed in the surface-damaged layer, the machined surface and and (f) polished.

©The American Ceramic Society American Ceramic Society Bulletin www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9206
 How Abrasive Machining Affects …

the original surface of the ceramic tile have been stud-

ied using XRD. Partial results are shown in Fig. 9.
Compared with the original surface, the phase composi-
tions of the surfaces machined using grinding wheels
with grain mesh size Nos. 240, 600 and 1800 show no
obvious changes (see Fig. 9).Therefore, we cannot find
the generation of new substances after machining.

We find that the intensity of the diffraction peak of

quartz changes after polishing and that the phase struc-
ture of all of quartz changes from α-SiO2 to β-SiO2, as
shown in Fig. 9.The instantaneous temperature of grind-
ing can reach 900∞C in stone grinding, which is higher
than that of ceramic tile grinding.The turning point of
the structure phase of quartz is 537°C.We suggest that
the rapid increase of grinding temperature causes the
phase transformation of quartz.

During the rough-grinding process, the breakage of

ceramic tile is the main problem that increases cost. As
discussed above, the quartz grain in the surface trans-
forms its phase and causes the grains to expand and
condense.Therefore, thermal stress concentration
occurs in the contact area between the grinding wheel
and the tile, which causes the cracks.These cracks and
other residual cracks in the damaged layer mentioned
above may cause tile breakage.

Fig. 9. XRD patterns of the machined surface and original surface of

ceramic tile C.

We also have measured the

mean grain sizes of the surface
quartz phases using XRD.The
results show that the average
grain size in the machined sur-
face is ~60 nm.The results also
show that there is only little
variation with the changes of
the grain mesh sizes of the
grinding wheel and the ceramic
tile.The measured values are
~10 nm larger than those of
the original quartz phases of
the ceramic tile used.We sug-
gest that the grinding tempera-
ture causes the growth of
grain size and that the materi-
als in the machined surface Fig.10. XPS diagrams of ceramic tile B ((curve 1) original surface, (curve 2)
layer are crystalline. ground with grain mesh size No. 1000 and (curve 3) polished).

XPS ANALYSIS
Figure 10 presents the results of the XPS measurement.The surface electronic binding
energy of four major elements on the surface increase after the ceramic tile is ground

©The American Ceramic Society American Ceramic Society Bulletin www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9207
 How Abrasive Machining …

and polished.We cannot distinguish exactly the changes of the mechanical action and
possible chemical actions between grinding wheel and ceramic tile.We suggest the
mechanical grinding action is the major reason for the increase of surface energy and
the surface electronic binding energy. Also, there is no obvious chemical reaction on
the surface layer.

CONCLUSIONS
Although many problems of the surface properties of vitreous ceramic tile need fur-
ther study, some results can be provided from the current work.
• In vitreous ceramic tile, grinding the plastic deformation grooves, craters (pores) and
cracks are the main characteristics of the machined surface.
• There are residual microcracks in the surface-damaged layer. No new substance is
formed by mechanical action and chemical reaction.
• The thermal impact cracks caused by the transformation of quartz crystalline phase
formed by grinding temperature is the main reason of tile fracture during processing.
• The surface roughness and surface glossiness can be used to evaluate the grinding
quality under different procedures. ■

References
1C.Y.Wang, X.Wei and H.Yuan,“Grinding Mechanism of Vitreous Ceramic Tile” (in Chin.), Chin. J. Mech. Eng.,

9 [8] 9–11 (1998).

2C.Y.Wang, X.Wei and H.Yuan,“Polishing of Ceramic Tiles,” Mater. Manuf. Process., 17 [3] 401–13 (2002).
3E. Sánchez, J. Garciía-ten, M.J. Ibáñez, M.J. Orts,V. Cantavella, J. Sánchez and C. Soler,“Polishing Porcelain Tile:

Part 1—Wear Mechanism,” Am. Ceram. Soc. Bull., 81 [9] 50–54 (2002).
4E. Sánchez, J. Garciía-ten, M.J. Ibáñez, M.J. Orts,V. Cantavella, J. Sánchez and C. Soler,“Polishing Porcelain Tile:

Part 2—Influence of Microstructure and Microhardness,” Am. Ceram. Soc. Bull., 81 [12] 57-61 (2002).
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Microscope” (in Chin.), Journal of Shandong Institute of Building Materials, 13 [4] 308–10 (1999).
6J. Xie, G.H.Yang and Y. Liu,“Generation Mechanism of the Decorative Glossy Film and Polishing Tool” (in

Chin.), Diamond and Abrasive Engineering, 103 [1] 20–24 (1998).

7H. Huang, H.J. Xu and X.P. Xu,“Study on Surface Structure of the Polished Granite” (in Chin.),Tool Eng., 34

[Suppl] 11–12 (2000).

8L.Yin and Z. Liu,“Study of Surface Damaged Layer of Marble Polished” (in Chin.), Abrasive and Grinding, 74

[2] 21–22 (1993).

9C.Y.Wang and R. Clausen,“Marble Cutting with Single-Point Cutting Tool and Diamond Segment,” Int. J.

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©The American Ceramic Society American Ceramic Society Bulletin www.ceramicbulletin.org October 2003 9208
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