Mold box and method of manufacturing a block

Abstract

The present invention relates a mold box method of manufacturing a block, and a wall block with a stepped-back strata and ledges imprinted on one or more faces of the block. A mold box is provided with a block face liner that is machine cut to create a particular strata and ledge pattern that is widest at the top of the liner and steps back over a plurality of planes to a narrower width at the bottom of the liner. Masonry material is allowed to form in the mold box around the liner to produce the strata and ledges imprint onto one or more faces of the block. The invention also relates to the mold box, multiple embodiments of the block face liner with differing strata and ledge patterns, and to blocks formed in the mold box and methods of constructing walls with the blocks.

Description

[0001]This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60 / 944,177, filed Jun. 15, 2007, entitled “Method of Manufacturing a Block”, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference herein.FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0002]This invention relates generally to a method of manufacturing a block, the block and walls constructed from such blocks. In particular, this invention relates to a block manufactured with a one or more faces that have a plurality of irregularly contoured strata and ledges on a plurality of planes.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0003]In the manufacture of retaining wall blocks and other kinds of blocks made from concrete, it is common to use a mold that forms a block module which is then split to form two or more blocks. When a block module is split, the split surface has an irregular appearance, which is desirable if the desired look is one of natural stone. A split block appearance has a desirable appearance for many applications, such as re...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0022]The wall block may include at least one face surface having a stepped surface contour stepping inwardly from the upper surface of the block to the lower surface of the block and additionally may have both the first and second face surfaces having a stepped surface contour that may step inwardly from the upper surface of the block to the lower surface of the block. The wall block may

Problems solved by technology

This is a labor intensive undertaking that also can result in undesirable damage to the blocks and high overall costs of production.

This reduces the possibility that the material will hang up in the mold box during removal due to either vacuum or suctional forces caused by remaining liquid in the material or undercut areas in the side wall.

However, the creation of a truly random appearance requires the production of multiple block shapes for use in a single retaining wall.

This is inefficient from a production standpoint because this requires multiple molds and more kinds of blocks to inventory.

If only one face of the block is intended to be the front face, then the block system will suffer a trade-off between having enough face sizes to create a random, natural appearance and the cost and inefficiency of using multiple molds and creating multiple inventory items.

Images