Translucent Natural Rock Sheet Cladding With Micrometric Thinning
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing technologies are incapable of producing large, petrographic slides with micrometric precision and suitable thickness for decorative cladding, and lack the ability to handle curved profiles, limiting their use in the ornamental stone sector.
Innovation Solution
A thinning device using a mobile conveyor belt with adaptable plungers and a support plate, coupled with precise height gauges, gradually reduces rock thickness to micrometric precision, allowing for the production of translucent natural stone sheets that can be customized in size and shape, and are sandwiched between polarized films for aesthetic effects.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If conventional diamond wire loom machines are used to cut rock blocks into sheets, then rock sheets can be produced, but the sheets cannot achieve micrometric precision thickness and large dimensions required for petrographic slides
Solution Approach 1:
The thinning process is divided into multiple stages using a multi-stage device with sequential plungers. Each plunger performs a specific thinning operation, allowing progressive reduction of thickness to micrometric precision without requiring a single complex cutting operation.
Solution Approach 2:
A support plate is introduced as an intermediary element between the rock sheet and the plungers. The support plate provides a stable base for the rock sheet during the thinning process, enabling precise control of thickness reduction while maintaining the sheet's structural integrity.
2Manufacturing precision
If rock sheets are thinned to micrometric precision, then petrographic quality is achieved, but the production scale is limited to small laboratory samples
Solution Approach 1:
The device incorporates a mobile conveyor belt that dynamically transports rock sheets of various sizes through the thinning process. This dynamic system allows the same micrometric precision mechanism to handle both small laboratory samples and large-scale petrographic slides, eliminating the size limitation.
Solution Approach 2:
The thinning device is designed with universal applicability, capable of processing rock sheets across a wide range of dimensions. The mobile conveyor system and adjustable plungers work together to provide consistent micrometric precision regardless of the sheet size, making the device suitable for both laboratory and industrial applications.
3Manufacturing precision
If traditional polishing methods are used, then stone sheets can be polished, but curved profiles cannot be handled and precision is insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The polishing system uses a mobile conveyor belt that can adapt to different sheet shapes and profiles. The dynamic positioning system allows the polishing plungers to accommodate curved profiles and various geometries, providing precise polishing control for diverse rock sheet shapes.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
Enables the production of translucent natural stone sheets with dynamic colors and textures, suitable for decorative cladding, offering aesthetic appeal and versatility in shape and size, filling a niche market in the ornamental stone sector.
Implementation Method 1
the optical effect of birefringence gives unusual colors and textures to the minerals present in a rock sheet, when observed by a transmitted light polarizing microscope
Implementation Method 2
optical anisotropy is a crystallographic characteristic of certain minerals, where the physical properties of their crystallographic arrangement become different depending on the direction in which they are analyzed
Implementation Method 3
Each type of mineral, with anisotropic properties, subjected to this polarized light will behave in a unique way in terms of color, texture and other technical characteristics, due to the phenomenon called pleochroism
Data Source
AI summary
This patent describes a new type of decorative cladding, consisting of an assembly whose main element is a translucent natural stone sheet (LR), interposed by polarized films (PP) which, when subjected to a light source (FL), show optical phenomena in the minerals contained in the sheet, providing the observer with unusual colors, effects and textures. It includes a thinning device (DDD) which is equipped with conveyor belts (EST); equipped with a plurality of horizontal skids (PAH), preferably with a flap, fixed below the belt (EST), helping to support the support grid (PS); and is equipped with a plurality of thinning modules (MD), responsible for producing the aforementioned sheets of translucent natural stone.