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Innovation - Ceramic Tiles

Innovation in the Ceramic Tile Industry

Innovation is key to what we do. Take a look at some of our innovative technologies below.

Flash Sintering

With a reduced temperature and firing time, our Flash Sintering technology can cut energy, emissions and costs. It also has the added benefit of being able to alter a material's properties, e.g. toughening ceramics. Find out more about this revolutionary technology here.

Non-destructive testing of unfired glazes

We can help you to improve how to measure the thickness of your glaze, thereby reducing faults during firing. 

Antibacterial Coatings

Tiles can be prone to forming bacteria on their surfaces, and areas where such bacteria gather can cause a hazard to human health. Antibacterial agents, such as those included in household cleaning sprays can kill and remove bacteria from surfaces, but most of these types of products have a limited time period when they are active. This is especially the case in food contact areas.

A possible way to improve the efficacy of ceramic surfaces is to have an inherent antibacterial action included in the glaze coating. By formulating new glazes Lucideon is able to produce a glaze with long term antibacterial properties that reduces the potential for bacterial growth. Additionally, these coatings can also potentially reduce the surface roughness of ceramics, which lowers the available sites that bacteria are able to adhere to, and this in turn reduces the amount of bacteria that is able to grow on the surface.

Self-cleaning and anti-scratch tiles

Tiles are used as a hard-wearing, light-fast surface that can be easily cleaned. However, even the hardest surfaces can be scratched or damaged over time by abrasive cleaning techniques.

At Lucideon we can develop glazes that are more resistant to scratching than most standard commercially-available glazes by altering the constituents to give a very smooth hard surface that resists scratching for longer periods of time.

In some applications, such as tiles that are applied in places that are hard to obtain access to, it is difficult to keep the surface clean. A solution can be to apply a self cleaning technology to the tile surface.

Lucideon is able to develop glazes that are self-cleaning; all that is required is a splash of water to remove any adhered dirt (if the tiles are outside this can be in the form of rainfall).