Hello, this is what I have been up to in my spare time. When I told a friend about my story about Gulsons Brickworks, they said; "why don't you do one on Oakleigh?" So I did and here it is. It is incomplete and is very much a work in progress. There is not a lot around that tells their story so if you have any information, or more particularly photographs, please tell me and I will get a copy if that is OK with you? I have compiled this from a whole host of sources. Compiled
means “made up from other sources.” I
don’t claim much in the originality department, except putting it in one
document. Having no desire to “re-invent the wheel,” large blocks of
appropriate information have been copied whole from the Internet and other
parts adapted from other published works. This is just the beginning. I have over 150 pages to upload and re-format so please be patient.
An aerial view of some of the brickworks in 1931
A Whimper and a Bang
On a quiet warm summer day in December 1982, two small simultaneous, muffled explosions broke the silence. For years, the old brick works had lain empty, idle, vandalized and defaced by graffiti with its’ nearby deep brick pit long since filled by years of the suburb’s refuse. Within seconds, the two tall brick chimneys fell to the ground in a cloud of dust and ash.
Their
fall was barely noticed.
And
that is how over one hundred years of brick making in Oakleigh came to an
end. These chimneys were the last
operational remnant of this once thriving industry, now gone. Once, the brick works at Oakleigh supplied around 20% of Melbourne's bricks. Their collapse was the end of an era.
The
chimneys were part of the Oakleigh Brick Company works in Stamford Road, This long established company had supplied countless millions of bricks for the building
of Oakleigh and the surrounding suburbs.
Their
story and that of several other brick makers has all but disappeared from the
landscape and is fast moving from memory into history. The story of the brickworks in Oakleigh is
of significance as an example of our early local industry. Bricks manufactured at their sites were used
to construct the majority of the older buildings in Oakleigh, including many of
its public buildings and these works were a major employer in Oakleigh. When the Oakleigh Council decided to create the Eaton Mall, they covered it with brick pavers. Knowledge of its past still fresh. Many of the streets around it were also done in pavers. When Monash Council redid the mall, up came the pavers and down went square stone pavers to give it a more "mediterranean" look. Substituting an imported culture for a local one seems to be the standard these days. Save us from architects wanting to make a statement without reference to the past.
The Companies
The brick, pipe and tile works in one form or another were in existence for over 100 years. During that period, some properties changed hands several times. Although there were eight or nine quarries in the area, there were around forty different operators. It is sometimes difficult to separate some of the articles published about them because the local newspapers seemed to use a common expression, namely “Oakleigh brickworks” to describe any one of several different companies. The following is a list of the operators. The list is in chronological order of commencement of the works; it may not yet be complete.
Company |
Address
|
From
|
To
|
Oakleigh Black Brick
& Tile
Co Pty Ltd
|
Ferntree
Gully Road Notting Hill
|
1857
|
1884
|
John and Henry Goding
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1885
|
1914
|
Brickyards, Clarton St
Oakleigh
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1889
|
1889
|
Eureka Brickworks
|
Dandenong Road Oakleigh
|
1889
|
1889
|
Excelsior Brickworks
(Wright & Wade)
|
Dandenong Road Oakleigh
|
1889
|
1889
|
Moroney Brothers FTG Rd
Oakleigh
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1890
|
1897
|
Dicksons Brickyard
|
Park Road Oakleigh
|
1891
|
1891
|
Scott Oakleigh
Brickworks
|
Dandenong Rd (B/w Grant
& Clyde Sts)
|
1892
|
1896
|
Brick & Pipe Company
(Oakleigh Station) Ltd
|
Warrigal Road Oakleigh
|
1894
|
1895
|
Dixons Park Road
Oakleigh
|
Park Road Oakleigh
|
1894
|
1895
|
Henry Ethell Stamford Rd
Oakleigh
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1906
|
1909
|
Baxter & McKell
Stamford Rd
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1910
|
1916
|
Oakleigh Junction Brick
Company Pty Ltd
|
Cnr Dandenong Road and
Ferntree Gully Road
|
1910
|
1921
|
Evans Brothers Roof
Tiling
Pty Ltd
|
Park Road Oakleigh
|
1912
|
1968
|
Glen Iris Brick Tile and
Terra Cotta Pipe Co Pty Ltd
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1912
|
1978
|
New Gamble Brick &
Quarrying Co Pty Ltd
|
Ferntree Gully and
Dublin Streets Oakleigh
|
1912
|
1982
|
Oakleigh Brick Co
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1912
|
1976
|
Terra Cotta Roofing Tile
Company Pty Ltd
|
Box Hill Road Oakleigh
(Huntingdale Road)
|
1921
|
1929
|
Stamford Brick Company
|
Stamford Road Oakleigh
|
1923
|
1978
|
Reliance Tile Company
Ltd
|
Box Hill Road Oakleigh
(Huntingdale Road)
|
1927
|
1939
|
Atlas Cement and Tile Co
|
Dalgety Street Oakleigh
|
1928
|
1949
|
Major and Wells (Major
R.W)
|
Neerim Road Carnegie
|
1930
|
1935
|
Sun Cement Tile Works
|
135 Neerim Road Carnegie
|
1935
|
1957
|
Globe Cement Tile Works
|
111 Murrumbeena Road
Murrumbeena
|
1937
|
1958
|
Wellburn Tile Co
|
Box Hill Road Oakleigh
(Huntingdale Road)
|
1940
|
1952
|
Masonry Veneer Pty Ltd
|
North Road Huntingdale
|
1946
|
2013
|
73 Westminster Street
Huntingdale
|
1946
|
1968
|
|
Eclipse Tileworks
|
1949
|
1952
|
|
Reichell Tile Company
|
North Road Clayton
|
1949
|
1950
|
Atlas Products
(Victoria) Pty Ltd
|
Dalgety Street Oakleigh
|
1950
|
1968
|
Atom Tile Works
|
Shafton Street Oakleigh
|
1951
|
1952
|
Clements and Baker
|
Natalia Street Oakleigh
|
1951
|
1952
|
Merval Tiles
|
Clifford Street Oakleigh
|
1951
|
1952
|
Watts I
|
486 Dandenong Road
Carnegie
|
1951
|
1951
|
Penhall and Clements
|
486 Dandenong Road
Carnegie
|
1952
|
1952
|
Cemantile Industries Pty
Ltd
|
Main Road Clayton
|
1956
|
1968
|
Harvey Cement Products
Pty Ltd
|
440 Clayton Road Clayton
|
1958
|
1958
|
Sun Cement Tiles Pty Ltd
|
30 Hargreaves Street
Oakleigh
|
1958
|
1961
|
Presa
|
Fairbank Road Clayton
|
1968
|
1962
|
Brickworks at Oakleigh
John DeBurgh Perceval 1946
John Perceval, well known artist met Guy Boyd when they were both Cartographers during the Second World War. After the war, he moved to "Open Country", the Boyd studio in Carnegie. See my post in "The Rameking" for more about them. This painting appears to be of the Glen Iris works painted from Moroneys Hill looking south west.
There were many individuals and companies that operated in Oakleigh. Some companies had several owners over the course of their lives. Company records are scarce and almost no photographic evidence remains. Alphabetically, these are the ones who operated.
Atlas Cement and Tile Co
Atlas Products (Victoria) Pty Ltd
Atom Tile Works
Australian Plaster Industries Pty Ltd
Baxter & McKell Stamford Rd
Brick & Pipe Company (Oakleigh Station) Ltd
Brickyards, Clarton St Oakleigh
Cemantile Industries Pty Ltd
Clements and Baker
Clifton Brick
Dicksons Brickyard
Dixons Park Road Oakleigh
Eclipse Tileworks
Henry Ethell Stamford Rd Oakleigh
Eureka Brickworks
Evans Brothers Roof Tiling Pty Ltd
Excelsior Brickworks (Wright & Wade)
Glen Iris Brick Tile and Terra Cotta Pipe Co Pty Ltd
Globe Cement Tile Works
Harvey Cement Products Pty Ltd
John and Henry Goding
Major and Wells (Major R.W)
Masonry Veneer Pty Ltd
Merval Tiles
Moroney Brothers FTG Rd Oakleigh
New Gamble Brick & Quarrying Co Pty Ltd
Oakleigh Black Brick & Tile Co Pty Ltd
Oakleigh Brick Co
Oakleigh Junction Brick Company Pty Ltd
Penhall and Clements
Presa
Reichell Tile Company
Reliance Tile Company Ltd
Scott Oakleigh Brickworks
Stamford Brick Company
Sun Cement Tile Works
Sun Cement Tiles Pty Ltd
Terra Cotta Roofing Tile Company Pty Ltd
Watts I
Wellburn Tile Co
Significance
The quarries for the brick works were located at Oakleigh and nearby in Oakleigh East and Notting Hill, Victoria. Oakleigh is located approximately 14 kilometers South East of Melbourne, the State capital of Victoria. (Co-ordinates 37’54’47 s, 145’06’07 e). When Oakleigh was amalgamated at the end of 1994 into Monash, with a small section going to Kingston City, the City of Oakleigh (3166, 15 km SE, Monash City) comprised 3084 ha with about 55,000 residents. Its genesis was a square mile (262.4 ha) village reserve surveyed in August 1850 at the South Yarra Pound on Scotchman's Creek; a tributary of Gardiners Creek, 10 miles (16 km) South-East of Melbourne.
On the 30th of January 1893, the Federal Bank of Australia Limited failed. It wasn’t the first, but when it closed its doors, it was the end of the land boom in Victoria. Following the gold rush of the 1850s, money was plentiful and the price of land increased spectacularly between 1880 and 1890, also in part fuelled by population growth. The currency of the times was optimism and the skyline of Melbourne changed dramatically with the construction of many high-rise buildings. Melbourne was now larger than many European cities. Land speculation was a game that many people were playing.
Topography
Oakleigh is located in what is known as the “sandbelt” extending from Caulfield and arcing through Oakleigh and back through to the bayside suburb of Black Rock. The major extractive industry in these areas has been sand quarrying, with brick clay in Oakleigh coming second. The first recorded “survey” of soil type in Oakleigh was by Mr Arthur Bedford Orlebar, BA, MA, (Oxford) a National Schools Board Inspector, who reported on the 9th of November 1854 that “the soil being the same as in South Melbourne and Prahran, viz, a silicious sand and clay or schistose rock.” (A few years later, in 1858, Arthur Orlebar, a Sawyer was living in Oakleigh and A.B. had migrated to India where he became a professor of Astronomy in Bombay. He later returned to Melbourne and died here in 1866.)
Vegetation
Early histories report Ring-Tail Possums, Bandicoots, Koala, Kangaroo and wallaby as well as numerous native birds in the area.
Aboriginal Occupation
Originally home to the Kulin people, according to T.G.Newton, (1953) “it was well known that Aborigines conducted their coroborees on the Atkinson Street Hill where, later the residences of the Nelson family, Dr Brown, Councillor Cole, Dr Morrison, Dr Adamson and others have been erected.” It is also recorded that aboriginals once camped on the site of the original Court-House on the Broadway.
Rather than describe the kilns in use at each of the brick works, it is probably better to generically cover the types of kilns they used. Brick kilns first started in pits then walls were added. These are known as “Clamps.”that were ventilated at the top, rather than have a chimney. Building a tall chimney stack, allowed the fire to burn more efficiently by improving air flow or “draw” through the kiln. The bricks produced by Clamps were not of high quality. Variations of the different kilns have been invented over the years with varying degrees of efficiency and cost, but all kilns fall into one, or both, of the following categories:
There were several “Hoffman” kilns built at some of the brick works in Oakleigh. The Hoffman Brick and Tile Company was originally established in Albert Street Brunswick in 1870. They expanded in 1884 to 70 acres after Buying 36 acres in Dawson Street, making it the largest brickworks in Victoria. The Melbourne suburb of Brunswick was known for its deposits of clay, so it became a centre for pottery production. Brick makers had been using the clay since the 1840s. At the end of the nineteenth century, there were more than a half-dozen potteries operating in the Melbourne inner suburb of Brunswick.
“Meg Morris and Ann Reynolds were held captive
at this Brick Works by Phyllis Hunt’s boyfriend Brian Lowe in a storyline
building up to Prisoner’s 500th Episode in 1984. Bricks are everywhere in Prisoner, all the time. Even the
officers live in brick buildings. To
viewers from other parts of the world this may seem peculiar, perhaps even the
result of budget consideration, but, no!
There really are bricks everywhere in Melbourne.”
Hank Donat, Mister
SF at
Standard Brick Works, Box Hill
The brick, pipe
and tile works sites are of local historical significance for its association
with the post-World War 1 & II housing construction boom in Melbourne,
because bricks, pipes and tiles were much in demand as a mass-produced, and
relatively easy to use building material.
The Works also helped revolutionize aspects of the building industry in
the post-war periods. These sites, produced the bulk of Oakleigh and districts’
brick, pipe and tile requirements during this period. The sites are also
significant for their association with Oakleigh as a centre of industrial
activity at the time.
Location Details
Oakleigh is an early outer south-eastern suburb of Melbourne,
first sub-divided in 1853. Like many
brickworks around Australia, the Oakleigh brick makers not only made bricks,
pipes and tiles, but also a small amount of other pottery including sanitary
and domestic wares, although the type of clay here was generally unsuitable for
anything other than brick, pipe and tile.
The locations of these brickworks were
chosen due to proximity to a source of good clay, transport and a permanent supply
of water for mixing. Oakleigh was also
an area of growing low cost housing and a ready supply of labour.
Some of the Historical Brickworks’ Sites
In
pre-mechanical times, brick clay was prepared by being milled in a horse-drawn
pugmill. Bricks were pressed by
hand. This continued until brick-making
machines were imported from England.
Newer kilns had been built by this time. Oakleigh was home to
numerous brickworks over the years, some were one-man operations, others,
family concerns, some going to several generations.
History
William Maitland
Atkinson, appointed first Pound Keeper on 30 July 1842, chose the pound site
that was excised from John McMillan's cattle run first licensed in 1840. It was on a track to 'Western Port' known
locally as No Good Damper Road, the run and inn near the present Springvale
six-way junction where Dandenong and Centre Roads converge.
The
main Dandenong Road was defined to run through the Oakleigh village reserve
before the area was incorporated into the Mulgrave parish in March 1853. The name of Oakleigh probably derives from
early settler connections with Oakleigh Park in Hertfordshire, now North
London. Warrigal Road on the Western boundary was originally McMillan Street.
With Ferntree Gully and Wellington Roads as major routes to the Dandenong
Ranges branching off near Oakleigh, the township grew as a main road staging
post. From 1857 it was headquarters for
the road district, which became Oakleigh and Mulgrave Shire in December 1871.
The
Gippsland railway, constructed westwards from Sale to reach Oakleigh in 1877,
parallels the main road. The link with Melbourne's Princes Bridge Station, was
completed in April 1879 and prompted 1880s subdivisions that boosted the
population sufficiently for a borough of Oakleigh to sever from the shire in
March 1891. Six years later Oakleigh was removed from the shire's conjoint
title.
The
town's commercial centre gradually shifted towards the station complex. Two
short-lived lines, the private Rosstown (Carnegie) Junction Railway (1883) and
the Outer Circle (1890) branched from the Gippsland line at what became Hughesdale
in the area annexed from Caulfield in April 1913. Until 1922 a railways
workshop provided local employment.
Oakleigh-born soldier and aviator E.A. (Pard) Mustar (1893-1971) began
his career with the railways engineering division in 1911. He worked with my father in New Guinea, pre
WW2 on an oil exploration project.
Electrification
of the rail line in 1922 extended suburban development. Villa estates, mostly timber, reached out
along the railway from Hughesdale to Clayton and Westall. The population doubled to 12,000 between
1921 and 1933 enabling an upgrade in municipal status to a town in 1924 and a
city on 2 August 1927. Annexations from Mulgrave Shire in 1948 and again in
1959, together with sections from Moorabbin and Springvale enlarged the city's
area. From 1945 to 1961 the population trebled to 48 000, thereafter peaking at
57 284 in 1971 when 30% were born outside Australia.
Immigrants
were drawn to the area by migrant hostel accommodation at Holmesglen (from
1954) and then Westall (1970), and by new industry employment. This move was
reflected by 1974 in the 24 nationalities among students at Amstel (North
Clayton) primary school, opened in 1958 and now closed. People from Britain and
Italy predominated in the 1950s, with the Greek component then rising
significantly to be the largest migrant group in 1981. From the 1980s,
Greek-born people were outnumbered by those from Asia, predominantly
Vietnamese.
Until
the 1950s the dominant industries were small farms and market gardens, together
with brick making based on the Scotchman's Creek clay pits. They were
superseded by manufacturing and sand extraction in the south-east. Disused clay pits became interim rubbish
tips in the 1970s before conversion to reserves. Brickmakers Park is an extension
of an older creekside sports and recreation reserve, now included in the
Scotchmans Creek Linear Park. A
municipal nine-hole golf course lies along the creek's North side.
From
1927 to 1994 the football club, based at the recreation reserve on Warrigal
Road, was a member of the Victorian Football Association. The contiguous
Metropolitan (1908) and Huntingdale (1941) golf courses, together with Spring
Valley (1948) in South-East Clayton, were established on the sand belt
stretching into Moorabbin.
Oakleigh
General Cemetery, established 1859 and closed for burials in 1960, is now a
Pioneer Memorial Park. There is also a
public memorial to Father Nicholas Moutafis, Oakleigh's Greek Orthodox pastor
from 1964 to 2001.
The Victorian Legislative Assembly seat of
Oakleigh, even with boundary changes, has been centred on the municipality
since 1927. Originally a stronghold of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), it has
returned maverick conservatives as well as mainstream members of both the ALP
and the Liberal Party.
Clay Pit at Northcote Pottery
The Land Boom
Land speculation
had been the driver of this expansion.
The Federal Bank had been set up in 1882 to fund speculation on the new
suburban sub-divisions. In 1887 some of the banks began restricting
lending. Rentals had fallen because of
oversupply in the market. Borrowers
began defaulting on their repayments.
By the early 1890s, the boom had subsided and many companies had gone
under, followed by several banks and other financial institutions. Unemployment was high and in a time of no
government support, times became very hard.
Land prices crashed but no one had money to buy the land.
Oakleigh
was not immune and had in fact benefited from land speculation. New estates had sprung up and brick works
built to service them.
Oakleigh’s
geological formation between the Monash Freeway to the North and Dandenong Road
to the South, Huntingdale Road to the East and Warrigal Road to the West are
tertiary rocks, composed of marine and non-marine sand, clay, and gravel, with
bands of soft reddish brown sandstone, and hard ironstone, underlain with
decomposed granite of feldspar clay. This material constituted excellent material for
bricks, and tiles. Silurian mudstone
and sandstone are found north of Dandenong Road where the majority of brick
pits are found. South of these clay
fields, the geology of the Clayton – Springvale area turns to course sand
unsuitable for brick making.
The excavation at the side of the
hill at the intersection of Estelle Street and Stamford Road, and which extends
toward the West, altered the original natural shape of the hill. The clay shale
was originally removed in layers, to a depth of around 30 metres but has left a
steep area to the East and the filled brick pit is now a sporting ground.
If you were in Victoria from about 4.5 million years ago
until as recently as 7,200 years ago, you would have seen hundreds of active
volcanoes that were a part of Western Victoria’s landscape forming one of the
World’s largest basalt plains; with more than 400 volcanoes mapped.
This basalt plain
stretches from Melbourne to Portland and is as wide as from Colac to
Beaufort. It consists mainly of vast
open areas of grasslands, large, shallow lakes, small patches of woodland and
stony rises from the once hot lava flows. The low peaks of dormant and extinct
volcanoes dot the landscape.
During pastoral settlement of the volcanic plains in
the 19th Century, this stone was used to construct hundreds of
kilometres of dry stone walls and has become a characteristic feature of the
Western District landscape. These eruptions left vast, deep deposits of basalt,
or bluestone as it is known. From the
1830s, olivine basalt was quarried in Melbourne as a building material from
pits in what are now the Fitzroy Gardens and the suburbs of Carlton and Clifton
Hill. Later, quarries began in
Williamstown, Footscray and Brunswick, as well as Coburg and Preston.
The
gold rush of the 1850s saw the population of Victoria explode as a wave of
migration flooded the fledgling colony.
Many major buildings in Melbourne were made from this local bluestone,
as well as warehouses, bridges, Streets, curbing and laneways. For example, when the old Newmarket Sale
yards were redeveloped, over 1.6 million bluestone “pitchers” were
removed. Around 480,000 were used by
councils, another 480,000 were re used on the site and 700,000 were sold for
$2.50 each.
Footscray quarries provided bluestone for the
foundations of Parliament House, the old Treasury Building, Melbourne Town
Hall, St Paul's Cathedral, the General Post Office, Flinders Street Station and
the Argus offices at 365 Elizabeth Street.
Quarries in Clifton Hill, worked by convicts from the Collingwood
Stockade in Carlton North, produced stone for the now closed but historic
Pentridge Prison.
In part, because of the expense of transporting
bluestone, bricks gradually came to replace stone as the preferred building
material. Hoffman Brick & Potteries
Ltd in Brunswick, one of Melbourne's first brickworks (1870), was quickly
followed by Butler's Brickworks (1879), Fritsch Holtzer & Co. (1880) and
the Northcote Brick Co. (1882). The first brick clay pits were located in the
inner suburbs, close to the areas of greatest building activity.
Soils
The majority of Melbourne’s eastern
suburbs are covered by heavy clay subsoil, derived from Silurian shale some 400
million years old. A powerful downward
bending force, the perpendicular Melbourne Warp, (running parallel to the
Melbourne Dandenong railway line) transported these strata in a south-westerly
direction. Around 20 million years ago, tertiary seas flooded over the clay
shales, depositing sandstone material in the process. Many Eastern suburbs are well above sea level, and so in spite of
the tertiary sandstone flooding, they received only a light deposit of sand. As
sea levels dropped, this light sprinkling of sand eroded and left in its wake,
the older Silurian clay.
The
main soil type overlaying the brick clay area of Oakleigh is Aeric Podsol, a
free-draining soil, usually requiring fertilizing for horticulture. The underlying shale quarried for brick
making is Silurian mudstone. The
Silurian period is the third period of the Paleozoic era that began at the end
of the Ordovician period around 440 million years until around 419 million
years. Melting icecaps during the
Silurian period contributed to these sediments overlying the Ordovician layers.
Extensive erosion occurred during this period because of the lack of plants and
a large part of Victoria was formed by sedimentation during the Silurian period.
Mudstone
is hardened mud made up of a fine-grained sedimentary rock. (originally clay
with grains too fine to be seen without a microscope). It also contains other minerals such as
calcite. Some mudstone becomes shale,
(or laminated and fissile mudstone).
Shale is characterized by compaction into laminations, or layers about
one centimeter thick. “Fissile” means
that the shale easily splits along the laminations. Historically, the terms “shale” and “Slate” were
interchangeable. Shale can be crushed and
mixed with water to form clays for brick making.
Shale is thinly stratified, consolidated, sedimentary clay with
well-marked cleavage parallel to the bedding.
Very early in the days of
European settlement, large quantities of this fine and even grained mudstone
shale were discovered close to the surface in and around Oakleigh. The map on the next page shows these
deposits shaded in grey. The area in
yellow shows clay.
The Sandbelt
The
name “Oakleigh” is believed to come from the “She-Oaks” that grew along
Scotchmans Creek. Early descriptions of
the bushland area around the creek describe it as being steeply banked, shaded
by gums and ti-tree of around 3 metres in height with ferns of most varieties,
flowering shrubs and wildflowers.
Eucalypts, such as Stringybark, Ironbark and White Gum were in
abundance. The flat land where the current
Oakleigh shopping centre now stands and beyond were mainly open heath land with
native grasses and some eucalypts (mostly Stringy-Bark) with Ti-tree scrub to
the North. The three-chain road, now
the Princes Highway, was surveyed to accommodate the mobs of cattle being moved
and was for a long while, a thin meandering heavily timbered track.
Brick Kilns
Clamp, Yallourn 1925
This
shows the construction of a Rectangular Downdraught Kiln at the Gulson Brick
Works in Goulburn in 1964. Note the
shape of the roof. This is an
Intermittent Kiln.
This
shows the construction of a Rectangular Downdraught Kiln at the Gulson Brick
Works in Goulburn in 1964. Note the
shape of the roof. This is an
Intermittent Kiln.
Usually
these are either clamps or rectangular downdraught kilns that are sealed and
the internal temperature increased according to a specific process or timetable.
After the firing process is complete, both the kiln and bricks are cooled. The
kiln is left to cool sufficiently before the bricks can be removed. Due to the relative ease and cost of
construction these are the kilns types were primarily used in one-man
operations with low volume output.
There
are two types of continuous kilns:
Tunnel kiln - bricks are
moved through a stationary fire zone, like a train in a tunnel.
Continuous kiln - bricks remain
stationary and the fire moves through the kiln with assistance or help of a
chimney or by a suction fan. Most brick
works in Oakleigh used the “Hoffman” kilns of this type. Both types are long structures in which only
the central portion is directly heated. The same result can be achieved with
both types of kilns.
Hoffman Kilns
As well as Hoffman Brick,
Tile and Pottery Company (1862-1990), (the largest of these), There were Cornwell’s Pottery, Gillbrook
Pottery, Victorian Art Pottery, Federal Pottery, and the Brunswick Brick, Tile
& Pottery Works. From the 1880s,
Bendigo Pottery was the largest in the state until overtaken by Hoffman's
Pottery in the early twentieth century.
Hoffman
was the largest of the dozens of brickworks and potteries operating in the
Melbourne inner suburb of Brunswick. They started with brickmaking, but by 1900
were producing a large range of architectural and garden ornaments as well as
Bristol ware crocks, cannisters, bottles and jars for commercial and domestic
use.
There
was no Mr Hoffman here in Australia.
The name came from the process they used to make bricks. The
company was started by Jenkin Collier, David MacKenzie and brothers Barry and
William Owen who in 1870 established the Hoffman Patent Brick and Tile Company
(later renamed the Hoffman Patent Steam Brick Company). The name came from the Hoffman steam brick
making process invented by Freidrich Hoffman in Stettin, Prussia, now in
Germany.
Interior
of “Hoffman” kiln, showing the central tunnel that the fire moved along, with
ventilation shafts above. The chambers
(left side) contain the bricks.
Unlike
the Rectangular Downdraught Kilns common at the time, the Hoffman kiln, (now
still the most universal type in use,) is a circular or oval burning fire
passage with rooms around each side containing bricks to be fired. A fire wagon moves around the passage to
fire each room in turn. The rooms are
also interconnected by fire trace holes at floor level so the next room in turn
is pre-heated by the hot gasses from the room where the bricks are being
fired. To be technical, it is a natural
draught, multi-chamber transverse arch continuous permanent structure made from
common bricks.
Fresh unfired
‘green’ bricks are put into a chamber and the entrance is bricked up and sealed
using ash and clay as a mortar to keep out air from outside. Hot air from
cooling bricks in one chamber is used to dry and pre-heat bricks in the next.
Drying
is done slowly to make sure that all the bricks dry uniformly and that
distortion does not occur. Once the
bricks are dry then it is important to raise their temperature quickly to
maintain reducing conditions in the chamber. Organic material in the clay helps
with this process.
Once
the required temperature has been reached, covers over the openings in the roof
are opened to allow ‘easing’ of bricks by allowing cold air into the chamber.
After firing the bricks are cooled in
the chamber before removal. This
process provides the heat for the drying process of the next batch. New ‘green
bricks’ are then placed in the chamber and the process cycle starts again. Each cycle takes ten days to complete. The
kiln operates by natural draught with the buoyancy of the exhaust gases
providing the driving force.
A
central chimney is connected to a flue running the length of the chambers. Each chamber is connected to the main flue
with fresh air also available to regulate temperature. Usually two fires move around on opposite
sides moving from chamber to chamber in a continuous process of drying,
pre-heating, firing and cooling. This
process is controlled by experienced brick makers, who operate a system of
dampers and slides.
A
central chimney is connected to a flue running the length of the chambers. Each chamber is connected to the main flue
with fresh air also available to regulate temperature. Usually two fires move around on opposite
sides moving from chamber to chamber in a continuous process of drying,
pre-heating, firing and cooling. This
process is controlled by experienced brick makers, who operate a system of
dampers and slides.
The
fired bricks are allowed to cool and are removed from an outer door. A fresh batch of bricks is then put into the
room and allowed to dry before the fire trolley comes around to fire them. Fires burn continuously and can use any fuel
from wood to oil, coal and gas. Hoffman
kilns vary in size but are on average around five metres high, fifteen metres
wide and up to one hundred and fifty metres long.
The Hoffman Brick Company was a leader in introducing
pioneering brick making technology to Victoria to supply the building boom of
the 1880s. Their products remain widespread throughout Melbourne. The derelict
Hoffman Brickworks in Brunswick, Melbourne is now a site of considerable
historical, technological and social significance in Australia. The combination
of the high output patent Hoffman continuous firing kilns and the patent Craven
steam brick presses marked the first full industrialization of the brick making
process in Australia, and may be a relatively early surviving example of brick
making industrialization anywhere in the world.
The
production of domestic wares was finally phased out when their pottery closed
in 1960. In the early 1930s the company introduced a line of slip-cast art
pottery, labelled ‘Mel-rose Australian Ware’. These
wares were sold by leading department stores like Myer and Mutual. It was a
great success, and is said to have been the only thing that kept the company
from going under during the Depression of the 1920s and 30s.
With the closure of the pit and other parts, the site had been
effectively reduced to the central brick production area and remnants of the
pottery production area. The buildings and plant of primary individual
Significance are the three Hoffman kilns, the machinery associated with the
brick pressing plant and the structure housing it. Hoffman was purchased by Clifton Brick in 1959 but only continued
production until 1962.
Northcote Pottery showing a number of “Hoffman”
kilns
There are many
different tasks undertaken at a brick works.
These depend on the type of work and the type of kiln. Modern automated brick works have caused the
loss of many of these occupations.
Gambles came closest to full automation, having only quarrymen at the
beginning of the process and unloaders at the other. Until the 1970s, there were different employment categories for
men, women and juniors. Female rates
were about 1/3 less than the rate for males and the junior rate was about 1/3
of the adult rate. The following is a
list of categories from the Department of Labour and Industry Pottery Board in
September 1968.
Automatic
Extruder Operator (i.e. a man operating extrusion, dressing and loading
machinery)
Automatic Machine
Loader and Unloader Assistant
Bitumen Jointer
Burner
Clayhole Men
(Employer to provide tools)
Drawer (i.e
drawing inside kiln)
Drawer, other
Drying Room
Attendant
Feeder of Pipe
Machine
Greenware Sorter
Grinding
Attendant
Hand Feeder of
Raw or Burnt Clay into crusher or griding pan
Junction Sticker
and/or Knocker Operator
Junction Repairer
of Burnt Ware
Kiln Labourer
(i.e a person whose duties comprise assisting a Placer, Drawer Setter or Tunnel
Kiln Operator and/or the cleaning of fire holes and/or flues)
Machine Rigger
Mandril Operator
Man carrying or
wheeling into or out of kiln or to or away from kiln
Man in charge of
Pug or Mixer Machine
Man operating or
taking off machine making Siphons, D traps, inlets and the like
Man taking off
Pipe Machine
Man sorting pipes
Man working Pipe
Planging Machine
Man boring or
using explosives
Mouldmaker
Packer of goods
into Railway Trucks
Pipe or bend
dresser
Pipe Cutter of
burnt ware
Presser
Setter (i.e
setting inside kiln)
Setter, other
Tunnel Kiln
Operator
Hand Dipper
and/or Spray Operator
Kiln Placer
and/or Unloader
Man Hand Pressing
dust tiles or working semi-automatic tile press
Slip House
Attendant
Tunnel Kiln
Operator
Automatic Glazing
Machine Attendant, including Feeder and/or Cranker
Boxer, including
Tile Sorters
Hand Dipper
and/or Spray Operator
Burnt Ware Sorter
Caster
Clay Shaper
Driller and/or
Grinder of unburn ware
Glazer
Greenware Sorter
Grinder of burnt
ware required to use calipers
Grinder of burnt
ware other, 1st six months experience
Jolly Hand and/or
Profiler (including semi-automatic machines) 1st six months experience
Jug Cutter
Kiln Car Placer
and/or other Unloader
Male Machine
Operator
Man cementing
and/or leading insulators
Man sanding
insulators
Mill Room Hand
Mouldmaker
Packer
Presser (screw
and lever type inclusive)
Presser
(automatic)
Pug Mill Hand
Sagger Maker
Sagger Maker’s
Assistant
Setter inside
kiln
Thrower-1st
six months experience
Thereafter
Tunnel Kiln
Operator
Turner (required
to use calipers) 1st six months experience
Thereafter
Turner other 1st
six months experience
Thereafter
Assemblers
Bitumen Sprayer
Cleaners and
Finishers
Glazer
Glazer’s
Attendant
Glazing Machine
Attendant (Automatic)
Jug Trimmer
Packer of Fired
Ware
Machine Operator
Placer
Presser (screw or
lever type)
Press Operator
(Automatic)
Spray Operator
Test Room Hand
Turner (required
to use calipers) 1st six months experience
Thereafter
Turner, other 1st
six months experience
Thereafter
Dipper and/or Spray
Operator
Jigger Hand (including
semi-automatic machine)
Jolly Hand (including
semi-automatic machine)
Mouldmaker
Placer and/or Drawer
Polisher of Glazed Ware
Slip House Attendant
Tunnel Kiln Operator
Cup and Caster
Sponger
Dipper
Fixing handles
and/or spouts
Gilder on glaze,
Gilder, Bander, Stamper
Handle Maker
Handle Trimmer
and/or Cutter
Jigger Hand
(including semi-automatic machine)
Jolly Hand (including
semi-automatic machine)
Packer/ Carton
Packer
Polisher of
glazed ware
Tower
Transferer-slide
on
Caster-Sanitary
Ware
Caster-other
Dipper and/or
Spray Operator
Grader of Glazed
Ware
Green Ware
Inspector
Grinder of Burnt
Ware
Hand Feeder of
raw or burnt clay into crusher or grinding pan
Kiln Car Placer
and/or Unloader and/or other Placer
Man fixing
handles or spouts
Mouldmaker (blocks and cases)
Mouldmaker
(other)
Packer
Slip House
Attendant
Tunnel Kiln
Operator
Turner, Jolly
Hand and Jigger Hand (including semi automatic machine)
Caster-Sanitary
Ware
Caster-other
Dipper and/or
Spray Operator
Fixer of Handles
or Spouts
Jug Trimmer
Packer
Turner, Jolly
Hand and Jigger Hand (including semi automatic machine)
Caster-(other)
Dipper and/or
Spray Operator
Mouldmaker
Packer
Placer and/or
Unloader
Slip House
Attendant
Dipper and/or
Spray Operator
Examiner and/or
Finisher of Green Ware
Packer
Placer and/or
Drawer
One
of the most productive areas often overlooked when reporting on brick making is
the use of explosives to loosen the clay or shale. In the end, it was explosives that caused the closure of a number
of quarries close to populated areas.
Councils, including Oakleigh passed by-laws prohibiting the use of
explosives.
Using
explosives for blasting is necessary for the recovery of clay or shale in many
quarries. Blasting can cause noise and vibration that have an impact on the
surrounding environment. Proper security of explosives and control of blasting
practices is necessary to ensure the safety of employees and the protection of
the community and environment from adverse effects.
Blasting will
result in both ground and airborne vibration. The latter commonly includes both
audible noise and vibration known as airblast, that causes objects to rattle
and make noise. At the levels experienced from blasting associated with
quarrying, structural damage to adjoining properties is unlikely to occur. In
addition, the noise levels experienced from blasting at a quarry site, are
unlikely to cause any hearing damage to anyone outside the worksite.
Theft of Explosives 1933
Annoyance
and discomfort from blasting can occur when noise startles individuals or when
airblast or ground vibration causes vibration of windows or other items at a
sensitive Site. The degree of annoyance will therefore be influenced by the
level of airblast and vibration as well as factors such as the time of day, the
frequency of occurrence and the sensitivity of individuals.
In
most cases, a competent operator can reasonably predict the level of airblast
and ground vibration. However the
generation and transmission of airblast and ground vibration is affected by a
number of factors including blast design, meteorology (particularly wind speed
and direction and temperature inversions), topography, geology and soil water
content. It is possible that on some
occasions the level of airblast and/or ground vibration will exceed the
predicted levels.
These days,
several people are involved when once, only a Shot Firer was used. Shotfirers assemble, position and detonate
explosives to break or dislodge rock and soil or to demolish structures. Shotfirers may perform the following tasks:
- checking blasting areas to make sure that safety regulations are met
- cutting channels under working faces
- checking bore-hole depths and ensure that they are clean
- deciding quantity of explosives required
- inserting detonators and charges into holes
- connecting and test or inspect the blasting circuit
- firing charges
- inspecting the area to make sure all explosives have been detonated
- checking site safety after blasting (falling rock hazards, underground mine roof supports and harmful fumes, for example), and declare the area safe.
Creswick Powder Magazine
Security of explosives was viewed somewhat flexibly
in former days. Some were stored in
sheds secured with a bolt and padlock.
Sometimes, the explosives were stored in a dugout in the quarry with a
loose fitting door. There were several
thefts of explosives and detonators from often poorly secured stores.
Hand
operated jumper bars were used in most pits until the introduction of electric
rotary rock drills. Explosives are now
electrically fired, making the process safer.
This is now the only method used in pits today. The use of a “cuddy” or safety shield is
also mandatory. The dangerous practice
of “bulling”, or dropping explosives with the fuse lit into a hole by hand or
using a tamping rod has now thankfully passed into history.
Following an
explosion, “barring down”, or manually clearing loose clay or shale from the
face. An early safety device was to tie
a rope around the waist of the worker in case of a collapse on the face. Even hard-hats were not worn. Later, safety belts and hard hats were made
mandatory. Softer clay was loosened by
hand or mechanically. Shale was removed
using a power shovel or excavator.
The manual work
in the works was usually controlled by a leading hand who was a person who
assumes any responsibility other than that customarily done by an ordinary
employee. They were usually men of long
experience in most, if not all facets of brick making who would assume the
responsibility of training all the other workers in their tasks. An additional wage loading was paid to
a Leading Hand.
Pitwork
Quarrymen, Shooters or Jumpermen worked in the pit and were also known as pitmen or breakers. They also dug drains and sump-holes to keep the quarry face clear. Clay Getter-gets clay and a General Hand does anything else. Pitmen worked by removing clay from a series of descending horizontal terraces, by digging, filling and wheeling away the clay. Quarrying soft clay doesn’t need explosives but was done either by hand or mechanical excavator with continuous buckets. Later dragline excavators or power shovels were used. This does not leave loose material on the face as it leaves a smooth surface.
Pitwork
Quarrymen, Shooters or Jumpermen worked in the pit and were also known as pitmen or breakers. They also dug drains and sump-holes to keep the quarry face clear. Clay Getter-gets clay and a General Hand does anything else. Pitmen worked by removing clay from a series of descending horizontal terraces, by digging, filling and wheeling away the clay. Quarrying soft clay doesn’t need explosives but was done either by hand or mechanical excavator with continuous buckets. Later dragline excavators or power shovels were used. This does not leave loose material on the face as it leaves a smooth surface.
This
image shows a quarry worker gently pushing an explosive charge down a hole
bored in the rock. The reel next to his right foot contains a cable to permit
detonation from a safe distance. The work is hot, dirty and dangerous. As well as the obvious trauma hazard, this
procedure (shot-blasting) can generate large concentrations of silica dust.
Silicosis is a serious and progressive disease.
The term mixed dust fibrosis describes the pulmonary disorder caused by the
inhalation of silica dust simultaneously with another non-fibrogenic dust. Most dust particles in a brick works settled
quickly as they were large and were stopped by the nasal passages. Finer particles of less than.0002” were
dangerous, but Government testing found no particles that exceeded the minimum
standard. To reduce dust inside the
works, grinding was done outside where the wind dispersed the dust. Good in summer but quite cold in winter.
Clay
or shale was originally removed and broken up from the face by using a
“spalling hammer.” Spallers had a high
incidence of eye injury as eye protection in earlier times was not
mandatory. Small trolleys of up to one
ton were filled by hand and pushed along narrow-gauge rails to either a “truck
hole” where the contents were tipped into a skip that is then hauled up an
inclined cable railway to the brick works.
The bottom of the pit may have a network of rails. Later, bulldozers were used to push the clay
to the conveyor. This is many times more
efficient than by hand.
Some
brick works had their crushers located in the clay pit where the crushed clay
was then transported by a conveyor direct to the works. This had the benefit of separating a very
dusty part of the process, and allowing wind to disperse the dust within the
pit.
A setter does all
the work inside the kilns. Green bricks
are soft and require careful handling during this process. Work is restricted
only depending on the capacity of the brick machines. Up to 3 setters could work in a kiln. Bricks were brought to the door of the kiln and the setters would
place them inside. In some works,
bricks arrived at the kiln in the form they were placed inside, so the setter
just ran them in using an overhead carrier.
This was usually done in a Clamp, nor other types of kiln. A good Setter could place up to 70,000
bricks per day. For this rate to be
achieved, a conveyor delivered the bricks to the Setter and could be adjusted
to the height of the stack as it became progressively higher.
Bricks are set in
rows or “bolts.” A good setter would
arrange the ends of the bricks in the bolts so you could see from the front end
of the stack, to the back. This lets the
air flow uninterrupted so the steam in the drying stage and the gasses in the
firing stage can pass without staining the bricks. Bricks are set as close to the roof as possible in an arched kiln
to reduce the effects of hot air rising.
As the stack rises, the space between the bricks is reduced. Setters must keep the rows in line with the
flues to ensure proper air-flow.
Sometime a Setter will also build flues into the stacks to aid
air-flow. Supervision of Setters was
essential to ensure the correct positioning of bricks in the kiln. Even firing results in even bricks. When the kiln is opened, the fired bricks
were then sorted as they were unloaded, usually into “firsts”, “seconds” and “clinkers.”
Salary was dependent on the type of kiln.
Unloading a kiln
was another specialized job. In larger
companies, the job of loading and unloading was split between the Setters who
loaded the bricks into the kiln and the Draggers who unloaded them. This was not a popular job. Sometimes the Draggers at the Oakleigh Brick
Company would have their trousers catch fire because of the heat from the
bricks. This sometimes happened on
Fridays when the fire would catch up with the bricks. To combat the effects of heat, Draggers would wear leather or
rubber “mits” or “cots.” Copious
quantities of water was consumed by them, along with salt tablets. It was hot, dirty work. Draggers would load bricks onto a trolley,
usually made of wood.
Wheelers were the
people who pushed the wooden barrows of bricks to the Setters or from the
Draggers. Generally, the rule of thumb
was that the load should not exceed 50kg.
The centre of gravity of the load was the determinant. Usually it did not go above the height of
the wheelbarrow handle when the wheeler was standing upright.
Put simply, they are man-made rocks. We take sedimentary material and turn it
into metamorphic by applying heat. They
are small individually moulded rectangular blocks of clay of uniform size that
are baked in a kiln until hard and used as a building or paving material. The first attempt to standardize the size of
a brick in England was in 1477. Much later, Queen Elizabeth 1st granted a charter to brick and tile
makers, after which a standard size of 9” x 41/4” x
2 ¼ inches became common,
although variations in size continued.
In 1849 the Statute Brick was required to be this size. Today, they are produced in a standard size; 2 ¼ inches by
3 ¾ inches by 9 inches, or 65mm by 102.5mm by 215mm.
Bricks are everywhere. They are one of the oldest building materials known and are an
almost universal method of building.
Historically, bricks were made close to where they were intended to be
used. This was also the case in
Victoria. Several brick works were
built in Oakleigh during the late 19th and early 20th
Centuries to service construction works in the newly established and rapidly
growing suburb and the surrounding area.
Making bricks
goes on all over the world and has done for thousands of years. The basics are the same wherever you go and
are similar to baking a cake. You mix
the ingredients, put them into a mould, bake them, let them cool, and use
them. With brick making, the process
needs lots of continuous heat, usually from a fire and an insulated chamber to
fire them in. Huge quantities of wood
or coal were burned to make each batch.
When someone came
to an area that had sufficient clay, a small kiln, usually made of mud or
unfired clay (and known as a “Clamp”) would be built to hold the “green”
bricks. The Brick Maker stacked
the bricks appropriately to ensure sufficient space around them to conduct the
heat. When the bricks were suitably
“fired” they could be used. The brick
maker would eventually make enough bricks to build a simple rectangular
downdraught kiln. This type of kiln was
popular at the time and generally had sufficient capacity to hold up to forty
to sixty thousand bricks.
This meant that the kiln had sufficient thermal mass and
volume to produce commercial quantities of bricks necessary to ensure that the
kiln cooled slowly and less heat was lost during firing. The vast woodlands around Oakleigh were
quickly used up by this process and by the many farmers moving into the area.
Wood chopping events were common in Oakleigh towards the
end of the 19th Century.
Fortunately massive reserves of brown coal were at the end of the
railway, but the problem for many early brick works was that they were operated
by a sole brick maker who needed to be there twenty-four hours a day to set up,
fire, unload and remove the bricks.
It
was hard dangerous physical work demanding long hours and hard work for little
return, except for volume production. A
single kiln with a single operator could take around two weeks to make a batch,
and then set up ready for the next one.
If a fire went out, it was hard to re-start and a batch of bricks could
be ruined. Many batches of under fired
bricks (or doughboys) were made during this period. Although the workers were paid little and generally considered to
be from a lower socio-economic group, the work needed skill and judgment and
expert timing to be done properly. A
sole proprietor also needed to have the optimum number of firing cycles from
each kiln to maximize output.
Significant deposits of suitable shale/clay were
exploited to manufacture bricks and the forests that previously existed were
used to fire the brick making kilns.
Little now remains in the area of this now vanished industry, and what
does remain receives little, if any recognition. Throughout Australia, historic brickworks sites generally exists
now only through neglect.
By the 1860s there were more than 40 brickworks and
potteries in Brunswick alone. But the industry gradually spread east, with
works established in Box Hill, Nunawading, Oakleigh and Camberwell. Many brick works manufactured not only
bricks, but also building materials such as roof tiles, drainage pipes and
domestic items such as mixing bowls and garden pots. For example, Hoffman's brickworks in Brunswick also had a major
role in manufacturing the pipes for Melbourne's sewerage works.
As a result of the depression and diminishing clay
supplies from their original pits, many of Melbourne's brickworks scaled down
production in the 1930s, and this was the same for the Oakleigh works; with the
disused clay pits and quarries used for rubbish and garbage disposal or
swimming holes and, once filled in, converted into parks or shopping centres
(such as Highpoint City, Altona Gate and Northcote Plaza).
- First Class Bricks
- Second Class Bricks
- Third Class Bricks
- Made of good clay earth that is free from saline deposits and are sand moulded.
- Burnt thoroughly without being vitrified and have deep red, cherry and copper color.
- Regular and uniform in shape and size with sharp and square edges and parallel faces.
- Must be homogeneous in texture and emit a clear ringing sound on being struck together.
- Free from flaws, cracks, chips, stones and lime.
- Should not absorb water more than 20% of its own dry weight after 24 hours, immersion in cold water.
- Have a minimum crushing strength of 105 kg per sq. cm when tested according to the test.
- Should not show appreciable sign of efflorescence (As the water evaporates, it leaves the salt behind, which forms a white, fluffy deposit, that can normally be brushed off. The resulting white deposits are referred to as "efflorescence") either in dry state or subsequent to soaking in water.
- They shall be well burnt or slightly over burnt.
- They must give clear ringing sound when struck.
- The may have slight irregularities in size, shape and color.
- They may have slight chips, flaws or surface crack but must be free from lime.
- The minimum crushing strength of second-class brick should be 70 kg per sq cm.
- These bricks are slightly under burnt or over burnt.
- They are not uniform in shape, size and edges.
- They shall not observe water more than 25% of their own dry weight after 24 hours, immersion in cold water.
These are very costly to produce as they are quite
labour intensive. It is only a
specialist or boutique company that could or would make them today. They are
made by throwing a lump of
clay into a mould and
then cutting off any excess. Sometimes machine-made bricks
are treated to give them a rough
or irregular appearance to imitate a hand-made brick.
These bricks are made from clay that has been mixed
(pugged) with water. This type was produced at the Oakleigh Brick Company. These bricks come in two types;
- Semi-dry plastic. The clay is mixed with up to 12% water depending on the clay. The mix has to be sufficiently dry to fall into a mould using its own weight. The clay is then formed under pressure into a frogged brick. These bricks have smooth faces and sharp edges. Dry pressed bricks have a cork-like appearance.
- Stiff-plastic. The clay for these bricks has slightly higher water content (up to 17%). The clay is forced under pressure from an auger into a mould. The rough brick is then put into a second mould for a final pressing. The texture of these bricks is rougher than a semi-plastic brick. Wet-pressed bricks are very strong bricks, with a smoother, more dense surface.
A different machine is needed to make
wire-cut bricks.
The water content is higher again (up to 25%).
The clay is forced using an auger into a conical tube tapering to a
die. The resulting rectangular sausage
of clay is then cut into bricks by a wire or wires.
Extruded bricks are usually smooth like semi-plastic bricks
but can also have a pattern or texture applied. The holes in modern extruded bricks reduce the
amount of clay used, making them cheaper, lighter and help key in the
mortar bed.
Facing bricks are (firsts) bricks that are intended to be visible, and
are thus designed with some aesthetic aims in mind so that they are visually
interesting or appealing to look at.
Many brick makers produce
facing bricks, using a variety of techniques.
As the name implies, facing bricks are specifically designed to be used
as facing, for example on the exterior of a wall, where the bricks will be
seen.
These bricks may lack the tensile strength of engineering
bricks, which are used for structural brickwork, although facing bricks can be
used for structural applications in some cases. Face Bricks are also wire
cut, but are of higher quality, with an added surface effect on one
side that’s visible when laid. They are specifically hard-burned for use in exposed wall
surfaces and are able to withstand all kinds of weather and environmental conditions.
These bricks are designed to have a
neat, even appearance. They also tend
to be made from materials which are interesting to look at, since they will
comprise the actual face of a building, and will be the first thing people
encounter when approaching. While
facing bricks can come in classic red, it's also possible to find in other
colors. Some bricks may have inclusions
that add visual texture, and facing bricks can also be stamped with motifs or
designs to make them more attractive.
Facing bricks can be extruded or moulded, and in some cases may be made
by hand, although handmade bricks are quite expensive. In some brickworks, special Draggers were
employed to only handle face bricks.
These bricks are lower quality bricks, without special finishes,
making them cheaper, and are used where they’re not visible. Also
called hard bricks or building bricks and are made of clay. They are mainly used for internal brickwork and have low compressive
strength. Commons
are used in general work with no special attractive appearances. When these
bricks are used in walls, they may require plastering or rendering. The color and surface texture of common bricks might vary
greatly since no attention is paid to these aspects when they are fired.
Brickmakers Park
Cnr
Stamford Road and Hilbert Ct, Oakleigh 3166, Victoria, Australia.
Melways Map: 69 Ref: H6
When
all the works had gone, the former Oakleigh Council created Brickmakers Park on
the site of the old Oakleigh Brickworks brick pit and brick works. The Council set up a display of the
equipment from the recently closed “Gambles” brickworks in one corner of the
park.
An eternal flame, fed by gas from rotting garbage in the tip was meant to provide on ongoing memorial to the industry. In the mid 1980s, the Oakleigh Council was also looking at using the gas produced from this pit and from Reg Harris reserve to heat the water in the Oakleigh swimming pool. The vote was lost in council. Following council amalgamations, the new Monash council re-assessed the site, amidst safety concerns. The flame went, some of the display was dismantled and what you see now is what is left.
The
site occupies a large area on the Western side of Stamford Road, Oakleigh,
Victoria and lies within the Melbourne Water Drainage Catchment and is not
suitable for built environment. To the
North is the rise known as Moroney’s Hill.
The site currently acts as a drainage easement for
some storm water runoff from the residential zone as well as overflow from the
Estelle Street site. The sites previous
use as brick pits has left a heritage value in the parklands established following
their filling as Council garbage dumps.
These reclaimed excavations have formed man made multi-use parkland and
is frequented by a variety of bird life.
“AN OAKLEIGH toilet block well-known by
locals as a meeting place for gay sex will be bulldozed by Monash Council in a
bid to make the area safer. The toilet
block at Brickmakers Park, which is listed on several gay and lesbian websites
as a place to meet for sex, is now patrolled by police two or three times a day
to deter participants. Local workers
and residents last week told the Leader they were fed up, with one elderly
woman too frightened to leave her house at night. Councillors last week voted to replace the brick toilet block at
Brickmakers Park with an automated $227,700 Exeloo single cubicle unit, in a
move welcomed by residents.
“I wouldn’t poke my
head outside; I’m so frightened,” Mrs Grant said. Oakleigh Constable Anesti
Mavridis confirmed that the toilet block was commonly used for homosexual sex
and police patrolled the area two or three times each day. Constable Mavridis said he believed the new
Exeloo would help residents feel safer.
They are clean, they are well-lit up, and they are safer than the older
toilet blocks,” he said. The new Exeloo
will be similar to toilets already installed in the Clayton and Syndal shopping
centres. The units are self-cleaning
and users can stay in the unit for only a set amount of time before the doors
open automatically. The new toilet should be operating by March next year.”
Waverley Leader 3 NOV 09 @ 07:07AM BY EMMA SCHMIDT
"Ramping up the fun at Brickmakers Park
March
18, 2013, midnight
CONSTRUCTION has
started on a new playground at Brickmakers Park in Oakleigh. The work will
take about eight weeks and the old playground will be temporarily unavailable
during this time. Access to the gazebo will also be restricted.
Details: Recreation Services, 9518 3559"