Are all grey engineering bricks created equal?

[epsilonGreedy]

I am assuming these are a commodity item best purchased from a local BM. One thing that might sway me is if a particularly brand of engineering brick complements a heritage look.

 

 

[Brickie]

I would assume someone somewhere makes them imperial sized for remedial works on Victorian bridges etc but I’d bet they’re £££££. Have you had a sample batch of your handmade bricks delivered yet? If you use the standard metric blue engineering’s commonly available,I’d compare them in length to your face bricks. If the engineering’s are laid with 10mm Cross joints (so 215mm brick plus 10mm & so on) & your face bricks average at say 218mm then this could give you problems if any of the engineering’s are to be seen. 

 

[epsilonGreedy]

1 hour ago, Brickie said:

I would assume someone somewhere makes them imperial sized for remedial works on Victorian bridges etc but I’d bet they’re £££££.

 

 

Sorry I should have provided more info, there is no specific brick size worry as I intend to build with modern regular sized bricks.

 

My interest is more in the detail of the finished brick face. Some engineering blues appear suitable for fancy modern commercial building as they have glazed two-tone luster with a touch of an extra colour. To create an older property look I reckon a matt mid grey finish would be best.

[PeterW]

I used imperial engineering bricks direct from TP - cost about 10p more than the same metric brick but they were reds and not staff blues. 

[PeterW]

 

1 minute ago, epsilonGreedy said:

To create an older property look I reckon a matt mid grey finish would be best.

 

You may struggle to get an engineering brick in anything but red or blue - the slight glossy finish is partly down to the firing temperature and the clay mix becoming more glass like and less brick texture. 

 

There is a good sample of different colours of Class B engineering bricks here 

[Jeremy Harris]

There's a good reason they are colloquially  known as Staffordshire Blues, as that's the colour that they end up when fired to near-ceramic temperatures using Staffordshire clay, which was always the traditional clay they were made from.  That's just a hang over from the Industrial Revolution and the way that the technology for firing at controlled high temperatures came out of the Staffordshire potteries industry.  The use of "engineering" bricks came about from the need for bricks with a high compressive strength and high resistance to weathering during the Industrial Revolution. for everything from canal locks to the mounts and buildings for things like big steam engines.

 

Traditionally, ordinary "house" bricks were made near to, or on, the actual building site, by itinerant brick makers, who used local clays and fired them in open fires, which is why we have such a wide variation in "heritage" brick colours.  If your interested, there is still one itinerant brick maker left in the UK, who has an interesting web site about bricks: http://ajmugridge.co.uk/