Exterior finish with slate basement facade

Gusevsky Andrey Anatolyevich

Facade decoration with slate

The word slate evokes a certain type of roof on buildings and nothing more. Surprise comes when you get acquainted with a wide range of its application, popularity and properties.
Judging by the limitation of the use of slate products, the price is also available to different categories of the population. Who would have thought that even finishing the facades of houses with flat slate is carried out.
In the application of this material, one can distinguish the main segments.

Arguments for use and where

The main areas of application of flat slate include:

• Facing structures in construction. These include sanitary cabins, various partitions and walls of ventilation shafts, flooring in an industrial room, boards for window sills, ducts, various jumpers, formwork and this is not the whole list.
• Cooling tower irrigators at power plants.
• The design of ventilated facades and facade decoration private slate houses.
• Installation of puff sandwich panels.
• The material has become indispensable in farm buildings - the arrangement of showers and toilets, the construction of arbors and aviaries for animals, the manufacture of composting and narrow walkways, the design of beds, the construction of fences.

Attention: Your buildings made of slate will be durable and strong, because unlike wood, slate does not rot and does not deteriorate by insects.

Slate production is divided into a pressed and unpressed product. Pressed material has significant density and strength, therefore it is more often used in the decoration of external walls.
The second type has a low density and is used indoors.
The remaining properties are identical:

• Frost resistance when the coating withstands more than 55 freezing and thawing cycles.
• Convenience, ease of handling and installation. It harmonizes with any architectural structures and is cut with a saw or hacksaw.
• Moisture-resistant material, not subject to corrosion and decay.
• Long-lasting and durable product in operation.
• Slate does not support combustion processes.
• Resistant material to the negative effects of the atmosphere.
• It has excellent sound insulation, so the noise of wind, rain, hail, will not disturb the members of the family indoors.
• It does not react with acid, alkali solutions and other aggressive components.

What is against its use

Looking through the proposed video and photo screensavers, picture galleries and videos, a variety of colors and various shades does not catch your eye. Non-bright colors and colors predominate, which either complement other materials or themselves appear as separate spots.
So:

• A slate with a stretch can be attributed to environmentally friendly products, although studies have shown that there is no particular harm from it.
• It has significant weight and large mass.
• The value in the delivery of slate is its transportation and storage.
• Moss from long inactivity may appear on the surface of the sheets, additional processing of the coating with special compounds is required.
• Demand creates supply, but sometimes with overpriced slate products. These costs pay off over time due to savings on expensive lumber, labor.
• Slate is brittle material, so work with it must be done with a partner or colleagues.

How to work with flat slate

Frozen Slate Waves

Practice shows that facade decoration flat slate or otherwise, asbestos-cement sheets are used quite often and quite do-it-yourself. To perform the work, special tools, knowledge, high qualification in the construction specialty or skills are not required.
A few simple rules and instructions will help facilitate the conduct of the workflow and prevent the negative and undesirable consequences of actions:

• Wear a protective mask or respirator to protect your airways from asbestos dust.
• To prevent deformation and destruction of the edge, thin strips with a width of less than 6 mm cannot be cut.
• Slate slices are processed with acrylic paints.
• Nails are driven into a slate plate into pre-drilled holes.
• Each sheet is subjected to visual inspection for deformation and cracks.

Attention: Slate sheets that have flaws - cracks, chips, bumps, are used primarily when there is a need for smaller plates.

Slate paneling

So:

• The slate is mounted on the frame, for which it is necessary to arrange a wooden crate. The lathing is made of boards or timber laid at a distance corresponding to the dimensions of the slate sheet (0.6 m).
  As a wish, a layer of hydro-thermal insulation between the frame is added. For these purposes, eco or mineral wool is used.
• Preparation of slate sheets consists of a preliminary inspection and removal of deformed sheets. Then they are measured and cut for subsequent installation.
  Slicing refers to the most critical and difficult moment.

Attention: A sheet with a thickness of more than 6 mm is cut with a saw with water cooling, and less than 6 mm are made notches on both sides and neatly breaks at the edge of the table, coinciding with the fracture line.

• Slate is mounted and mounted to the crate with screws in pre-drilled holes. Screw caps are closed with fixing layouts.
  The diameters of the holes for the screws are made 1-2 mm wider than nails and screws, so as not to get splits in the mountings.
• The last stage relates to the processing of special compounds from the appearance of mosses and lichens, acrylic paint is used.
• Finishing the foundation with slate is performed in two versions. As in the previous description, with the frame and crate, or simply glued to the absolutely smooth surface of the outer foundation wall.
• Finishing the basement from slate is often done after the construction of the building, when the homeowner began to wonder what to veneer the basement of the house with. The basement refers to the part of the building that is most susceptible to mechanical stress and adverse atmospheric influences.
  The technology of execution and its observance affects the durability of coatings. The base is insulated with foam plastic 5 cm thick, which is fastened with plastic dowels.
  The first and second foam layers are arranged and fixed in such a way as to overlap the joints. Flat slate is attached to the dowels, but of greater length.

Manufacturers of flat slate do not part with practical material suitable for facade decoration and roof coverings.