Design, Fabrication and Performance Evaluation of a Manual Clay Brick Moulding Machine

Abstract

In an attempt to improve the production of clay bricks for housing and general construction purposes, a 215 X 102.5 X 65 mm manual brick moulding machine was designed and fabricated. The machine parts were made of mild steel, because of its availability and versatile machinability. The efficiency of the machine was examined using local clay, sourced within the University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria. Water was added to the clay after sieving to form a paste, and then packed into a mould box, before manually rammed and compacted with the machine mould cover. This process allowed for the formation of required shape, which was sent to kiln for baking to obtain stronger bricks. The machine is capable of producing a total of four bricks at a time using the available four mould boxes. The production time of the four bricks was found to be relatively equal to the time used by an automated one to produce equal number of bricks, indicating favourable efficiency. Thus, the fabricated manual machine can be used for mass production of clay bricks for improved and effective housing delivery.

Keywords

• : Clay Brick
• Housing
• Mild steel
• Moulding machine
• Manual