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Absorption:

The percentage of moisture absorption by weight. The process by which a liquid is taken into (soaked up by) another substance and held there. Expressed as a percentage of weight of the dry unit. A key element to consider in freeze-thaw climates.

Aggregate:
Materials that are added to mortar or grout at the time of mixing to impart special properties to the mortar or grout.
Anchor:
A metal device for securing dimensional stone to a structure.
Arch:

A curved stone structure resting on supports at both extremities used to sustain weight or bridge or roof an open space. 2. A curved compression structural member, spanning openings or recesses; also built flat.
 
Back Arch: A concealed arch carrying the backing of a wall where the exterior facing is carried by a lintel.
 
Jack Arch: An arch having horizontal or nearly horizontal upper and lower surfaces. Also called a flat or straight arch.
Major Arch: An arch with spans greater than six feet and a rise to span ratio greater than 0.15. Typical forms are straight arch, Gothic arch, or parabolic arch.
 
Minor Arch: Arch with maximum span of six feet arid a rise to span ratio less than or equal to 0.15. Typical forms are jack arch, segmental arch, or multi-centered arch.
 
Relieving Arch: An arch built over a lintel, flat arch, or smaller arch to divert loads, thus relieving the lower member form excessive loading. Also known as a discharging or safety arch.
 
Trimmer Arch: An arch, usually a low rise arch of brick, used for supporting a fireplace hearth.
Arris:
The angle, corner, or edge produced by the meeting of two surfaces. The edge of external angle. A natural or applied line on the stone from which all the leveling and plumbing is measured.
Ashely or Ashlar:
A flat faced surface generally square or rectangular having sawed or dressed beds and joints. A Random Ashlar pattern is one where stones of varying length and width or height are set so that neither vertical or horizontal joints are continuous.
 
Coursed Ashlar: Ashlar set to form continuous horizontal joints.
 
Stacked Ashlar: Ashlar set to form continuous vertical joints.
 
Random Ashlar: Ashlar set with stones of varying length and height so that neither vertical nor horizontal joints are continuous.
Baluster:
 A miniature pillar or column supporting a rail. Usually used in balustrades.
Balustrade:
 A railing parapet consisting of a handrail and balusters, sometimes on a base member and sometimes interrupted by piers.
Batter:

Recessing or sloping masonry back in successive courses.
Bed Joint:
A horizontal joint between stones, usually filled with mortar, lead or sealant.
Bluestone:
 A hard argillaceous metamorphic sandstone of characteristic blue, gray and buff colors quarried in the states of New York, Pennsylvania, (Historically quarried near the Hudston River & Appalachian Plateau).
Border:
 A flat stone used as an edging material, a border stone is generally used to retain the field of the terrace or platform.
Bush Hammered:
A mechanical process which produces textured surfaces. Textures vary from subtle to rough, done with either a multi-pointed chisel or pneumatically pulsated steel rods.
Carve:
 Shaping by cutting a design to form. The trade of a sculptor.
Carving:
 Cutting of ornamental shapes, figures, etc. from models or details, which are too intricate to produce from patterns.
Cobblestone:
 A natural rounded stone large enough for use in paving.
Corbel:
 Projecting successive courses of masonry out from the face of the wall to increase the wall thickness or to form a shelf or ledge.
Cornerstone:
 A stone forming a part of a corner or angle in a wall. Also a stone laid at the formal inauguration of the erection of a building.
Coursed eneer:
This is achieved by using stones of the same or approximately the same heights. Horizontal joints run the entire length of the veneered area. Vertical joints are constantly broken so that no two joints will be over one another.
Cut Stone:
Finished, dimensional stone, ready to set in place.
Cutting:
 Hard work required to finish a stone which cannot be done by machine.
Delamination:
A failure evidenced by the separation between layers of the stone.
Dimension:
 Stone-Natural building stone that has been selected, trimmed or cut to specified shapes and sizes. Final surface treatment, or finish is as specified.
Dolomitic Limestone:
A limestone rich in magnesium carbondate. It is frequently somewhat crystalline lit character. Ibis found in ledge formations in a wide variety of color tones and textures. Its crushing and tensile strengths are greater than the politic limestones and its appearance shows ereator greater in texture.
Drip or Drip Kerf:
A recess cut into the underside of projecting stone to divert water and prevent it from running down the face of a wall or other surface of which it is a part.
Dry Wall:
A stone wall that is constructed one stone upon the other without the use of any mortar. Generally used for retaining walls.
Efflorescence:
A deposit or encrustation of soluble salts, generally white in color and usually carbonates or sulfates that may form on the surface of stone brick, concrete, or mortar when moisture moves through and evaporates from the masonry.
Exfoliation:
Peeling, swelling or scaling or stone or mineral surfaces in thin layers; caused by chemical or physical weather or by heat.
Fabricated:
 Dimensional stone manufactured and ready for installation.
Flagstone:
Thin slabs used for flagging or paving walks, driveways, patios, etc. It is generally fine-grained sandstone, bluestone, quartzite, or slate, but this slabs of other stones may be used.
Gauged or Gauging:
A grinding or "planning" process to make all pieces of material the same thickness when placed or set in the same plane.
Granite:
 A very hard, crystalline, igneous rock, gray to pink in color, composed of feldspar, quartz, and lesser amounts of dard ferromagnesium materials - Black "granites" are similar to "true" granites in structure and texture, but are composed of different minerals.
Hearth:
 That part of the floor of a room made of stone on which the fire is made or above which is a stove, fireplace, furnace, etc.
Honed or Hone Finish:
A very fine, smooth finish on stone with little or no gloss.
Joint:
 The space between installed units or between dimensional stones and the adjoining material.
Jumper:
A piece of stone of higher rise than adjacent stones which is used to end a horizontal mortar joint at the point where it is set.
Keystone:
The last wedge-shaped stone placed in the crown or top of an arch regarded as binding the whole.
Lintel or Header:
A beam placed or constructed over an optining in a wall.
Limestone:
 A sedimentary rock composed primarily of calcite or dolomite. The varieties of limestone used as dimensional stone are usually well consolidated and exhibit a minimum of graining or bedding direction.
Lintel:
A beam placed or constructed over an opening in a wall to carry the superimposed load.
Masonry:
 1. The practice of the mason's craft with brick, tile, concrete masonry units and other materials.
2. The work resulting from the practice of the mason's craft; structures built of stone, brick or other materials set as units in patterns and amenable to assembly with mortar whether or not mortar is usually used.
3. THe type of construction made up of masonry units laid with mortar or grout or other accepted method of jointing.
Metamorphic Rock:
Rock altered in appearance, density and crystalline structure, and in some cases mineral composition, by high temperature or high pressure, or both. Slate is derived from shale, quartzite from quartz sandstone, and true marble from limestone.
 
Natural Bed:
The setting of the stone on the same plane as it was formed in the ground. This generally applies to all stratified materials.
Natural Cleft:
This generally pertains to stones which are formed in layers in the ground. When such stones are elevated or separated along a natural seam the remaining surfaces is referred to as a natural cleft surface.
Offset:
 A course or unit that is set in from the course directly under it.
 
Palletized:
 A system of stacking stone on wooden pallets. Stone which comes palletized is easily moved and transported by modern handling equipment. Palletized stone generally arrives at the job site in better condition than un-palletized material.
Paver:
A single unit of fabricated stone for use as an exterior paving material.
Pitch or Pitched Stone:
Stone having arris clearly defined, face however is roughly cut with a pitching chisel used along the line which becomes the arris.
Polished:
The finest and smoothest finish available in stone, generally only possible on hard, dense materials or with high silica content.
Projections:
 Refers to the pulling out of stones in a veneered wall to give an effect of ruggedness. The amount each stone is pulled out can vary between 1/4" and 1 1/2". Stones are either pulled out at the same degree at both ends or sometimes one end is pulled out leaving the other end flush with the majority of veneer.
Quarrier:
 One who extracts natural stone from a quarry.
Quarry:
 The location of an operation where a natural deposit of stone is removed from the ground.
Quartzite:

1. A compact granular rock composed of quarts crystals, usually so firmly cemented as to make the mass homogeneous. The stone is generally quarried in stratified layers. THe surfaces of which are unusually smooth, the crushing and tensile strengths are extremely high. The color range is wide.
2. A silver-grey, metamorphic sandstone formed in exceedingly hard layers- in some deposits, intrusion of minerals during the formation process created unusual shades of brown and gold.

Quirk Miter Joint:
An external corner formed by two stone panels at an angle with meeting edges mitered but leaving an exposed edge revealing a 90 degree angle.
Quoins:
Stones at the corner of a wall emphasized by size, projection, rustication, or by a different finish.
Raked Joint:
A mortar joint formed by removing the mortar a given depth from the face of the masonry.
Rubble:
 A product term applied to dimension stone used for building purpose, chiefly walls and foundations and consisting of irregularly shaped pieces. THey are partly trimmed or squared and generally have one split for finished face and selected and specified within a site range.
Sand Blasted:
A matte textured surface finish with no gloss; accomplished by exposing the surface to a steady flow of sand under pressure.
Sandstone:
 A sedimentary rock consisting usually of quartz cemented with silica, iron oxide or calcium carbonate. Sandstone is durable and has a very high crushing and tensile strength and a wide range of colors and textures.
Sawed Edge:
A clean cut edge generally achieved by cutting with a diamond blade, gang saw or wire saw.
Schist:
 A foliated metamorphic rock (recrystallized) characterized by thin foliae that are composed predominantly of minerals of thin platy or prismatic habits and whose long dimensions are oriented in approximately parallel positions along the planes of foliation. Because of this foliated structure, schists split readily along these planes and so posses a pronounced rock cleavage. The more common schistose are composed of the micas and other mica-like minerals (such as chlorite) and generally contain subordinate quartz and/or feldspar or comparatively fine-grained texture.
Sedimentary Rock:
One of the three classes of rock which make up the earth's outer crust. It is formed from the disintegration of older rocks, soils, plants, and animals.
Slab:

1. Lengthwise cut of a large quarry block of stone.
2. A piece of stone cut from the quarry block prior to fabrication.

Snapped Edge:
This generally refers to a natural breaking of a stone either by hand or machine. The break should be at right angles to the top and bottom surface.
Spall:

(Verb) To flake or split away through action of the elements or pressure.
(Noun) A chip or flake so formed.

Split Face Sawn Bed:
Split on the face, either by hand or machine, with top & bottom surfaces, or beds, sawed.
Stone:
 Sometimes synonymous with rock, but more properly applied to individual blocks, masses, or fragments taken from their original formation of considered for commercial use.
Strip:
Long pieces of stone, usually low height ashlar courses where the length to height ratio is at a maximum for the material used.
 
Template:
A pattern for repetitive marking or fabricating operation which is of the exact shape the stone is to be fabricated in.
Texture:
 Three dimensional surface enrichment independent of color, any finish other than a smooth finish.
Thermal Finish:
Surface treatment applied by intense heat flaming; textures vary from subtle to rough. The heat flaming process expands air pockets within the stone and pops the stone away from the pocket, leaving a texture.
 
Unit:
 A piece of fabricated dimensional cubic or thin stone.
Undercut:
 Cut so as to present an overhanging part.
 
Veneer:
 An outside stone used as a decorative facing material which is not meant to be load bearing.
 
Wedging:
 Splitting of stone by driving wedges into planes of weakness.
Wholesaler:
 One who purchases dimensional stone in all forms for resale to the trade.
 
 
       
  Pine's Stone Company, Inc. | Glenwood Springs, Colorado | Toll Free 800.928.2940 | Office 970.945.2940 | Fax 970.945.7962