The Sodium Feldspar Deposit for Unglazed Stoneware at Ottana (Central Sardinia - Italy)

摘要

This article describes a new feldspar product recently prepared by Maffei SpA for the unglazed stoneware tiles market. After a brief description of the tiles market, the paper covers all project development phases, from exploration, industrial characterization and mine opening, to the launching of the new product onto the ceramic market. The ore deposit is examined from the point of view of regional geology, mineralogy and petrography, reserves and quality. Some hypotheses on the genesis of the deposit are advanced. Lastly, the chemical and physical characteristics of the new product are presented and its behaviour in unglazed stoneware mixes is discussed.