Hollow clay building blocks are made for use as a wall unit. The blocks are made from selected brick clays that are press moulded and burnt. These hard, dense blocks are hollow to reduce shrinkage during firing and reduce their weight and they are grooved to provide a key for plaster, as illustrated in Fig. 61. The standard block is 290 long x 215mm high and 62.5, 75, 100 and 150mm thick.
Clay blocks are comparatively lightweight, do not suffer moisture movement, have good resistance to damage by fire and poor thermal insulating properties. These blocks are mainly used for non-load-bearing partitions in this country. They are extensively used in southern Europe as infill panel walls to framed buildings where the tradition is to render the external face of buildings on which the blocks provide a substantial mechanical key for rendering and do not suffer moisture movement that would otherwise cause shrinkage cracking.
