Sandstone Paving

Sandstone is also known as arenite. It is a sedimentary rock composed of sand sized minerals or rock grains. The most common minerals on earth are quartz and feldspar so most of the sandstones consist of these two only. The color of sandstone is tan, yellow, white gray commonly but it can appear in other colors also. Sandstones are normally resistant to weather so they are very much used for building and paving material. Sandstone paving is a very wide subject of study and its use is very wide too. Due to their hardness some sandstone are also used as grindstone.

Sandstone as aquifers:

The rock formation which is composed of the sandstone allows the percolation of water and other fluids. These are also porous enough to store large quantities so they are used as aquifers and petroleum reservoirs. Aquifers which are fine grained sandstone are used for filter out the pollutants from the surface.

These are clastic in origin and are formed from cemented grains, which are fragments of pre-existing rocks or mono-minerallic crystal. The binding material for these is calcite, clays and silica. The formation of sandstone can be divided into two steps,

1) A layer or layer of sands accumulates in the process of sedimentation from water or air.

2) After the accumulation the sand get compacted by pressure of overlaying deposits and cemented by precipitation of minerals within the pore spaces between sand grains.

The most common cementing material used in formation of the sandstone is silica and calcium carbonate. It is derived from the dissolution or alteration of the sand after it got buried. Colors will be depending up on the percentage of the various particles of sand and minerals. The other main factor of the color and properties of the sandstone is the environment where the sandstone is formed, the environment are divided into two types,

a) Terrestrial Environment: These include the rivers, lakes and deserts.

b) Marine Environment: These include the beaches, deltas and turbidity's.

We will discuss about the types of the sandstones. Following are the major groups of the sandstones,

1)      Quartz Arenites: These are mainly formed from the quartz gains. These are common in beach environment.

2)      Oolite: This is actually limestone which possesses the properties of the sandstone.

3)      Arkoses: These are mainly composed of the feldspar. These are poorly rounded grains and less sorted than the pure quartz sandstone.

Paving is the technique in which the surface of the road is made durable by the use of some material. Sandstone paving is in which paving is done using the sandstone. The sandstone used here is of high quality because of the strength and durability needed by the paving material. Sandstone paving was very famous in last century and now days the concrete paving is mostly used. In the rural areas sandstone paving is still used as it’s durable and cheap also. Sandstone paving allows the surface to be stronger as the grains will allow tires of vehicles to hold the surface better. Sandstone paving slabs are very famous worldwide and natural sandstone paving is famous among the tourists.