Joseph Aspdin was the inventor of modern day Portland cement. He called it Portland cement because its colour and appearance is similar to Portland limestone, quarried from the Isle of Portland in Dorset.
Joseph Aspdin was born in 1778 in Leeds, Yorkshire. He had little formal education and is described as an eccentric man who loved gambling, drinking and smoking. He married, but his wife died soon after giving birth to their only child, William.
Joseph Aspdin became a bricklayer and learned how to make bricks by using clay mixed with sand or finely crushed rock. In 1824 he took out a patent for a new type of hydraulic binder which he called “Portland Cement”. This was made by burning finely ground chalk and clay until the carbon dioxide content was driven off, then grinding the resultant clinker together with gypsum (calcium sulphate).
The manufacture of cement at that time would have been very dusty and dirty work, as there were no effective filters on the crushing machines. Joseph Aspdin named his first cement after the color of stone quarried on the Isle of Portland from where he came from – hence “Portland Cement.” The early cements were used for cosmetic purposes for finishing off buildings but were not strong
Joseph Aspdin was a Yorkshire mason and inventor of Portland cement. He obtained the patent for his invention in 1824. The main ingredients of Portland cement are limestone and clay, which is mixed together and then heated at high temperature, forming a rock-like substance called clinker. This clinker is then ground with a small amount of gypsum to form Portland cement.
Aspdin was born in 1778, and died in 1855. His father was also named Joseph, who worked as a joiner and carpenter in Wakefield, Yorkshire.
He tried to make his fortune by emigrating to the United States in 1815, but came back to England after just a few years gone. He moved to Leeds and started working as a plasterer.
In 1822 Joseph Aspdin invented his new type of cement (Portland cement), which he produced by burning ground limestone mixed with clay powder in a kiln at high temperatures (about 1450°C). When the product was cooled down, it was ground into powder to form what Aspdin described as “Portland Cement”. The reason for this name is that the material cured into a hard stone-like material that resembled the Isle of Portland stone quar
Joseph Aspdin was an English cement manufacturer who obtained the patent for Portland cement on October 21st, 1824.
Joseph Aspdin was the first to burn finely ground limestone and clay minerals in his kitchen stove.
The development of this type of cement is said to have begun in the UK when Joseph Aspdin invented “Portland” cement. The name is derived from its similarity when set to Portland stone, a limestone quarried on the Isle of Portland in Dorset, England.
Portland cement is a basic ingredient of concrete, mortar and most non-specialty grout. The most common use for Portland cement is to make concrete. Concrete is a composite material made of aggregate (gravel and sand), cement, and water. As a construction material, concrete can be cast in almost any shape desired, and once hardened, can become a structural (load bearing) element. Portland cement may be gray or white.
The invention of modern Portland Cement usually is attributed to Joseph Aspdin from Leeds in Yorkshire in 1824 who cooked a mixture of finely ground hard limestone and clay in his kitchen stove and ground the clinker thus produced into powder, producing what he called ‘Portland Cement’ because set samples resembled local Portland stone.
Joseph Aspdin (1778-1855) was first person to patent Portland cement in 1824. He called it Portland cement because the concrete made from it looked like Portland stone, a widely-used building stone in England. His son, William Aspdin, continued the business when Joseph retired in 1847. William inherited his father’s original cement patent and many of his notes and samples.
Joseph Aspdin was born in 1778 and died in 1855. He was a bricklayer by trade and lived at 10 Tyersal Lane on the outskirts of Leeds, Yorkshire, England. His father also worked with bricks and tiles.
Aspdin was granted a patent for “Portland Cement” on October 21, 1824. It was a chemical process based on roasting chalk (calcium carbonate) and clay in a kiln to produce an artificial hydraulic cement (a cement that would harden underwater).
The production of chemical cements began in the early 1800s with the burning of lime to form clinker (a rock-like material), which was then ground into powder to produce natural cements that were used for construction of canals, bridges, ships docks and harbors throughout Britain.
Aspdin experimented with different fuels
Joseph Aspdin, who invented Portland cement. Aspdin was born at Armley in Leeds, Yorkshire, England on the 13th December 1778. He was the eldest of 8 children and was baptised at the Parish Church on the 12th February 1779. He is said to have studied chemistry under a local doctor, and began work at the age of 16 as a bricklayer’s labourer.
In 1814, Joseph Aspdin set up business in Leeds, England manufacturing artificial cement (the term Portland cement was not used until about 1825). In 1824 he patented a process of making a cement which he called Portland Cement because it looked like Portland stone when set*. This product proved to be superior to the existing cements of the time and became very popular. In 1825, he sold the patent to his son William for £8200 (William had been involved in perfecting the product and so got some of the credit for its development). William continued to make and sell it as “Patent Portland Cement”. His business flourished and within 10 years he opened other factories in Rotherhithe and Swanscombe, Kent. The first known use of Portland cement in concrete was in 1824 when John Johnston used it as an aggregate
Joseph Aspdin was the inventor of Portland cement and was granted a patent by the British Patent Office on 21st October 1824.
Aspdin’s patent described a material that he called Portland Cement because it produced a concrete that resembled the best quality building stone in England, which was quarried on the Isle of Portland, Dorset.
He produced his cement by burning finely-ground chalk and clay until the carbon dioxide was removed. This cement when mixed with water, sand and gravel formed an artificial stone which was stronger than those used at the time.
Joseph Aspdin (1778-1855) lived in Wakefield, Yorkshire where he worked as a “bricklayer” (brickmaker).
His main ingredients were limestone containing clay or shale and he burnt these to a clinker then ground them to a powder. He took out his patent in 1824 calling it Portland Cement because it looked like Portland Stone when set. It was not an instant success because it did not work well in cold weather but it became popular for use under water in harbours.
In 1843 Joseph’s son William Aspdin improved the process by using high temperature to burn off carbon dioxide from limestone leaving calcium oxide which combined with silicates
Joseph Aspdin was a British cement manufacturer who obtained the patent for Portland cement on 21 October 1824. The patent consisted of six pages of preliminary explanations and claims and seven pages of tables and drawings. In the patent he called his invention ‘Portland cement’ because when it hardened it resembled a well known building stone quarried on the Isle of Portland.
1843, in the United States, Isaac Charles Johnson further developed the use of Portland cement and made what is thought to be the first true artificial cement. By carefully measuring the ingredients and burning them to a temperature of about 2,700 degrees Fahrenheit (1,482°C), he produced a stronger, finer product than had previously been known.
A few years later, in 1854, John Grant of Scotland discovered that mixing slag with hydraulic lime produced an even stronger product that could also be used as mortar. In 1865, Joseph Monier was granted a patent for reinforcing iron structures with concrete by embedding metal mesh within it.