Batusabak (slate) adalah batuan metamorf homogen berbutir halus yang berfoliasi dan berasal

dari batuan asal berupa batuan sedimen bertipe menyerpih yang terdiri dari lempung atau abu
vulkanik yang mengalami metamorfisme regional berderajat rendah. Ini adalah batuan metamorf
foliasi berbutir paling halus.[1] Foliasi mungkin berhubungan dengan perlapisan sedimen asal,
namun berbentuk bidang - bidang yang tegak lurus dengan arah kompresi metamorfik.[1]
Foliasi yang sangat kuat disebut juga "Belahan sabak".[1] Foliasi ini disebabkan oleh kompresi
yang kuat yang menyebabkan lempung berbutir halus menyerpih dan tumbuh kembali dalam
bentuk bidang - bidang yang tegak lurus dengan kompresi.[1] Ketika para ahli memotong tepat
sejajar dengan foliasi menggunakan alat - alat khusus, banyak batusabak akan membentuk
lapisan - lapisan datar batuan yang telah sejak lama digunakan sebagai bahan atap, ubin lantai,
dan tujuan lain.[1] Batusabak biasanya berwarna abu - abu, terutama yang biasa terlihat sebagai
penutup atap. Meskipun begitu, batusabak dapat terbentuk dalam warna yang bermacam -
macam bahkan dapat berwarna khas pada satu tempat saja. Batusabak berbeda
dengan batuserpih.

Page, William (ed.) (1906). The Victoria History of the County of Cornwall; vol. I.
(Chapter on quarries.) Westminster: Constable.

Hudson, Kenneth (1972). Building Materials; "Chapter 2: Stone and Slate". London:
Longman, pp. 14–27. ISBN 0-582-12791-2

Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an

original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade
regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock.[1] Foliation may not
correspond to the original sedimentary layering, but instead is in planes perpendicular to the
direction of metamorphic compression.[1]
The foliation in slate is called "slaty cleavage".[1] It is caused by strong compression causing
fine grained clay flakes to regrow in planes perpendicular to the compression.[1] When
expertly "cut" by striking parallel to the foliation, with a specialized tool in the quarry, many
slates will display a property called fissility, forming smooth flat sheets of stone which have
long been used for roofing, floor tiles, and other purposes.[1] Slate is frequently grey in color,
especially when seen, en masse, covering roofs. However, slate occurs in a variety of colors
even from a single locality; for example, slate from North Wales can be found in many
shades of grey, from pale to dark, and may also be purple, green or cyan. Slate is not to be
confused with shale, from which it may be formed, or schist.
The word "slate" is also used for certain types of object made from slate rock. It may mean a
single roofing tile made of slate, or a writing slate. This was traditionally a small smooth piece
of the rock, often framed in wood, used with chalk as a notepad or noticeboard, and
especially for recording charges in pubs and inns. The phrases "clean slate" and "blank
slate" come from this usage.

Historical mining terminology[edit]

Before the mid-19th century, the terms slate, shale and schist were not sharply
distinguished.[2] In the context of underground coal mining in the United States, the term slate
was commonly used to refer to shale well into the 20th century.[3] For example, roof
slate referred to shale above a coal seam, and draw slate referred to shale that fell from the
mine roof as the coal was removed.[4]

Mineral composition[edit]
Slate is mainly composed of the minerals quartz and muscovite or illite, often along
with biotite, chlorite, hematite, and pyrite and, less
frequently apatite, graphite, kaolinite, magnetite, tourmaline, or zircon as well as feldspar.
Occasionally, as in the purple slates of North Wales, ferrous reduction spheres form around
iron nuclei, leaving a light green spotted texture. These spheres are sometimes deformed by a
subsequent applied stress field to ovoids, which appear as ellipses when viewed on a cleavage
plane of the specimen.

Uses[edit]

Slate roof

Slate in buildings[edit]

Slate-faced church and homes in Wurzbach, Thüringen, Germany

Fine slate tile work, Saint Leonhard's Church, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.

Slate can be made into roofing slates, a type of roof shingle, or more specifically a type
of roof tile, which are installed by a slater. Slate has two lines of breakability – cleavage and
grain – which make it possible to split the stone into thin sheets. When broken, slate retains a
natural appearance while remaining relatively flat and easy to stack. A "slate boom" occurred
in Europe from the 1870s until the first world war, allowed by the use of the steam engine in
manufacturing slate tiles and improvements in road and waterway transportation systems.[5]
Slate is particularly suitable as a roofing material as it has an extremely low water absorption
index of less than 0.4%, making the material waterproof. In fact, this natural slate, which
requires only minimal processing, has the lowest embodied energy of all roofing materials.
Natural slate is used by building professionals as a result of its beauty and durability. Slate is
incredibly durable and can last several hundred years, often with little or no maintenance. Its
low water absorption makes it very resistant to frost damage and breakage due to freezing.
Natural slate is also fire resistant and energy efficient.[6]

Slates with holes for fixing, viewed from below. Photographed in Tremedda, Cornwall, a farm in England

Slate roof tiles are usually fixed (fastened) either with nails, or with hooks as is common with
Spanish slate. In the UK, fixing is typically with double nails onto timber battens (England
and Wales) or nailed directly onto timber sarking boards (Scotland and Northern Ireland).
Nails were traditionally of copper, although there are modern alloy and stainless steel
alternatives. Both these methods, if used properly, provide a long-lasting weathertight roof
with a lifespan of around 80–100 years. Slate roofs are still used today.
Some mainland European slate suppliers suggest that using hook fixing means that:[7]

 Areas of weakness on the tile are fewer since no holes have to be drilled
 Roofing features such as valleys and domes are easier to create since narrow tiles can be
used
 Hook fixing is particularly suitable in regions subject to severe weather conditions, since
there is greater resistance to wind uplift, as the lower edge of the slate is secured.
The metal hooks are, however, visible and may be unsuitable for historic properties.
Slate tiles are often used for interior and exterior flooring, stairs, walkways and wall
cladding. Tiles are installed and set on mortar and grouted along the edges. Chemical sealants
are often used on tiles to improve durability and appearance, increase stain resistance,
reduce efflorescence, and increase or reduce surface smoothness. Tiles are often sold gauged,
meaning that the back surface is ground for ease of installation. Slate flooring can be slippery
when used in external locations subject to rain. Slate tiles were used in 19th century UK
building construction (apart from roofs) and in slate quarrying areas such as Blaenau
Ffestiniog and Bethesda, Wales there are still many buildings wholly constructed of slate.
Slates can also be set into walls to provide a rudimentary damp-proof membrane. Small
offcuts are used as shims to level floor joists. In areas where slate is plentiful it is also used in
pieces of various sizes for building walls and hedges, sometimes combined with other kinds
of stone. In modern homes slate is often used as table coasters.
Other uses[edit]
Because it is a good electrical insulator and fireproof, it was used to construct early-20th-
century electric switchboards and relay controls for large electric motors. Fine slate can also
be used as a whetstone to hone knives.
Due to its thermal stability and chemical inertness, slate has been used for laboratory bench
tops and for billiard table tops. In 18th- and 19th-century schools, slate was extensively used
for blackboards and individual writing slates, for which slate or chalk pencils were used.
In areas where it is available, high-quality slate is used for tombstones and commemorative
tablets. In some cases slate was used by the ancient Maya civilization to fashion stelae.
Slate is material of choice for traditional black playing stones in the game of Go

 Other uses


Slate gravestone in Hingham, Massachusetts

John Betjeman's grave with inscription on slate at St Enodoc's Church, Trebetherick, in Cornwall

Leonard Bramer, painting Mors Triumphans (oil on slate)

 

"Slate Cone" in Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh

Slate extraction[edit]

Exhibition Slate mine at Fell, Germany.

Historical Pit Vogelsberg 1 at Fell

Mules carrying slate roof tiles on their backs. Dharamsala, India. 1993

Main article: Slate industry

In Europe[edit]
Most slate in Europe comes from Spain, the world's largest producer and exporter of natural
slate, and 90 percent of Europe's natural slate used for roofing originates from the slate industry
there.
Lesser slate-producing regions in Europe include Wales (with a museum at
Llanberis), Cornwall (famously the village of Delabole), Cumbria (see Burlington Slate
Quarries, Honister Slate Mine and Skiddaw Slate) in the United Kingdom; parts
of France (Anjou, Loire Valley, Ardennes, Brittany, Savoie); Belgium (Ardennes); Liguria in
northern Italy, especially between the town of Lavagna (which means chalkboard in Italian) and
Fontanabuona valley; Portugal especially around Valongo in the north of the country.
Germany's Moselle River region, Hunsrück, Eifel, Westerwald, Thuringia and north Bavaria (with
a former mine open as a museum at Fell); and Alta, Norway (actually schist, not a true slate).
Some of the slate from Wales and Cumbria is colored slate (non-blue): purple and formerly green
in Wales and green in Cumbria.

In the Americas[edit]
Slate is abundant in Brazil, the world's second-biggest producer of slate,
around Papagaios in Minas Gerais, which extracts 95 percent of Brazil's slate. However, not all
"slate" products from Brazil are entitled to bear the CE mark.[8]
Slate is produced on the east coast of Newfoundland, in Eastern Pennsylvania, Buckingham
County, Virginia, and the Slate Valley of Vermont and New York, where colored slate is mined in
the Granville, New York area. Pennsylvania slate is widely used in the manufacture of turkey
calls used for hunting turkeys in the U.S. The tones produced from the slate (when scratched
with various species of wood strikers) imitates almost exactly the calls of all four species of wild
turkey in North America: eastern, Rio Grande, Osceola and Merriam's.
A major slating operation existed in Monson, Maine during the late 19th and early 20th centuries,
where the slate is usually dark purple to blackish, and many local structures are still roofed with
slate tiles. The roof of St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York was made of Monson slate, as is the
headstone of John F. Kennedy.[9]
Slate is found in the Arctic, and was used by Inuit to make the blades for ulus.

In Asia[edit]
China has vast slate deposits; in recent years its export of finished and unfinished slate has
increased. It has slate in various colors.

In Australia[edit]
Deposits of slate exist throughout the Australian continent, with large reserves quarried in
the Adelaide Hills (Willunga and Kanmantoo) and the Mid North (Mintaro and Spalding).

Fossils[edit]
Because slate was formed in low heat and pressure, compared to a number of
other metamorphic rocks, some fossils can be found in slate; sometimes
even microscopic remains of delicate organisms can be found in slate.[10]

References[edit]
1. ^ Jump up to:a b c d e Essentials of Geology, 3rd Ed, Stephen Marshak
2. Jump up^ R. W. Raymond, Slate, A Glossary of Mining and Metallurgical Terms, American
Institute of Mining Engineers, 1881; page 78.
3. Jump up^ Albert H. Fay, Slate, A Glossary of the Mining and Mineral Industry, United States
Bureau of Mines, 1920; page 622.
4. Jump up^ J. Marvin Weller, ed.,Supplement to the Glossary of Geology and Related Sciences,
American Geological Institute, 1960; page 18.
5. Jump up^ Schunck, Eberhard, and Hans Jochen Oster. Roof Construction Manual Pitched
Roofs.. Basel: De Gruyter, 2003. 12. Print.
6. Jump up^ Natural Slate, the natural option
7. Jump up^ Galician and Spanish Slate website "Hook Fixing". Retrieved on 26 January
2010 archived
8. Jump up^ Fundación Centro Tecnológico de la Pizarra. Report into the "Technical properties of
Bambui Slate from the State of Minas Gerais (Brazil) to ascertain its compliance with the Standard
EN12326". Brazilian Slate Report, retrieved on 27 January 2010
9. Jump up^ Granville: Facts accessed 23 March 2011
10. Jump up^ BBC Video: David Attenborough: Lost Worlds, Vanished Lives
2. a. Kelompok I : BGI yang berkaitan dengan Batuan Sedimen, kelompok ini dapat dibagi
menjadi

3. Sub Kelompok A : BGI yang berkaitan dengan batugamping : Batugamping, dolomit, kalsit,
marmer, oniks, Posfat, rijang, dan gipsum.

4. Sub Kelompok B : BGI yang berkaitan dengan batuan sedimen lainnya : bentonit, ballclay
dan bondclay, fireclay, zeolit, diatomea, yodium, mangan, felspar.

5. b. Kelompok II, BGI yang berkaitan dengan batuan gunung api : obsidian, perlit, pumice,
tras, belerang, trakhit, kayu terkersikkan, opal, kalsedon, andesit dan basalt, paris gunung
api, dan breksi pumice.

6. c. Kelompok III, BGI yang berkaitan dengan intrusi plutonik batuan asam & ultra basa : granit
dan granodiorit, gabro dan peridotit, alkali felspar, bauksit, mika, dan asbes

7. d. Kelompok IV, BGI yang berkaitan dengan batuan endapan residu & endapan letakan :
lempung, pasir kuarsa, intan, kaolin, zirkon, korundum, kelompok kalsedon, kuarsa kristal,
dan sirtu

8. e. Kelompok V, BGI yang berkaitan dengan proses perubahan hidrotermal : barit, gipsum,
kaolin, talk, magnesit, pirofilit, toseki, oker, dan tawas.

9. f. Kelompok VI, BGI yang berkaitan dengan batuan metamorf : kalsit, marmer, batusabak,
kuarsit, grafit, mika dan wolastonit