Customer: Hoyle Stone Products, Millington MD
Challenge: The client was looking for a fully customizable product that was moisture resistant, sturdy, fully customizable and affordable to help them create one of a kind concrete molded products.
Solution: Hoyle Stone Products is a precast concrete manufacturing company based in Maryland. As a cast stone manufacturer they specialized in custom architectural and decorative precast stone and concrete. Their process requires a high level of craftsmanship and skill, building the custom forms, and hand finishing each piece.
Hoyle Stone’s concrete material contains a mixture of premium aggregates, admixtures, colors and cement along with just enough water to allow the material to be moist and moldable, similar to the beach sand when building a sandcastle. Each mold then reveals the shape and detail of the mold once released. Each stone will then cure in a steam chamber overnight, allowing for a fully cured stone in the morning.
In 2015, Hoyle Stone was introduced to the hot knife foam cutter and expanded polystyrene (EPS). The introduction of EPS foam in place of other materials, has saved time and fine tuned their design process ten fold. They used EPS foam to create specific profiles in the molds and even in the safe packaging of the final stone products to their installation site. EPS foam has become an integral part of Hoyle’s precast concrete manufacturing process.
Foam Supports for Stone Casts
Hoyle’s cast stone mix is put into each mold and compacted using a handheld, mechanical, air powered tamping tool allowing for the material to be packed tightly. Once the mold is full, it is turned, and the mold is carefully removed in sections and hand finished. Hoyle uses foam supports for the stones to rest and maintain their shape during their cure time in the steaming chamber.
Foam Block Outs or Voids in Concrete
Some stone design projects call for voids or block outs in their design. The voids may be because they are going to be placed around an existing column or pole or a custom material will be added later. Instead of using wooden blocks, Hoyle replaced it with EPS foam.
Hardshell Foam Application
In cases where customers want the look and feel of cast stone but are concerned about structural support or costs, Hoyle Stone offers hard shell eps foam pieces. The desired shape is cut out of EPS foam on the hot wire foam cutter and then treated with a cementitious spray, coating the foam entirely, making it hard, durable and look like stone with a foam center.
Foam Party Props
Hoyle Stone began using foam in tiki bars and small stage props design thanks to the affordability and ease of use of EPS foam.
EPS Foam Plugs for Archways and Windows
Hoyle Stone Products offers foam plugs for circular windows and archways that are ideal for their mason clients. Instead of the mason crew having to build a support out of wood on site, Hoyle will cut the exact size, shape and curvature they need to support their brick design.
Creativity Meets Concrete
Mallory from Hoyle Stone has unleashed her creativity to encompass colorful and retail-oriented concrete products via Wild Child Concrete. From Lazy Susans to trays, soap dishes to planters, Wild Child Concrete adds a colorful twist to the world of concrete.
Hoyle Stone is a prime example of the versatility that EPS Foam brings to the precast concrete industry.