Doing "perfect" seams for natural, engineered, "green" or recycled glass and stone slab countertops has always been a challenge for most fabricators in our industry. Up until the last decade, there have been very few options for guys to use when it comes to having really professional looking seams - especially if they were going to have to finish their seams by hand.

When I first got into the "slab" side of our industry back in 1985, the preferred method of finishing a seam was to grind a small bevel on either side of the stone where the seam would be. This really accentuated the seam, made it stand out. The seam was then "set" using a clear silicone sealant. Not knowing any other method, this technique was the "norm" (for me and many guys like me) for many years. This technique is still used by many Fabricators to this day. Is it wrong? That will depend on one's local market and the style of workmanship that is expected by the customer.

Fast forward to 1995 - the art of doing "cleaner" seams started to become a real issue as clients became more educated about what to expect from a stone countertop installation, and did not want to see an "ugly" seam in their Natural Stone countertops. The "beveled" look became the less desirable way of doing seams. What replaced this technique was to perform a "tighter" seam with no bevel. The only problem with this method, was that ANY chips present on either side of the seam would stick out like a sore thumb. To reduce the visual impact of this kind of seam - a different type of adhesive would be introduced that would work better than silicone - that material would be Polyester resined glue. The added advantage was that with Polyester - one could add a colorant or tint to the glue. It would still be seen, but not noticed as much. The glue in the seam would still be visible, but it would subtlety colored closer to that of the adjacent stone on either side of the seam.

Now with colored Polyester glue in the seam, I and many guys like me - thought we really had a better looking seam.... Except for those darn chips that always seamed to be there. I would notice them - and our customers would too - making the next step in the evolution of seams a necessity - "dressed" seams.

The next step towards perfection came when someone started to "dress" or polish back each side of their seams, so there were no longer any chips visible to the naked eye. This took time, a lot of patience, and moreover - LOTS of practice until the technique was mastered. Once a guy "got the hang of it" the technique would take anywhere from 15 minutes per side - up to an hour per side of each seam edge. This was a time consuming process, but the seam looked fantastic.

There was one small problem that still plagued Fabricators - and that was lippage at the seams. A guy could have perfectly flat and chip free seams, but when he installed the two pieces out in the field, there would many times when one side of the seam would stick up and create a "lip" or "lippage" at the seam. Again necessity is the mother of all invention, and the seam leveling tool was invented. Enter the Omni Cubed Seam Leveler, and the Gorilla Grips seam puller, and other tools or systems that are designed to "flatten out" a seam. Prior to the advent of these great devices, a guy would have to "re-grind" their seams and remove the high sides ot the stone by hand. This is known as "Seam Polishing," and in my opinion is a great technique, but should ONLY be used as a last resort to "smooth out" a seam. The down side to doing this procedure is that if enough material is removed - the reflection at the area that was ground down and re-polished will be distorted. In some cases, the cure can be worse than the problem.

Now, with a seam leveling tool, fabricators could work their seams and flatten them out making their seams look as close to invisible as possible, but there was still the "time factor" that bothered many fabricators - especially on the seam dressing step. This took a quantum leap in time savings with the introduction of the Seam Phantom. This tool replaced the "by hand" process of doing flat, straight seams and gave the fabricator a huge time-saving factor in performing his seam dressing steps to do flatbutted straight seams with no chips or gaps between the pieces.

Necessity (being the mother of all invention) again ushered in the next step in seaming technology with the Accu-Seam VGi-1 system. This system is designed to do inside mitered corner seams with a radiused corner instead of a sharp 45 degree turn - making the daunting task of doing a "French Miter," "Lock-Notch," "Butterfly," or "Euro-Miter" (or whatever else you'd want to call this type of seam configuration) where you have an inside corner of 90 degrees an easy and speedy task. The Accu-Seam VGi-1 simply makes doing inside mitered corner seams faster and easier.

Additionally, a "serpentine" seam system is available that allows a fabricator to perform a "wavy" seam to hide high contrast movement and color on either side of a seam, by creating a serpentine path for the seam to follow. This may not always be warranted on a project, but when it is - there's now a way to do it accurately and fast - with no chips.

Now the tools are all there to make straight-butted seams, inside mitered corners, serpentine seams and leveling of any of these seam types a reality. The fabricator that can do a near perfect seam with no chips and that is super tight is the guy that will dominate his market in years to come - because his seams will scream out "Quality." And that is the name of the game. Until next month...

Best Regards and Happy Fabricating!

Doing "Perfect Seams" using the Seam Phantom, Gorilla Grips and the ACCU-SEAM seaming systems are subjects that are taught every month by AZ School of Rock. For more information, contact Kevin M. Padden at www.azschoolofrock.com, by phone at 480-3099422 or via e-mail at info@azschoolofrock.com

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