Is there a need for an MPCP (a mostly printed concrete printer)

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I really think (for all the reasons) it isn’t going to win any battles in the short term. Especially in the US. But my optimism comes from the far future. That’s not a very fair fight because I can argue all I want but if it still can’t handle the smallest overhang and it looks like a crayon drawing of a kindergartener, then it isn’t going to be used in a Frank Lloyd Wright house.

I picked the victorian house because it has that round part and the roofs are sharply pitched. The Frank Lloyd Wright house is one made for his son and it has a ramp through the whole house up to the roof. The compound curves must have been a pain to build. The third house has a courtyard and I picked it because it is boxy, but not in the traditional suburb 2x4 construction I see so often.

If the machine was capable of making the main structure of any of these houses, then it seems (from my naive perspective) that you could then have that much flexibility in one neighborhood if every house was built by robots. The engineering could also have the flexibility to have complete control on the thickness and patterns in the layers.

I really don’t think the mechanism of setting up the machine is a big deal. That kind of cost will always go down at scale. Once you are setting up hundreds of jobs per day, investing in software to auto square and deskew an imprecise gantry will pay for itself.

The difference in our arguments is probably because you have experience in the field and I am a day dreamer with a naive point of view. I’d like to imagine it is because you have been conditioned on the old way of building. But that’s not very likely. The truth is that most people (at least here) want a house they can resell. So building a house that perfectly fits one family isn’t going to be that desirable. If you do invest in a bespoke custom house, you’re probably willing to hire a good architect firm, engineering firm, and building firm to get exactly what you want and bricks or sticks would work fine for that.

In summary: I am not going to put all my money into a new 3D printing house printer. :slight_smile:

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Windows and doors happen with current 3D printed structures, assume that if R&D is in any way, shape or form important to economic viability it will be done.

Consider, instead of concrete, or supplementing concrete, multi-part resin or UV cured resin or better yet, foam could also be implemented, and can generate overhangs. (Slow, to be sure, but can be done.) And/or we can add pick and place machines to the printer in order to place lintels, plumbing, electrical, and other amenities currently added manually.

For high-rise, we do not need to disassemble everything. Even less than we need to do with current cranes, as the printer could “climb” a set of vertical girders on the perimeter of the building, not entirely dissimilar to the way a printer with a stationary bed would. We already pump and crane the concrete il to do this, it doesn’t seem too high a hurdle. The steel frame of the building and the cranestill get assembled as normal, just the n number of vertical girders for the printer mechanism added, and we put the crane on that instead. No need to dismantle the lrintwr each floor, just “park the extruder” and crane the next floors in place, then run the next floorplan.

Next assume that we get some more work on material science in order to facilitate economical building in this fashion.

So let’s add in another extruder to add a smooth wall to the building. Interior, exterior, whatever. Something that will have an aesthetically acceptable surface to the wall, and can be smoothed to a nice vertical surface suitable for paint, and will support picture hooks, TV wall mounts, tiles. Done right, maybe it can even have infill structures to provide thermal and sound insulation properties, while providing a smooth surface that would at most need light patching and sanding, certainly no more work than gypsum drywall, possibly also way less flammable. Maybe all of the interior walls can be made this way, with pick and place electrical conduits, or even just wiring channels left in the walls.

Let’s look at what we currently have for 3D printers and slicer software and extrapolate. We have multi-material printers and slicers that can separate out materials. We have the ability to pause printing to insert non-printed pieces into printed structures. We can mix thicker and thinner layers (combine infill layers), so that the exterior print is smoother than the infill (concrete?) structure.

The current concrete printers are like the first generation of 3D printers. Not great, but starting to be usable with a lot of tweaking. I don’t know about you, but my first 3D printer was crap, and it produced crap results that weren’t particularly great, and nowhere NEAR what any of my current printers can produce. So let’s put some thought into how some of the current 3D printing could scale. Have an extruder whizzing around at 600mm/s laying down 0.5mm layers for interior wall surfaces, and every 150mm, the concrete printer lays down a layer. Add pick and place for electrical/comms, floor joists, and you could start with a hole in the ground and have a 2 storey house. Add flooring, cabinetry and plumbing fixtures, paint. Maybe exterior cladding.

If there’s money in it, It’ll happen.

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I like to think that is the key- I don’t think that outdoor implementation will prove successful either - building components that are quickly assembled is logically the way to go -

Then I get into a logic short circuit- printing flat surfaces is faster, so lie walls down and embed fixtures and windows. Lightweight materials for insulation and ease of transportation.

Then I get caught in my own logic trap as there are plenty of modular/prefab systems already, some ultra high quality.

I am inclined to think printing may be a way of taming crudely recycled materials, fibre or plastic - for it to work for me it has to be doing something better, not just offering another fabrication method.

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I know it hurts, but this is the future (and this particular company’s been doing it since 1929, so it’s not exactly new tech)

I think though that the software aspect @jeffeb3 is fascinating - every component is meticulously controlled and precisely positioned. Construction of completely finished homes takes days (they would point to an 8 hour project), they are almost infinitely customisable with the concrete slab the only really obvious place for human error and inefficiency.

I think there’s a place for the printing process here - even if it’s only laying glue or making spacers between components - or dare I say it, creating effective packaging.

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So currently 3D printing in place leaves 100-150mm “layer lines” that are only aesthetically acceptable if you happen to have a fetish for log cabins. The result is a need for a lot of finishing work inside.

Let’s add that second material extruder, have it print some sort of foam (Good thermal and acoustic insulation, win-win) in thin lines. Above, I said .5mm, but it could be anywhere from 0.1mm to 1mm with good results, I think.

Foam is pretty easily workable, but the main advantage over modular construction is that it’s all in place. No assembly, no seams. Minimal finishing time, and labour. No crew of workers patching screw holes, mudding and taping walls. Sand and paint. Maybe even skip sanding if you don’t mind a slight texture left from printing, or if you can add a knife blade after the extruder to get a very smooth texture without layer lines. Have it on an actuator so that it only activates for surface extrusion.

Pretty much removes an entire union from the build process. no drywall, no mudding no taping. Just paint and go. Hmmm. Robots already paint our cars…

To me, that is “doing something better” The end result better aesthetically, structurally, and allows architectural features that would be difficult to pre-fab, like removing sharp corners from walls, if they aren’t desired.

Let’s add a standard curve with a 50mm radius to all angles where walls join. not difficult to adapt countertops, closet shelves or other amenities to that corner. Have the corners where major appliances are expected have a 90° interior angle, no problem. Have a curved wall or a turret with straight segments for where the windows go.

Pre-fab also becomes much less economical with customization. Even changing a 10’ section of wall from having 2 electrical outlets to 3 means that this wall is “special” and needs to be specifically placed. Putting a small window in this bedroom and a larger window in that room means the same. This house gets an extra 2’ in width, and it might as well be a different design entirely as far as fabrication goes. For 3D printed, all of these are just parameters in the CAD/CAM. Add in a VR tour, and no surprises for the homeowner,

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Appreciate this topic, and look forward to seeing better affordable sustainable efficient housing actualize.

Personally have no commercial construction experience, have only remodeled ~8 bathrooms, multiple bedrooms, living spaces, kitchens, total ~7000sqft split across several houses over couple of decades. With that limited experience, my 2cts…

3D Concrete printer seems neat for the bespoke Hogwarts inspired castle I hope to build for my kids if/when they fund the project. But…

HVAC, plumbing, electrical, insulation, moisture control, networking and other stuff seem like a PITA with existing 3D concrete setups.

For regular homes, considering materials and setup/teardown, I don’t have the understanding/vision to see how 3D printing concrete setups will outcompete decent CNC’d OSB/ply/lumber factories churning out homes or partial homes (e.g. pre-framed walls with wiring/plumbing/windows/insulation/etc… already prefabbed). So, for regular above ground construction, I’d sooner use/invest in CNC based setup that factory line assembles walls/blocks. If DIY’n, then something like https://wikihouse.cc or larger. Met Shaun and Dennis at RMRRF, they’re a couple of friends that seem to be working towards constructing a wikihouse using rockwool filled structural OSB blocks, that assembles almost lego style. Neat project, hopefully they’ll share their progress on the forum, using a brown LR3 I think.

Ideally, if I could pick any machine(s) to be invented, to assist with sustainable shelter, it’d be something that digs… e.g. a gyrotron, or direct energy drilling, or something else electrical.
Something that can (laser/plasma) heat ground’s silica into structural glass would be neat. Wouldn’t need much material, just a lot of energy. Alternatively, pour concrete into form lined dug out below level walls.

Note how Mr Tfue’s underground residences have low heating and cooling costs. All built just using an axe and shovel.

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Strangely perhaps, that’s one of the things I like! I like that the method is clearly expressed, but of course that’s also one of the great stumbling blocks when trying to fit things to it.

I don’t think it will age well in a patina sense either -

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Too true. I think this is just because the current implementation is so crude. It has to get better eventually.

That would be interesting. Obviously, changing to an extruded material means there is going to be a lot of different possibilities. Since it is so big, I’m surprised it isn’t some kind of 2 part epoxy mixed with aggregate in the nozzle.

I’m honestly a big fan of that too. There is a lot to be gained by having a design heavy process and a central location for most of the labor. Prewiring the walls is where you see they are really optimizing things. My only issue are the constraints. But they are making lots of progress making bespoke designs and then making custom prefab houses. It isn’t the sears and roebuck houses from mid century anymore.

The video did mention printing some parts on site and then showed an overhang. But I agree you’re into a place where that is fixing a weakness and not a strength of the process.

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I’ve always wondered why there aren’t a few guys following up the extruder with a trowel to smooth the layer lines.

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That would be the crossover point where you may as well have a few guys laying blocks

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It’d be the same guys that have to lay the rebar into the structure.

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Those are still pretty much one shape. Same with the container houses. They are too inflexible, not incredibly more flexible.

I look in my neighborhood and I see about 6 floorplans. Small, medium, large and their mirror.

What if you wanted to live in a suburb, but wanted a house like this?

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Not sure how you grabbed that photo, but that house is right in my backyard. Small world indeed.

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Sorry, I don’t have much more to add to the conversation. I still think 3d printed houses are a long way off past a niche novelty.

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It might be a while off with full-blown houses, I can’t help but want an outdoor capable printer. Consumer 3D printers really took off when people could print whistles and Pikachu at home. If we start printing fire pits and sheds, maybe we get the ball rolling for the big brains to come in and figure out how to do it better and faster.

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I literally did an image search for “victorian house”. That’s awesome that you live so close to it. It looks great.

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Considered trying out CNCs? :slightly_smiling_face: Maybe bespoke Plasma cut fire pit with (-<) logo , or CNC’d wikihouse shed?

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Concrete printers are super interesting, but yeah I can’t think of much real life applications for them.
Not that they couldn’t work, but it would take a long time to set up for stuff that could probably be done in less time by one or two humans, plus it would remove the only part of the construction that is actually fun and not too difficult/boring.

Laying brick isn’t very time consuming at all, I don’t know if any of you guys worked in construction, but generally things are starting to move a lot quicker when it comes to making the walls. It’s usually just a matter of a few days to make one entire floor for an mason who knows his job.

What usually takes a lot of time is to make the fundations, to terraform, to coordinate the dozens of different people and teams who need to be there at the right time, to get the materials, to do the paperwork, etc.
Brick laying is arguably the most fun part, its where you see the most progress happen quickly and it’s not even very physically difficult.

I can’t really think of much use for a concrete 3D printer as far as 2024 technology goes, except some niche aplications like making some weird shapes structures, or internal structures for statues/decorative stuff.

There was a dude who built a small princess castle for his daughter using 3D printing, I think it was a great application.

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This looks interesting. Seems to address a few issues that have been brought up.

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That looks neat. They said they built the parts off site. I want to see pictures during the construction.

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Cool though

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With some reluctance I have to agree! Check out the printed furniture!

Very cool indeed.

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