Advancing 3D Concrete Printing for Affordable Housing (2023-11)¶

3D concrete printing (3DCP) technology is expected to address the construction industry's inefficiency, lack of skilled labor, and safet concerns, while tackling the housing shortage due to global populatio growth. Current applications in academia and industry have mainly focuse on fabricating wall elements, which do not fulfill the potential of thi technology to fully automate the construction process, includin enclosures. In concrete construction, formwork is an essential part tha fundamentally influences labor needs, quality, time, and cost. Man building components, such as walls, beams, columns, and prefabricate blocks, have been successfully printed without formwork using variou additive manufacturing (AM) techniques for 3DCP. However, due to a 60 degree printing angle restriction when using a horizontal slicing techniqu and a corbelling printing method, to print spanning structures withou formwork remains a challenge. Most state-of-the-art studies in 3DCP hav focused on developing strategies to fabricate formwork, rather tha developing new techniques for printing them without formwork. Thi research aims to leverage the power of shape grammar to overcome th challenges of printing spanning roof structures in 3DCP. By drawin inspiration from historical structures, we propose a multi-directiona printing approach, integrating corbelling, radial, and inclined slicin techniques for toolpath design. Our objective is to establish shape gramma rules to break down enclosures into printable patches, design correspondin toolpaths using various slicing techniques, and validate the effectiveness o this approach by physically fabricating a prototype. To achieve thi objective, an algorithm, incorporating shape grammar rules and numerica modelling software, to optimize the 3D concrete printing process fo spanning roof structures was developed. Through this generative desig system, designers can efficiently generate diverse and sustainable roo designs, specifically tailored for affordable housing solutions.