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Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

perthnow.com.au

11–20 of 36 posts

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#11
post #4

No photos of the house, a broken video, and zero details on things like roofing, plumbing, in-wall wiring, etc. Oh wait, it’s a penny stock? Color me surprised...

I'm not sure what you mean by the broken video - most likely you have an ad blocker enabled.

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#12
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a more interesting video if you look at their channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfK41aTB7_VI2DHTJy2l-yg But why would you want a robot like this? Why not prefab the parts of the house and assemble on site?

Unfortunately that block wall it built looks quite sloppy if you really inspect the interblock spacing and vertical alignment between layers. And these are dry blocks with no mortar to let them slip and slide. Stand at the corner of a a block wall built by pros and look down the plane of the wall. You're going to see perfection. I do it any time the opportunity strikes and amazed at the consistency. No doubt a well s…

They are using glue instead of motar. It is being added just when then brick come out of the arm and then gravity is doing the rest.

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a more interesting video if you look at their channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfK41aTB7_VI2DHTJy2l-yg But why would you want a robot like this? Why not prefab the parts of the house and assemble on site?

And, it doesn't seem to do anything other than place the bricks. That's not the hard part of "laying bricks"...

I think you didn't try yourself to place bricks. That part requires some stamina, after building one home I got a big jump in muscle mass (from super-wimpy to average male). Also your "hard" part is not that hard.

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#14
post #9

Their system uses some custom adhesive as do some of the other systems around. The catch is how will this adhesive hold up in 30 years and are you brave enough to be that it works well on your house compared to the saving of using conventional systems? This is why innovation in building is slow. Fail fast is not possible. And there are often side effects. Just ask people with a metal framed house that creaks when it…

What about the gaps in the sides of the bricks? Do they get filled in?

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#15
Brick work and framing are two of the easiest and fastest steps in building a house. They are using an expensive system to do the cheapest steps. Essentially, they are answering a question no one asked.

The expensive and time consuming parts are everything else; something this system does not address.

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#16
post #15

Brick work and framing are two of the easiest and fastest steps in building a house. They are using an expensive system to do the cheapest steps. Essentially, they are answering a question no one asked. The expensive and time consuming parts are everything else; something this system does not address.

Actually, I think this may be a real time-saver for quick builds where you need an extra building like a garage or extra storage space.

As others have pointed out there are some flaws in the wall in that article and it might not be optimal for housing, but for quick and dirty jobs it will most likely do fine. Construction as a service! :)

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#18
post #6

Real (non-CGI!) timelapse of the robot bricklayer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YcrO8ONcfY It seems like a cool concept. The real example is slightly different to the CGI mockup, so I think they still have a bit of work to do. Best of luck to them! This could potentially bring down huge construction costs. Keen to see more automation in the construction industry.

And it will change little as long as the bottleneck is land and permits. And that the profits on each units are to be maximized.

I also wonder about reliability of such houses - that remains to be seen.

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#19
By this sample residential construction schedule for a 6,000 sq-ft custom home[1], it looks like they've theoretically managed to cut a 9-day job down to 3 without addressing the negotiation of foundation imperfections, plumbing, electrical, rebar reinforcement, air gaps, structural arches, and random site obstructions to name a few. Cool tech and surely a step in the right direction, but if we're still talking about affordable (patented, proprietary blocks?), sustainable (mortar substitute reliability?) housing that meets code, color me unconvinced.

Heimo Scheuch, CEO of Wienerberger AG: In times of digitalization, high demand for affordable housing and the prevailing shortage of skilled workers, the construction industry is facing major challenges.[2]

Prevailing shortage of skilled construction workers??

[1] https://www.b4ubuild.com/resources/schedule/6kproj.shtml

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qcyvoCtZB0

Re: Western Australia’s Fastbrick robot building home in three days a ‘world-first’

#20
post #6

Real (non-CGI!) timelapse of the robot bricklayer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YcrO8ONcfY It seems like a cool concept. The real example is slightly different to the CGI mockup, so I think they still have a bit of work to do. Best of luck to them! This could potentially bring down huge construction costs. Keen to see more automation in the construction industry.

And it will change little as long as the bottleneck is land and permits. And that the profits on each units are to be maximized. I also wonder about reliability of such houses - that remains to be seen.

Disclaimer: I know nothing about construction.

I think it'd be great to have some sort of automation in place for the simple & repetitive stuff (bricklaying), but it feels like we're a long way off from fully automated on-site house construction.

Possibly solved with prefabs?

> And that the profits on each units are to be maximized.

Wouldn't this benefit the construction company, since it brings costs down? (i.e. wages, insurance etc

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