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Where are the robotic bricklayers?

constructionphysics.substack.com

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Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#421

Post by imtringued »

dragontamer wrote: post #74
andrewmcwatters wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have contempt for the skills; I have great respect for the skills. I have contempt for the prices of things. If construction costs are cheaper than ever (are they really?) why can't I buy a box to live in without spending $300,000? Why is the permits process nationally broken? And despite being skilled, that doesn't mean they're informed: why do contractors not know what they're supposed to do? Why do the peo…

> why can't I buy a box to live in without spending $300,000? Manufactured homes are like $20,000. The plot of land that they go on however, is subject to political rules. Turns out that people don't like cheap housing to be available, because it attracts the underclass. Its important to remember that housing is mostly a solved problem. The politics of housing are not solved however: too much "progress" (aka: higher…

I agree. People pretend that expensive housing is an issue and then when it's their turn to buy and own the house they insist that it should stay expensive.

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#422

Post by SlapperKoala »

munificent wrote: post #93

With human bricklayers, you can find enough people who have that skill that the pay is low. Here in the US, the availability of illegal immigrants means that the pay is often literally criminally low and you don't have to provide benefits. Replace those bricklayers with a robot and its caretakers and now you need: 1. Someone with technical training who can keep the bot running happily. Since the technology is new and…

The cheapest way to automate something is always poor people.This applies even more so in the developing world. Where the vast majority of new construction is happening.

Though it would be interesting to see what the state of construction is like in developed countries that don't have access to a vast pool of cheap immigrant labor. Maybe New Zealand? Northern Europe?

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#423

Post by jcelerier »

IkmoIkmo wrote: post #350
function_seven wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they’re pleasant to look at. Half the time, the wall isn’t even “needed”, other than for aesthetic purposes. Whenever a wall is purely functional, it’s almost never made of small clay bricks today. I’m talking about foundation walls, subsurface retaining walls, and similar things. The types of walls that aren’t meant to be looked at, but instead meant to hold something back or up. Whenever you see a wall bein…

Yup. I'm from Amsterdam, the Netherlands as an example. A ton of the city and country has been built with brick. But modern construction typically is built with concrete with a thin facade of brick infront. The brick is just cosmetic, and typically pre-fab in large slabs of 20x20 bricks. For old homes that get renovated, it's popular to keep the old brick facade standing, demolish everything behind it, then build it…

> and typically pre-fab in large slabs of 20x20 bricks.

which were likely robotically brick-laid

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#424

Post by necovek »

imtringued wrote: post #400
SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because they’re pleasant to look at. I expect that this is less a case of "bricks have long been used because they’re pleasant to look at", and more a case of "Bricks are considered pleasant to look at, because they have long been used, and have that old-timey feeling"

I don't think so. I see a lot of buildings that are 30 years old and they look ugly because they don't have any complexity in their facade, just a single color of paint. Bricks add natural complexity to a facade. You can make a single color building look nice by adding details.

Actual clay bricks even more so with their imperfect uniformity and consistency.

FWIW, at least here, in construction even the thermal insulation clay blocks (basically, any wall-construction material made from clay, those red blocks :)) is called "bricks".

They are laid exactly like the regular (uniform, filled) bricks, so I would assume that's what's mostly used in construction everywhere even when not going for looks (they are lighter and have better thermal properties).

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#425

Post by imtringued »

andrewmcwatters wrote: post #52
pvorb wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Construction costs are cheaper than ever? The prices have skyrocketed in the past year. Is this something special to Germany? I would've expected that the pandemic shows equal effects elsewhere.

I'm just saying this because every but-actually poster says something like this, but I think homes come with more amenities now than they did in the 70s, so buying a home isn't really any cheaper adjusted for inflation.

Yes, bigger houses for fewer people means costs still go up.

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#426

Post by imtringued »

andrewmcwatters wrote: post #131
dredmorbius wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In attempt to turn this teachable: the costs that go into housing aren't just labour, whether skilled or unskilled. It's a number of economic goods and services, each of which has its own price dyanmic. The chief cost of housing is land , and that follows the laws of economic rents and assets , in two principle ways: - For goods subject to rents , that is, where supply is nonresponsive to price , any surplus value ac…

None of this is a mystery. There's nothing to teach to me here. It's just a complaint about the market.

No, it's a complaint about private land ownership.

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#427

Post by Gibbon1 »

cudgy wrote: post #346
Gibbon1 wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think about that every time I see yet another article on 3d printing houses. My parents added a bedroom to a stick framed house. The floor joists took a weekend. Nailing together and erecting walls took one weekend. Framing the roof, another weekend. That was my dad, mom, brother and I. And we used a skill saw, hammers and nails. I think the issue is each task of itself is fairly optimized. Yet there are a large nu…

Why? Isn’t most of the West one of the the least densely populated areas in the United States? Seems there would be lots of land to build single family homes.

I meant the US and Europe. And by extension places of that nature. Slower growing aging populations and the realization that low density single family both burdens local government with costly infrastructure that generates low revenue. Like a sewer main with 100 customers per mile. Only sustainable when growing fast.

There is a lot of multifamily being built despite fairly intense NIMBYism. And despite that you're seeing cities getting rid of R1 zoning.

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#428

Post by Folcon »

eloisius wrote: post #414
Folcon wrote: post #412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you link to some screenshots? Sorry it's really hard to get a sense of the difference you're describing and I'm really interested to see what it looks like.

Screenshots of woodwork? Edit: sorry that was unreasonably snarky. I know you're looking for pictures. The CNC-milled kind that I am talking about are easy to find. Google image search 'curved handrail cnc.' I'm actually having a hard time finding pictures of classic steam-bent curved handrails amongst tons of content marketing from bendywood and contractors. If you happen to tour an antique house with curved, wooden…

Ahh, so one continuous block of wood following the grain vs sliced together chunks that will bring to mind Frankenstein's monster.

Hmm, I wonder if you can feel the difference when you rub your hand over it if it's just polished, probably not if painted. So perhaps people who want polished wood for their staircase might go for the older style even if it's more expensive?

Yea, flubbed on the screenshots bit, was just thinking images of stairs and as I expected them to come from your computer my brain clearly went to screenshots instead of pictures =)...

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#429

Post by necovek »

dragonsky67 wrote: post #130

The question I would have around automated building construction is "why use bricks?". Bricks are great for humans to build with, they are just the right size and weight for the human hand to manipulate and place. They are not optimised for machine manipulation. I would guess that if you wanted to automate construction you would start by making things like walls on an automated production line, then ship the largest…

It is a great question, but it's like jumping on refactoring: you'll solve all the problems that were obvious with the old solution, but introduce new ones that you didn't think of that were already solved by the old one.

Basically, "thermal blocks", which is mostly what's used in construction in areas where they are used (Europe, rather than filled-in bricks) need to be modified to accommodate imperfections: you need half bricks, third-bricks, and they are easy to make on the spot.

For automated construction, you'd have to have a bunch of these pre-made, and the larger the block you are building with, the more types of those smaller ones you'll need.

These blocks are also relatively simple to put electrical and plumbing installations in (it's a lot more demanding to make "channels" in concrete than bricks).

Anyway, block construction is way cheaper than eg. gypsum board construction for interior walls in Serbia, and other than taking a lot more space, being heavier, and requiring curing time, it has a bunch of better properties (acoustic, thermal,...). The price not being high is actually the reason this is not further improved.

Filled-in bricks are mostly used for decoration of outside walls these days (and usually as plasterboards these days), and as far as paying for things go, humans will happily pay the most for good looks!

Re: Where are the robotic bricklayers?

#430

Post by SlapperKoala »

salar wrote: post #362

If this specific problem excites you and you're a hardware engineer, get in touch with us. We're working hard on solving this specific problem with the goal of getting construction speeds and cost down significantly: https://about.terraform.industries/engineering

What's your solution to the systemic problems they raise?
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