A house 3D printed from raw earth • Hacker News Board

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#101

Post by dagw » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:11 PM UTC

mrfusion wrote: post #25

dagw wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bulk of a house (and its major cost component) is the structure Using current pre-fab techniques a half dozen builders can raise the core structure of a single family house in a few days. A friend of mine is in the process of building a house and raising the core structure was the fastest and easiest part of the whole process. I don't see this being either cheaper or faster. The bulk of the cost in many cases is…

Well lumbar is expensive too now.

True. The question is if that is just a temporary thing or the new normal. I suspect prices will be back to 'normal' in a year

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#102

Post by bobthechef » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:11 PM UTC

laumars wrote: post #58

cptskippy wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says that it's been optimized to be printable, not for longevity or other characteristics needed in construction. What are the tradeoffs?

I would imagine if this house isn’t strong then future designs would be. Bricks and coffee mugs are also made out of clay so it’s not like we don’t already have a long history of experience working with the substance to create durable materials.

Yes, but bricks and coffee mugs are kiln fired, so this 3d printer would need to somehow accomplish that baking process or add something to the mix that would cause it to harden without being fired.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#103

Post by bobthechef » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:11 PM UTC

idiotsecant wrote: post #17

DougN7 wrote: post #7

Would this survive a rain storm or would it turn to mud? I couldn’t tell from the article.

It would pretty quickly erode away. I think that's why they've built it in a desert. Don't have to worry about rain if there is no rain!

Rain can be torrential in the desert.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#104

Post by kortex » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:12 PM UTC

surgeryres wrote: post #51

Yet another example of the over-hype of “3D Printing”. Yes it’s neat that they collected some local dirt, mixed it with some non-locally sourced water and binder, and poured it into an extruder run on some kind of non locally sourced energy, then sprayed it with some protective coating - it baffles me that people see this as a possible mainstream building technique. Running electrical, plumbing, air conditioning etc…

> Running electrical, plumbing, air conditioning etc through this structure is doable but much harder

Have you seen architecture in like, any warm part of the world, especially Italy? Masonry/concrete techniques dominate.

If anything, this is far easier to integrate with utilities, since it can be incorporated into the 3D design.

It also seems easier to drill through than traditional masonry/concrete.

This technique is even more labor-saving than filling formwork with local materials, because formwork is very labor intensive, and you can't readily incorporate unusual utilities, windows, shapes, etc.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#105

Post by bobthechef » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:17 PM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #95

travisporter wrote: post #41

Domes are ubiquitous throughout sci-fi. Why don't we have a competition to, say print domes or homes autonomously in antarctica or sahara?

Because domes are a terrible shape for humans. You can't hang pictures on the walls - the curve makes weird things happen. Likewise your furniture can't be against the wall it must be out to account for the curve. Domes look cool, so of course fiction is full of them. They are not impossible to build so a few people have built them. They are not a good shape though, so they won't catch on.

Right. They're impractical and a poor use of space. Also, it constrains how much of the space is walkable without bumping your head into the wall/ceiling. It's like living in an attic.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#106

Post by bobthechef » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:18 PM UTC

55555 wrote: post #63

I thought this was going to be about... bricks. Houses are traditionally made from earth.

Not in the US. Americans prefer living in cardboard boxes. I mean, timber frame and drywall palaces.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#107

Post by quickthrowman » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:20 PM UTC

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #65

rootusrootus wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's the first time I've heard of someone considering the Japanese home ownership model aspirational. Isn't that also where the 100 year mortgage idea started? I'd rather see that we built really solid houses that are fundamentally designed for ease of renovation, rather than routinely raze and rebuild from scratch. Code improves over time but not on a timescale that makes 20-year rebuilds sensible.

Unfortunately a lot of the rebuilds happens because of dramatic code changes. Houses built just 5 years ago will often be illegal to build again. Only way to bring it up to code is total remodel or worse tear down.

Your post is not how things work, already built homes are grandfathered in. There are still houses with knob and tube wiring, balloon framed houses, all sorts of things that aren’t allowed any more by building code.

If a Toll Brothers/(any builder) has generic plan house blueprints that need to be updated to include the new code changes, they pay an architect to change the drawings to include the new code requirements, and then continue building that design of house.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#108

Post by judge2020 » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:24 PM UTC

nanna wrote: post #86

Lots of unfair negativity here. I think this is wonderful. HN is full of random hacked-up tech that will never solve the worlds problems but nonetheless give a glimpse at what alternatives could look like. Experiments. This is what this is, and in my opinion it's stunning and I would move into one in an instant.

HN worries about the hard problems because they're real challenges that need to be solved before any improvements reach the wider market.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#109

Post by JAlexoid » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:24 PM UTC

mikeg8 wrote: post #76

CyberDildonics wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Running electrical, plumbing, air conditioning etc through this structure is doable but much harder, You realize there are lots of brick houses out there and those things aren't run through the brick walls either right? 2x4 dimensional lumber framing is used inside and those are run through the studs.

Yea but good luck running interior 2x4 furring walls for MEPs (Mechanical, electrical, plumbing) on curved wall structures like this. Would be an absolute carpentry nightmare.

This is a POC and an art project.

Stop with this arrogance, because I can bet that your POC are nowhere near as good looking.

Re: A house 3D printed from raw earth

#110

Post by mbgerring » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 5:24 PM UTC

vanderZwan wrote: post #94

mbgerring wrote: post #66

Every one of these obnoxious mud huts I’ve ever seen are single story, on like 10 acres of land, in a car-dependent rural area. More people living like this would worsen every current issue we face with environmental sustainability.

So you're complaining that these first demonstrations of a novel technology are not comparable to technologies developed over decades or even centuries? There is an expression for this: "the last of the old outperforms the first of the new" . Most of us don't seem to have too much trouble applying that concept to programming and hardware related developments, so why is this different?

In what sense is a mud hut a novel technology?