Brick Laying 3D Printing Robot For Architecture

It seems like the doldrums of summer have hit my news feed with very little in the way of architectural 3D printing news being released this week. It’s not surprising, therefore, that the most interesting robot video of the week comes from Australia, where it’s winter. The attached mesmerizing video is of the Fastbrick Robotics’ Hadrian 105 robot at work. Many assume 3D printing necessitates materials emerging from a nozzle but this is not the case. I guess there is an argument to be made the topic should be reframed as “construction robotics” but in this case the software used is directly related to architecture. I’ve written elsewhere that the development of quality software played an important role in the spread of architectural 3D printing. Here the Hadrian robot interprets already existing plugins for Solidworks 3D – a program I’ve used in the past to design of models for 3D printing – to calculate out the brick laying pattern. Mike Pivac, CEO, has this to say about the company’s expectation for the technology: “Fastbrick Robotics aims to make improvements in the areas of speed, accuracy, safety and waste” . I can’t blame him for wanting to get into the brick laying market; the brick laying market is worth a staggering $12 bil. globally.