Automation of Whole House Construction Using Contour Crafting

传统的制造自动化方法不适合于构造具有内部特征的大型结构。这就解释了为什么建筑自动化的发展缓慢。一种有前途的新自动化方法是分层制造，通常称为固体自由形式制造或快速原型制造，它使用添加剂方法，能够创建复杂的内部特征。然而，大多数当前的分层制造方法受限于它们提供适用于建筑的各种材料的能力。此外，它们受到材料沉积速率低的严重限制，这使得它们仅对小型工业部件的制造有吸引力。该项目提出了一种新的建筑自动化方法，使用分层制造过程称为轮廓工艺（CC），已在南加州大学开发。该过程旨在自动化建造整个房屋以及子组件。使用该过程，可以在单次运行中自动构建单个房屋或房屋群，每个房屋可能具有不同的设计。PI的研究计划的具体重点是扩展他们目前的研究活动，迄今为止，这些活动集中在小规模的部分，使用适当的建筑材料建造和测试房屋的全尺寸部分，并调查其他相关的可扩展性问题。为实现这些目标，PI旨在开展与以下方面有关的活动：（a）开发用于建造全尺寸房屋的关键机器元件，（B）软件和控制问题，以及（c）实验、测试和分析建造的结构。预计研究成果也将扩展到其他星球的建筑和陶瓷艺术领域。

Conventional methods of manufacturing automation do not lend themselves to construction of large structures with internal features. This explains why the evolution of construction automation has been slow. A promising new automation approach is layered fabrication, generally known as solid free form fabrication or rapid prototyping, which uses an additive method and is capable of creating complex internal features. However, most of the current layered fabrication methods are limited by their ability to deliver a wide variety of materials applicable to construction. Additionally, they are severely constrained by the low rates of material deposition which makes them attractive only for the fabrication of small industrial parts. This project addresses a novel construction automation approach using a layered fabrication process called Contour Crafting (CC) which has been developed at the University of Southern California. The process aims at automated construction of whole houses as well as sub-components. Using this process, a single house or a colony of houses, each with possibly a different design, may be automatically constructed in a single run. The specific focus of the PIs' research plan is to extend their current research activities, which have so far concentrated on small scale parts, to build and test full-scale sections of houses using proper construction materials, and to investigate other pertinent scalability issues. Towards realizing these objectives, the PIs aim at conducting activities pertaining to: (a) development of crucial machine elements for construction of segments of full-scale houses, (b) software and control issues, and (c) experimentation, testing and analysis of constructed structures. It is anticipated that the research results will be also extendable to construction on other planets, and to the field of ceramic arts.