
Perth engineer invents robotic bricklayer - gregcrv
http://www.perthnow.com.au/realestate/news/robot-brickie-perth-engineer-invents-worlds-first-robotic-bricklayer/story-fni0ckzf-1227414734482
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triggercut
As someone who follows construction technology, and someone who just happens
to be from Perth, this is great to see. There are a number of "brick placing"
robots starting to pop-up, most however seem to be a little... lets say
"delicate" for the battleground that is a construction site. (I'm thinking the
"Flight assisted Architecture" video, using swarms of drones to place
lightweight blocks, and a modified car factory arm on treads, which I
unfortunately can't find the link for right now.)

Retrofitting this onto an existing crawler chassis makes this more practical.
The major issues I see in implementation are unfortunately legislative. Most
suburban/residential construction sites -considering these are the most likely
to utilize it - have quite strict noise restrictions. A diesel engine running
24/7 is going to upset a few neighbors.

Also, from a Health and Safety perspective. Residential construction is very
fractured when it comes to trades, and at the best of times, difficult to
coordinate. I would imagine either a physical exclusion zone, or a temporal
one while this thing is operating since it appears to be semi-autonomous,
making it difficult to have others on site around it and maintain safety.

All things I'm sure the inventor has considered over development, but
challenges none the less.

~~~
bigiain
I'm pretty sure everything on that is hydraulically or electrically driven -
switching the diesel running the hydraulic pump out for an electric motor is
probably simple... I suspect the most difficult part of that would be the
software to manage having it drag around a 3 phase esxension lead safely...

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jqm
Wouldn't it be easier to automate building using something other than brick?
Probably bricklaying started because bricks were small enough a person could
carry and lay them individually (now they are ornamental of course rather than
strictly functional). With a machine there isn't the weight/size restraint of
a human laborer.

I worked one summer on a concrete crew building tip up slab buildings... big
structures like a Costco or trucking depot. How it worked was the foundation
was poured, then the forms for the walls (one or two walls at a time) were
placed on top of the foundation. A spray to prevent the concrete wall from
bonding the the floor was applied, and the wall was poured directly on top of
the floor and then tilted up by a crane. Then the next wall was poured on top
of the floor and the process repeated. The whole system seemed much more
efficient then laying blocks and a building shell could be assembled very
quickly.

While a cool invention, this robot bricklayer seems something like a
computerized horse carriage. It seems a paradigm shift is in order to really
automate building. Poured in place concrete may be a more efficient method for
automation.

~~~
callesgg
That way of building is not very fast when you have "intricate" details like
rooms, windows and doors.

btw for some reason people like bricks, think they look good. So i think there
is a market for it.

This is what you are looking for i would say, it is a robot that 3D prints
houses with concrete.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SObzNdyRTBs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SObzNdyRTBs)

Personally i think the fastest way of building robust houses that look good
without tons of human after work is with prebuilt segments.

I have literally seen a concrete base on a yard on my way to work in the
morning and an actual house walking back home in the evening.

~~~
pjc50
A lot of concrete prefabricated houses were built in the UK after the war.
Their history of problems would make them very unpopular for new build today.
[http://www.neverpaintagain.co.uk/blog/damp-in-concrete-
house...](http://www.neverpaintagain.co.uk/blog/damp-in-concrete-houses/)

~~~
saalweachter
I suspect he was referring to non-concrete prefabs.

I love a cool robot as much as the next guy, but a lot of these "building of
the future" technologies act like they've won the race after the first lap.
Prefab houses don't just give you the basic structure, they give you a
_finished house_ , with flooring, cabinetry, wallpaper, plumbing, electric...
it's like the difference between a 3d printer that can print some of its rigid
components and one that can print its servos and control circuits.

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NickNameNick
If the article is correct, that the robot is parked in a single location and
reaches across the building site to place bricks, then it can only be used for
unreinforced masonry structures. Perfectly reasonable in West Australia, but
not a great idea in places that get earthquakes.

I wonder how much modification it would need to be able to build brick
cladding around a timber frame structure.

When I was working for a builder we would show up on-site after the foundation
pad had set, and unload pre-nailed frames and trusses from a truck. Stand up
and fasten the frames, top-plate and roof trusses. Usually we would put the
ceiling battens in at this stage. Another contractor would put the roof on,
then we would paper (or tyvek etc) the outside of the house, and install the
windows and doors. The soffit under the eaves would go in. Then the brick
layers would clad the outside at more or less the same time the plumbers and
electricians were doing the pre-wire/pre-plumb.

With the eaves already in place, even a mobile robot is going to have trouble
placing the top several rows of bricks.

On the other hand it should be possible to change the build order, in which
case the only major change to the brick placing head would be an additional
mechanism to install the anchors that attach the bricks to the wooden frame.

~~~
sorbits
There is an animation showing how it works on YouTube:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rebqcsb61gY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rebqcsb61gY)

This confirms the “machine” is static in one corner of the building site, so
it seems limited to non-reinforced builds.

Though it might be possible to interleave it with manual labour to lay and
anchor the rebars.

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icefox
Article is missing a lot of facts that are easily found on the companies
website which of course they don't link to.
[http://www.fastbrickrobotics.net/](http://www.fastbrickrobotics.net/)

Also reminds me of the brick paving machine:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLDP6s5FPCk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLDP6s5FPCk)

~~~
alexggordon
If we can't change the URL to the one mentioned above, here's a news article
by a slightly more creditable website.

[http://www.popsci.com/australian-robot-will-shift-
bricks](http://www.popsci.com/australian-robot-will-shift-bricks)

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josephagoss
I was scared for a second that Hacker News was now presenting stories based on
location. Nice to see our City making some headlines. :)

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drcross
Bricklaying is a semi-skilled job, it's not just a matter of placing bricks on
top of each other. You need to have a perfect mix of cement and the corner
pieces need to be custom fit, usually by breaking full blocks down to side
with a lump hammer. All of this detail is glossed over so as usual I'm
hesitant about saying that this is much more than a pick and place robot.

~~~
IshKebab
It says it can cut the bricks.

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icanhackit
This seems like the missing link to the concept of 3D printing large
structures. Printing concrete in layers from the slab up to make walls seemed
like it was jumping the gun a little. This seems entirely more reasonable -
the finished structure will look more uniform and be made quicker as the
primary material is formed offsite and delivered in bulk, ready to use.

~~~
LoSboccacc
Dunno it feels like they invented the steam horse; laying briks after briks
seems grossly inefficient when one could drop entire wall sections at once,
especially if they start building them with self connecting piping

~~~
hhandoko
Brick construction is still a major selling point for homes in Perth
(especially double-brick [1]).

I've seen pre-fabricated homes in mining towns up North, where labour costs
are insanely high. While they look nice (and structurally sound), people still
prefer the traditional house constructions.

[1] - [http://www.anewhouse.com.au/2013/01/why-double-
brick/](http://www.anewhouse.com.au/2013/01/why-double-brick/)

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marcus_holmes
Is it like this for other cities? Strange random world-class inventions
popping up out of the suburbs with no warning.

We've got a thriving startup ecosystem that seems to be getting known around
town and yet we still get people appearing on the front page of HN that we've
never heard of.

~~~
SanFranManDan
Its a little egocentric to expect a metropolitan area of 2 million to not be
able to invent something. The world economy isn't on hold because one location
is doing well.

~~~
marcus_holmes
God no, Perth people are incredibly inventive and creative, it's not that we
don't expect people to invent things here (and if my first post sounded like
that then I got the tone totally wrong).

It's just that in a town where everyone knows everyone, we'd expect to hear
about awesome stuff like this happening locally before it hits HN ;)

~~~
fit2rule
I think what you're witnessing is the Perth "blow-hard" effect, wherein the
culture has a proclivity towards hype and hubris if it thinks something is
"world-changing", because Perth is an underdog city in the context of
Australia, an underdog country. Perth culture promotes the idea that its
citizens are bound by destiny to have a big impact on the world, since its
literally a city on the edge of the world, very far from most of the major
civilizing actions, and very isolated from most of what is going on. So it
"has to be" a very progressive, "forward-thinking" place. Whenever someone in
Perth invents something neat, its a "world-changing thing, invented here in
humble Perth" .. usually turning out to be exactly the opposite.

(Disclaimer: Sandgroper.)

~~~
rustynails
Your assessment is unfair. I'm not from Perth and have no vested interest in
defending it. The article is typical journalism. Perth blows no more smoke
than anywhere else. The only place in Australia that could be accused of the
arrogance you talk of is Victoria (nicknamed "France 2nd" for a good reason).
Perth now isn't exactly a shining example of journalism. It's one of the
lowest quality publications in Australia. Adelaide's advertiser is probably
the worst. ABC News or The Australian probably the best.

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endgame
Another interesting piece of automation: I tried to find a video of the robot
in action, but a search for Hadrian bricklayer on youtube only found videos
that played a text-to-speech summary of the article and a slideshow of
pictures.

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ars
At least where I live, houses are not built from brick, they are made from
cinderblock, with a facing (skin) of brick.

Not sure if this is because of labor, or cost or materials or some other
reason.

They should extend this machine to also lay cinderblock.

~~~
roel_v
In the image it's putting in 'bricks' the size of cinderblocks; basically
clay-based cinderblocks (not sure what the English term for them is). The
reason people build with two layers is for thermal insulation. It gives the
house mass, and you can leave a gap between the inner and outer bricks in
which you can put insulation, so that with 30-35cm in total, you can build a
passive house (can be heated with just locally produced energy), even when
it's -20 outside.

I don't know if it can lay bricks this close to an existing wall, but if it
can't already, that seems to me to be the main issue for adopting this thing
in Europe. I wonder how much it would save on the total cost of a house
though. Let's say labor for laying bricks on a 'normal' sized (200m2) house in
Europe costs 6000 euros (40m2 per facade, times 4, plus twice 40 for the
interior walls, times 25 euros per square meter excl vat). How much would this
machine cost to rent - 500 euros a day? (a big crane costs that, including
operator). You still need an extra man to supervise, stack bricks etc; total
cost per day is 1000 euros. Let's say it can actually build it in 3 days,
including delivery, cleaning etc. I doubt 3 days is feasible, because the
cement can't set that fast. But let's say 3 days. Then you need to count
another 1000 (at least) for the CAD engineer to prepare the plans. Seems like
minimal gains overall. Probably starts to make sense for large projects only,
but not many of those use much brick (but maybe they don't because it's too
expensive...)

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tikumo
With technology as printing with concrete or other fluids or even prefab
houses with sheets of concrete this is so time consuming.

