APPLIED RESEARCH TRANSFORMATION, PLLC — Department of Commerce SBIR Phase I: 2

Description

The construction industry is poised for a major transformation through the additive manufacturing approach of field-based concrete printing, an emerging technology using large-scale 3D printers to construct physical infrastructure. Most 3D printing is performed in a controlled environment. In field-based construction, many factors, especially environmental ones, affecting printed concrete product quality are difficult to control. These factors drive the need for field-based quality control methods. A significant hurdle to the anticipated growth of field-based concrete printing is the consistency of strength in the bond between successive layers of the printed cementitious materials. The end goal of this work is to develop a commercial system for measuring and controlling the quality of this interlayer bond strength under multiple environmental conditions likely to be encountered in the construction industry, including water content, temperature, humidity, wind, and dust. The initial research focuses on identifying characteristics of the mortar after it has been placed in varying environmental conditions. These characteristics will be used to build a commercial system that monitors the mortar in the previous layer and current layer during placement and adjusts the output of the printer in real-time to obtain optimal interlayer bond strength.