Brief Deskription:

In the current building process, mineral construction methods - especially in reinforced concrete construction - fall short of their technical possibilities. Poor life cycle assessments, low life cycle expectations and a large consumption of resources are much-discussed consequences. Through geometric optimisation, building components can be designed to be more economical and efficient. Until now, however, this was only feasible with cost- and waste-intensive formwork and reinforcement. Recent developments in large-format 3D printing are fundamentally changing this starting position. Additive manufacturing not only opens up paths for optimising performance, but also makes it possible to enrich components with new functions.

Against this background, the object of research is the development of a hybrid process chain for the design and manufacture of functionally integrated mineral structural elements.

The focus is on the computer-aided optimisation of material-related, mechanical, thermal and acoustic properties of the components. By charging them with performative properties, intelligent structures are created that make it possible to dispense with additional equipment elements. In sum, this means not only better building-physical characteristics, but also a significant reduction in the building component-related CO2 balance (LCA).  

The technical basis of the project is a networking of computer-aided simulation methods with large-format three-dimensional concrete printing (3DCP), which has been achieved for the first time. The result is a digital system construction with a zero-waste approach for formwork and reinforcement.

The prototypes created during the research are to be systematised in a new type of component catalogue according to type, life cycle assessment and material and made accessible to a broad spectrum of planners.

Possible applications range from large-format semi-prefabricated elements in new buildings to customised building components for existing buildings.  

 From: Current doctoral thesis - Dipl.-Ing. Saqib Aziz

Team:

Saqib Aziz (Digital Fabrication / Additive manufacturing/ parametric design/ Performative Optimisation)

Bradley Alexander (Akustik)

Lehrstuhl für Konstruktives Entwerfen und Tragwerksplanung

Universität der Künste Berlin

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christoph Gengnagel