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ETH Zurich researchers develop robotic process for impact printing earth materials

2024-09-23T12:32:00-04:00

Researchers at ETH Zurich have introduced a new robotic 3D printing method for cement-free low-carbon materials for a circular economy.

Using a technique called 'impact printing,' the team demonstrated a mixture of excavated materials, silt, and clay that was less dependent on additives for its structural strength due to the high-velocity deposition process. Their aim was to "increase the cost competitiveness of sustainable building materials through efficient and automated production."

Image: Girts Apskalns. Copyright: ETH Zurich - Gramazio Kohler Research, Chair of Sustainable Construction and Robotic Systems Lab

First, a custom printing tool was developed that can be integrated on multiple high-payload robotic platforms. The tool was then integrated with a high-payload Gantry system within the ETH's Robotic Fabrication Laboratory. The hardware is also compatible with an autonomous legged excavator system called HEAP, also developed by the Robotic Systems Lab. It has shown...

ETH Zurich’s 3D printed sculpture oscillates between ‘opaque boundary’ and ‘transparent curtain’

2024-03-14T12:06:00-04:00

ETH Zurich has unveiled a 6.5-foot-tall lightweight shell fabricated from 3D printing.

Named 'Fluid Forms,' and created by the institution’s Digital Building Technologies group, the structure seeks to showcase “an innovative robotic additive manufacturing method that enables the printing of doubly curved thin shells more efficiently.”

Video courtesy Ιoanna.M/YouTube

The design of Fluid Forms was inspired by the Costa minimal surface, which belongs to a family of shapes that minimize area for a given boundary, resulting in a geometry with strong structural properties. In contrast to horizontal plane printing, the fabrication process sees the print paths align to principal curvature directions, which, according to the team, reduces the need for external support and enhances the precision and surface quality of the curved surface.

Image credit: Dominik Vogel

“The print path orientation is controlled through a vector-field optimization method that has been fi...

Production begins on the world’s tallest 3D printed structure

2024-02-16T11:40:00-05:00

Production has begun on a 3D printed tower in Switzerland, which is expected to be the tallest structure of its kind in the world. Named the ‘Tor Alva’ or ‘White Tower,’ the project is currently being fabricated at ETH Zurich, where the first eight columns of the tower’s lower floor commenced 3D printing in February.

Image credit: Hansmeyer/Dillenburger

The columns’ fabrication sees a robot extrude the concrete in 8mm-high layered print paths. In a departure from traditional concrete construction, the 3D printing process means formwork is no longer required, freeing new avenues for the team to experiment with shapes, surface details, and cavities. The tower will also be the first instance of printed concrete being used in a fully structural manner, with steel reinforcement inserted during the robotic production process.

Image credit: R. Masallam

The tower will be constructed in the remote Swiss Alps village of Mulegns, where it will host music and theater performances. At 98 feet (nea...

ETH Zurich researcher develops 3D printed insulation foam using recycled materials

2023-12-01T11:48:00-05:00

ETH Zurich has published details of new research into lightweight building components produced using 3D printing. Led by doctoral architecture researcher Patrick Bedarf, the Airlements project centers on cement-free mineral foams derived from recycled industrial waste.

Working within the institution’s Digital Building Technologies group led by Professor Benjamin Dillenburger, Bedarf’s project emerged from a doctoral thesis on lightweight insulating construction elements, and how complex shapes could be manufactured with fewer material inputs. Bedarf ultimately deployed a sustainable insulation material produced by the ETH spin-off FenX using recycled industrial waste.

FenX’s mineral foam material is mostly made from fly ash, a waste product from industrial blast furnaces. Bedarf’s process then deploys 3D printing to shape the material into bespoke building parts without the need for formwork, which is traditionally only partly reusable and more time-consuming.

“Without automation, ...

ETH Zurich students construct timber dome entirely from waste materials

2022-10-20T12:00:00-04:00

A group of research students at ETH Zurich has completed a timber geodesic dome constructed from nothing but demolition waste. The research group, led by assistant professor Catherine De Wolf of the university’s Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering, sees the project as a demonstration of the potential for circular economics.

Photo credit: Catherine De Wolf

Photo credit: BuserHill Photography

Work on the project began in October 2021 when the group, titled the Circular Engineering for Architecture lab, gained permission to salvage materials from an old car depot scheduled for demolition. Through dismantling an entire floor of the building, the group salvaged OSB panels, wooden beams, steel girders, and plastic piping for use in the pavilion.

Photo credit: Catherine De Wolf

Photo credit: Anna Buser

According to the group, the decision to construct a geodesic dome from the waste materials was due to the shape’s stable, efficient, and elementary structural properties....

ETH Zurich students and researchers build prototype 3D printed 'eggshell pavilion'

2022-10-03T11:17:00-04:00

A group of faculty and students from ETH Zurich has completed a prototype architectural pavilion whose production merges 3D printing with computational design. Unveiled at the Vitra Design Museum in Germany, the Eggshell Pavilion’s development seeks to demonstrate how "digital design techniques and robotic 3D printing can enable the creation of freeform concrete structures out of recycled ultra-thin formwork."

Formwork 3D printing. Image ⓒ Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich

The pavilion’s design and fabrication was driven by design algorithms that generated both the geometry of the structure and the fabrication data needed to 3D print the pavilion. The team believes that this combination of computational design and robotic fabrication can unlock the potential for designers to shape concrete elements efficiently, avoiding traditional labor-and-cost-intensive formwork processes.

Formwork 3D printing. Image ⓒ Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich

The 3D printed formwork of the Eggshell...

Mariam Kamara highlights a diverse group of new faculty appointments at the ETH Zurich

2022-08-17T13:23:00-04:00

Renowned West African architect Mariam Kamara will be among twelve new professors joining the faculty of the ETH Zurich, the school announced on its website late last month.

Her appointment represents a “turning point” for the ETH, as the school’s faculty is now predominantly female for the first time in its history. She is joined by another new full-time appointment to the department, Maria Conen, who had previously been on the faculty as an adjunct professor of architecture and housing.

Kamara’s previous academic experience has included stops at Brown and the Harvard GSD, where she was the Aga Khan critic for 2021. Kamara’s practice atelier masōmī is well-regarded across the design world for her innovative work surrounding memory, the elevation of non-Western architectural traditions, vernacular design, and placemaking. Recently she was named as an honorary fellow by the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada.

Previously on Archinect: Mariam Kamara on the higher aspirations of...

ETH Zurich’s 3D printed foam uses 70% less concrete than traditional formworks

2022-01-11T14:06:00-05:00

ETH Zurich has unveiled details of their latest investigation into advanced building materials in construction. The project, titled FoamWork, explores how foam 3D printing can assist in creating concrete formworks. The initiative saw ETH Zurich’s Digital Building Technologies team work in collaboration with FenX AG to develop the printable mineral foams, based on recycled waste.

Image by Patrick Bedarf for ETH Zurich

“FoamWork explores how foam 3D printing (F3DP) can be used to produce unique shapes for functional stay-in-place or temporary and recyclable formwork in concrete casting,” the team explained. “The resulting mineral composite elements can save up to 70% concrete, are lighter, and feature improved insulation properties.”

Image by Patrick Bedarf for ETH Zurich

As part of the design process, a prototype ribbed slab measuring 2m x 1.3m (6.5ft x 4.2ft) was developed by the team, with an isostatic pattern shaped by principal stress lines. The resulting geometry required 24 foam...

ETH Zurich unveils robotically-assembled sculpture inspired by the Hanging Gardens of Babylon

2021-11-23T16:59:00-05:00

Researchers at ETH Zurich in Switzerland have offered an insight into the design and fabrication of a new architectural sculpture, built with the help of artificial intelligence and four robots. The structure, standing 22.5 meters (74 feet) in height, will consist of five geometrically-complex wooden pods all slightly offset from each other and supported by eight thin steel pillars.

Image: Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zürich

Titled "Semiramis" after the Babylonian queen associated in folklore with the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the sculpture is currently being manufactured at ETH Zurich’s Robotic Fabrication Laboratory. In what the team describes as a “delicate dance for the highest precision,” the wooden pods are being assembled by four suspended robotic arms, each collecting wooden panels and placing them in accordance with a computer-generated design.

Image: Pascal Bach / Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich

Once the robotic arms have placed four panels next to each other, cra...

ETH Zurich's HiLo unit combines medieval building techniques with innovative construction methods

2021-10-07T14:04:00-04:00

ETH Zurich has unveiled HiLo, the latest addition to Empa and Eawag’s modular NEST research building in Duebendorf, Switzerland. Featuring a doubly curved concrete roof, lightweight funicular floors, and self-learning building technology, the new unit reflects nearly a decade of ETH Zurich research in architecture and sustainable technologies.

Photo: Roman Keller

Sitting at the intersection of past and future, HiLo was inspired by medieval building principles and planned and built using state-of-the-art computational design and fabrication techniques. A team of scientists led by Philippe Block, Professor of Architecture and Structures, and Arno Schlueter, Professor of Architecture and Building Systems, along with industrial partners explored how lightweight structures and efficient construction methods can be combined with intelligent and adaptive building systems to reduce embodied and operational emissions in the construction and building industry.

Photo: Roman Keller

The unit’s ro...

Zaha Hadid Architects and Block Research Group unveil world's first 3D-printed concrete footbridge built without any reinforcement

2021-07-19T20:34:00-04:00

A first-of-its-kind arched masonry footbridge composed of 3D-printed concrete blocks and assembled without mortar or reinforcement is now open in Venice. The project, called Striatus, is being showcased at the public park Giardini della Marinaressa during the 2021 Venice Architecture Biennale until November.

Photo: © naaro

The approximately 40-by-52-foot pedestrian bridge was developed through a collaboration between the Block Research Group (BRG) at ETH Zurich and Zaha Hadid Architects Computation and Design Group (ZHACODE), in collaboration with Incremental3D (in3D) and made possible by Holcim. The project combines traditional masonry techniques with advanced computational design, engineering, and robotic manufacturing technologies. It aims to demonstrate an alternative, more sustainable, and ecologically responsible approach to building with concrete.

Photo: © naaro

Striatus is composed of a new type of 3D-printed concrete, which the researchers developed together with in3D. In ...

Jason Young has been named the next dean of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville's College of Architecture and Design

2021-05-13T19:46:00-04:00

Jason Young, professor and director of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville’s School of Architecture, has been named the next dean of the College of Architecture and Design effective July 1. [...] Young will succeed Dean Scott Poole, who announced in 2020 that he would step down and return to the faculty, continuing a successful 35-year career of teaching, professional practice, service, and leadership, with many accomplishments and accolades along the way.

"Young will succeed Dean Scott Poole, who announced in 2020 that he would step down and return to the faculty, continuing a successful 35-year career of teaching, professional practice, service, and leadership, with many accomplishments and accolades along the way." — The University of Tennessee Knoxville

Young will oversee the college’s four schools: architecture, interior architecture, landscape architecture, and design. Before the University of Tennessee, Young taught architecture at the University of Michigan, the University of California, Berkeley as the 2013 Howard Friedman Visiting Associate Professor of Practice, the Summer Institute for Architecture at the Catholic University of America, and served as a visiting professor at the Schwerpunkt Holz in Murau, Austria.

Jason Young’s academic research explores contemporary conditions of American urbanism in a post-city, digitally organized culture. He has lectured on his research at institutions including, the Rhode Island Schoo...

World's first digitally planned and built residence debuts in Switzerland

2019-03-05T18:08:00-05:00

In Dübendorf, Switzerland the official opening of the world's first digitally planned and built residence now stands. Coined, the DFAB House, the project was developed by researchers from ETH Zurich in collaboration with industrial partners and the National Center of Competence in Research (NCCR). The three-story house sits on top of the Next Evolution in Sustainable Building Technologies (NEST) research institute of Empa and Eawag in Dübendorf. According to ETH Zurich, "The aim of digital technologies is not only to make planning and construction more efficient but also more sustainable. For example, the digitally planned floor slab of the DFAB HOUSE is statically and structurally optimized in such a way that considerable amounts of material can be saved compared to a conventional concrete slab."

The three-story, 2,153 square foot smart house was developed by eight ETH Zurich professors ...

Watch these robots build a timber house structure in Switzerland

2018-03-30T14:57:00-04:00

A team of researchers from Swiss university ETH Zurich is to use robots to help assemble prefabricated timber modules into a 100 sq m, three-storey house. [...] The robots use information from a CAD model to cut and arrange the beams, then drill holes and connect them. Human workers bolt the beams together.

Photo: NCCR Digital Fabrication / Roman Keller

The Spatial Timber Assemblies robotic research project, with support from Switzerland's National Centre of Competence in Research Digital Fabrication, is the first large-scale architectural application for the construction robots at the new Robotic Fabrication Laboratory at the ETH Zurich.

Photo: NCCR Digital Fabrication / Roman Keller

"Unlike traditional timber frame construction, Spatial Timber Assemblies can manage without reinforcement plates because the required rigidity and load-bearing result from the geometric structure," the NCCR project description explains.

Photo: NCCR Digital Fabrication / Roman Keller

"Not only does this save material; it also opens up new creative possibilities. A total of six spatial, geometrically unique timber modules will be prefabricated in this way for the first time. Lorries will then transport them to the DFAB HOUSE construction site at the NEST in Dübendorf, where they will be joined to build a two-...

Begin your week with this serene video of two drones building a bridge by themselves

2015-09-21T12:56:00-04:00

These magnanimous drones, themselves having no need for a footbridge, build a suspension bridge for their human underlings in the Flying Machine Arena laboratory of ETH Zurich.

Developed as part of ongoing research in aerial construction, these two quadrocopters are capable of building the entire bridge by dispensing a motorized spool of Dyneema rope between two scaffolding surfaces, using a combination of knots, braids and wraps. When the drones are finished, the triumphant researchers walk from one end to the other.

Video credits: Aerial construction is a collaboration between the Institute for Dynamic Systems and Control and Gramazio Kohler Research at ETH Zurich, Switzerland, 2015

Get Lectured: ETH Zürich, Spring '15

2015-03-05T13:12:00-05:00

Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Winter-Spring 2015

Archinect's Get Lectured is back in session! Get Lectured is an ongoing series where we feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current term. Check back frequently to keep track of any upcoming lectures you don't want to miss.

The next featured poster comes from the ETH Zürich Department of Architecture (D-ARCH) in Switzerland.

Want to share your school's lecture series? Send us your school's lecture series poster and details to connect@archinect.com.

Listed below are upcoming lectures only. Lectures begin at 6 p.m. at the ETH Zürich Hönggerberg Building HIL, Auditorium E4.

Mar 10
Anthony Vidler / Professor - Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture at the Cooper Union, NY; Vincent Scully Visiting Professor of Architectural History - Yale University

Mar 24
Armand Grüntuch and Almut Grüntuch-Ernst / Grüntuch Ernst Architekten - Berlin

Apr 14
Amale Andraos / WORKac; Dean - Columbia University GSAPP

For ...