He put the thing together in his own garage and is building something already

May 14, 2014 14:06 GMT  ·  By

We've already seen one concrete 3D printer in action, but just because the Chinese got there first doesn't mean they were the ones that took off running at the head of the race. A man from Minnesota has been setting something like that up for two decades.

Going by the name of Andrey Rudenko, he was able to build a gigantic RepRap 3D printer with input from the RepRap community.

It is that 3D printer which he is now using to create a two-story building (he hopes for 10 x 15 meters / 33 x 50 feet wide), although it will take some time to complete it, since he can't exactly put it all together in his garage.

His concrete printing project dates back to about 20 years ago, when there were no advanced computers and software that could let him create the machine he sought.

Now, though, he is able to 3D print a house one layer at a time, with said layer boasting a width of 20 mm and a height of 5 mm.

The mixture of concrete and sand doesn't dry instantly, but it does it quickly enough for the process to actually work. By comparison, the Contour Crafting group uses a special trowel to make concrete buildings.

All the while, a relatively low-key Arduino Mega 2560 board and software guides the process, with help from some other 3D printer kits on the side (bought from Mass Mind).

Rudenko says that his technique is fundamentally different from that of Contour Crafting (Behrokh Khoshnevis) in that the new printing process creates a natural, free-layering of fine concrete that produces a natural-looking, natural texture on the outside.

He doesn't want there to be a need for any finish once the building process has been completed. And he doesn't even need to stick to 25 mm x 10 mm either, but can “pretty much print layers of any dimension.”

He also stayed away from cement additives, thus keeping cost relatively low, though he didn't rule out the use of a quick-setting concrete in case eventual customers were willing to cover it. However, the quality of the house might suffer, something which he sees no point in.

We have to say that he has a point: 3D printing a house already cuts down the time of building from a few months to a few days, so it's not like quicker-drying cement will make that much of a difference. Sure, he had some trouble with finding the right viscosity, but the issue shouldn't arise again in the future.