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Stone Spray research project wants to print bridges with sand, solar power

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Stone Spray research project wants to print your next home with dirt, solar power

Envious of your pet hermit crabs' 3D-printed domicile? Maybe you should cast your green eyes upon the Stone Spray project, an Eco-friendly robot printer that's exploring the viability of soil as a building material. Although making actual buildings is a bit out of the robot's reach, its team has managed to print a series of scaled sculptures (such as stools, pillars and load-bearing arc structures) out of sand, soil and a special solidification compound. The machine's jet-spray nozzle seems to have an easier time constructing objects over per-existing scaffolding, but the team is striving to design structures that don't require the extra support. "We want to push further the boundaries of digital manufacturing and explore the possibilities of an on-site fabrication machine," the team writes on the project's homepage, citing makeshift printed bridges or an on-beach canopy as possible applications of technology. If the Earth itself doesn't make a green enough building material, consider this: the Stone Spray robot can be powered by solar energy alone. Check it out in all of its sand-sculpting glory in the video below.

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Stone Spray research project wants to print bridges with sand, solar power originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 05 Aug 2012 23:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Stone Spray Robot, The In Situ Robotic 3D Printer

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The Stone Spray robot was created as a 3D printer to produce architecture out of soil. While technically speaking, this robot wasn’t designed to create art, the results of its efforts and the research project sure look like some interesting sculptural works.

stone spray robot 3d printer architecture beach

Stone Spray was created by Anna Kulik, Inder Shergill and Petr Novikov as a way to produce eco-friendly, efficient and innovative systems to “print” architecture in 3D. The device collects sand and dirt which is then sprayed from a nozzle with a binding component. This mixture solidifies and creates forms that look like they were sculpted.

stone spray robot 3d printer architecture columns

The movements of the ‘bot are controlled by a computer, so it can allow designers to have a direct input in the resulting shape, unlike other 3D printers. The spray is multi directional, and can even be sprayed vertically. While the prototype only produces pretty rudimentary small structures, here’s a rendering of the sort of thing a larger version might be able to produce:

stone spray robot 3d printer architecture

While I’m not sure of the practical applications for the Stone Spray robot, it sure produces some unique artistic output. Check it out in action in the video below:

[via designboom]