Homework answers / question archive / CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION  Background The world is moving rapidly, and the technology is increasing widespread; an era where Artificial Intelligence is taking over the human capital

CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION  Background The world is moving rapidly, and the technology is increasing widespread; an era where Artificial Intelligence is taking over the human capital

Computer Science

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CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION

 Background

The world is moving rapidly, and the technology is increasing widespread; an era where Artificial Intelligence is taking over the human capital. The times have changed, and the methods have evolved with intense diversification in the materials used, equipment applied and foundation used. This has impacted the engineering that was used few years back; making the traditional methods obsolete and have been succeeded by the relevant new methods and technologies that have taken over the world. For instance, the robots have started taking over the jobs that were initially performed by the human beings including working in a factory, serving as a waiter, building things, taking surveys and performing all kinds of entertainment activities (Borland and Coelli, 2017).

This drastic change in the last decade or two has left a huge mark in the engineering field and is constantly reviving the tools and techniques used in the field of engineering. There have been many innovations that have started to float in the engineering field in the recent years and have proved to be very beneficial and improving in construction ranging from infrastructure to the residential and commercial structures. The most popular and reliable innovations include the train tracks that float, smart rings for payments and identification of people, superconductive materials and a translucent roof that closes like a camera.  Another major invention that has changed the face of engineering and moved the game to another level in the engineering has to be the 3D printing.  As the technology evolves, 3D printing has had a severe impact and will continue to have a significant impact on the growing industries including the field of engineering Kosowatz, J. (2017).

 

Defining 3D printing

This innovative technology has been engraved as one of the important components in many of the important sectors including the engineering. 3D printing is preservative process where the layers of material are put together in order make a 3D part, making it the reverse of the subtractive manufacturing where a final product is incised from a larger block of material. The technology has now been used widespread as a manufacturing technique to design the concepts and also end-products. The use of 3D printing has provided several entities with comparative advantage making the entities restructure their entire modelling system. The use of 3D printing has allowed the world to alter the digital vision of anything into its physical form making the ideas come true.

 

3D concrete printing

As we have seen, 3D printing material had not only been limited to the plastic materials and metal materials, but it extends to the development of the 3D concrete printing. This technology has given the idea of building homes and even communities in rather a rapid time than the traditional engineering. This development has enhanced the tool kit for the field engineers who have added the 3D printing tool in their kit (Kosowatz, 2017). The successful experiments of the 3D printer building blocks and other concrete advancements have brought an idea to the minds that the engineering business will revolutionize very soon.  The limitation of time and expensiveness of the traditional architect and construction methods have pushed the idea of concrete 3D printing to a new avenue with its unbeatable timesaving and convenience. Although the idea of 3D printing seems quite new and innovative, there has been a major advancement in the early 1950s where a robotic machine was used for the bricklaying. A decade later, using the icosyanate form and pumped concrete, a machine was also developed. These advancements did not quite turned heads as they were very immature at that time and there were no final answers to the experiments (Manju R, D. R., 2019). Furthermore, the sophistication and intriguing nature of the 3D concrete printing has indeed made the engineers explorative even with the large-scale printers. The technology could be used to build resistant structure with a huge impact on saving the material that is wasted in traditional methods.

1.2 Aims and objectives

The aim of this thesis is to critically analyze the feasibility of concrete for the 3D printing and the potential of this new technology for forthcoming prospects.  The objective is also to critically evaluate the feasibility of the 3D concrete printing and the room for improvement as well advancement for further utilization of this technology. The lack of other researchers and engineers to target the concept of 3D printing and evaluating its potential use and advance has leaded me to examine the performance of this region. This research is also based on encouraging and promoting the use of 3D concrete printing by establishing the foundation of the equipment and processes that are involved in the 3D concrete printing. 3D printing not only reduces the costs of construction but also increases the rate of productivity in the building industry. However, there is a criticism raised over the build ability of the 3D concrete printing and thus multiple approaches and benchmarks would examine in order to assess the potential build ability of the concrete mixture.

1.3 Research Methodology

The type of information in this research is taken out by different Literature surveys, still the proper method is not decided. It might be the totally literature based with different sources of research, which has been already done. Or different software can be used for analysing purpose to carry out the different properties of material.

CHAPTER 2 – LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Technologies of 3D concrete printing

3D printing has been the idea in many ideas and thus the utilization of the process by several engineers and several economies as a whole has developed many tools and machineries to work along with it. However, there are some basic tools and elements that are used while working with the 3D concrete printing. The most important and the most basic elements of the 3D concrete printing consist of the hardware and the operating system in which the printer is the main component of the operations. The development in the field has lead to evolution in the technology used in the 3D printing (Nadarajah, N. 2018). With the evolution in the technology, there has also been a drastic development in the manufacturing process involved in the 3D concrete printing.  The primary object of these processes is to create a 3D object using differentiated techniques and tools. The processes mainly involved in the 3D concrete printing are four including reductive, forming, casting and additive manufacturing.

• Reductive manufacturing: In this type of 3D concrete printing process, simple machining tools are used such as chipping, millings and turning to reduce the larger piece of material to turn it into the required figure is created.
• Forming manufacturing: This manufacturing process is completely different from reductive in such a way that forming uses the raw material to compress/stress the material to bring it in the required shape. Unlike reductive manufacturing, none of the material is wasted in this process.
• Casting manufacturing: Casting is the most commonly used type of 3D printing that is basically the process of pouring the material into the mould in order to create the require figure.
• Additive manufacturing: This process uses the material and produces the 3D printing layer by layer with using different kinds of material including plastic and concrete.

2.2 3D Concrete printing using the CAD design package or 3D scanner

The main aim of studying this research done by Manju Rathore and Deepika Rathore in the International Journal of Recent Technology and Engineering (IJRTE) is to study different 3D concrete printing structures and to evaluate the work of different engineers looking for answers in the similar field. As explained by the researchers, the technology of 3D concrete printing could be used to build structures that include geometrically complicated structures, heavy force bearing constructions and structures of hydraulic (Manju R, 2019). Moreover, the greatest advantage that could be received by the construction companies is to achieve efficiency not only in time but also in the costs and usage of the material. Moreover, the requirement for labor force would be comparatively less as the 3D printing eliminates the need of manual work.

Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute in Mumbai, from where the researchers of this study come from have provided elaborative explanation regarding the printing, finishing and the processes that are involved in the review paper they published. The study comprehensively examined the processes and softwares that are required or that have been used commonly or those that could potentially be used for the 3D concrete printing. The study suggested that the models of 3D printing could be produced with the aid of 3D scanners or through using the CAD design packages. To process the 3D models before printing them from the STL file, software could be used i.e. “slicer”. With the help of the slicer, a G-code is produced, and the 3D sculpt is transformed in to progression of thin layers (Palermo, E. 2004). The instructions that the G-code provides, the printer start laying down the layers of material in order to construct the model from the progressions of the cross-sections. Almost like the virtual cross sections from the CAD model, the layers are fused to create the conclusive shape of the model. There were more processes that were elaborated in the review of the paper including the Selective Laser Melting (SLM), Selective Laser Sintering (SLS) and laminated object manufacturing.

Apart from the utilization of 3D printing in the field of building and construction, the conclusion of the report suggested several other ways 3D printing could be used in the field of construction and its various other uses (Manju R, 2019). They explained the process of binder in their report and further concluded that it is only the method of 3D printing that could be used in which powder and other materials are used. Moreover, to mitigate the risk the appearance of the risk of the structure being not well defined, they presented the solution of using material that is not very thick but fine and the reduction of the size of the nozzles. Furthermore, there could be used alternative materials such as the limestone that would ensure that the appearance of the structure is not sacrificed.  Moreover, the research concluded that 3D printing is not only cost effective but also very helpful in building houses designed specially to be resistant to the natural disasters.

2.3 Different types of 3D printing technology (study by Nithesh Nadarajah)

With the increase in the technology, the level of professionalism has also increased in the field of 3D printing and thus there has been a drastic change in the technology used in 3D printing. There are different technologies used in different weather conditions with different locations. Many researchers have previously worked to explore different technologies that are being used and might have the potential to be used in the near future. A paper published by the Nithesh Nadarajah named development of the concrete 3D printing studied in depth various technologies that are being used around the globe in the field of 3D printing.

• Stereo lithography: This kind of technology includes mainly four parts that are used for 3D printing. The four tools include: a perforated podium that is lowered in to the tank, a container that could be filled with the liquid plastic also called photopolymer, a UV laser and a device handling the podium of the laser (Palermo, 2004). In order for the 3D printing machines to understand the model, a CAD file is converted into Standard Tessellation Language (STL).
• Digital light processing: This technology takes use of the digital micro mirrors that are laid out in the form of a matrix on a semiconductor chip that is usually called the digital micro mirror device, in which the each mirror represents a pixel in the image for the display. Under the safelight condition, a container of polymer in the form of liquid is exposed to the light from a DLP projector under the conditions of the safelight. The projector in this technology reflects the 3D model in liquid polymer. The polymer that is exposed to the light starts getting stiff and hard after which the build plates move down and the polymer is again exposed to the light from a DLP projecto (Nadarajah, 2018)r. This process ends at the point where the whole model is created after which the tub of liquid polymer is drained in order to reveal the final product that is solid and ready to be dried.

 

• Progress Report

Still research is going on to find the related articles on the similar topic. I am trying to complete till chapter 3 in December.

 

• Schedule for Semester 2

 

Targets	January	February	March	April	May
Research Methodology	ü
Analyzing and Calculations		ü	ü
Results			ü	ü
Discussion				ü
Final Touchups and proofreading					ü