{"id":1247,"date":"2016-08-15T15:09:37","date_gmt":"2016-08-15T14:09:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cclresource.wpengine.com\/?p=1247"},"modified":"2019-03-20T14:59:05","modified_gmt":"2019-03-20T14:59:05","slug":"robot-fabricated-building-material-is-100-times-lighter-than-brick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/engineering\/robot-fabricated-building-material-is-100-times-lighter-than-brick\/","title":{"rendered":"Robot-Fabricated Building Material Is 100 Times Lighter Than Brick"},"content":{"rendered":"

A new building material, woven\u00a0by robots, has been used to construct a ground-breaking structure that is on display\u00a0at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. The Elytra Filament Pavilion<\/a> is fabricated from strands of glass and carbon fibre,\u00a0resulting in a durable structure\u00a0that weighs\u00a0100 times less than brick.<\/p>\n

\"3060017-slide-11-this-robot-fabricated-pavillion\"<\/p>\n

The museum unveiled the\u00a0Elytra Filament Pavilion\u00a0to open its first ever Engineering Season, a\u00a0series of exhibitions<\/a>\u00a0that celebrate the “\u2018unsung heroes\u2019 of design.”<\/p>\n

From the shell of an idea to a construction game-changer\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

Conceived by a multi-disciplinary team from the University of Stuttgart, the 3-year project was led by experimental German architect Achim Menges alongside\u00a0architect Moritz D\u00f6rstelmann, structural engineer Jan Knippers and climate engineer Thomas Auer. Together, the group has pioneered the integration of biomimicry, robotic fabrication and new materials research in architecture.<\/p>\n

\"3060017-slide-01-this-robot-fabricated-pavillion<\/p>\n

To create the structure, which was inspired by the\u00a0forewing shells of flying beetles known as \u2018elytra\u2019, Menges and his team developed a fabrication process using\u00a0two KUKA robots, which wind resin-saturated glass and carbon fibres around a hexagonal framework.<\/p>\n

“Each has a specific individual fibre arrangement, fibre geometry and orientation that corresponds to the structural loads the canopy is experiencing, at the time it was made”\u00a0<\/em>says Menges.\u00a0Once the fibres harden to the point that they are stronger than the steel framework, the framework can be collapsed and removed.<\/p>\n

\"3060017-slide-07-this-robot-fabricated-pavillion\"<\/p>\n

“The real novelty of this project is that we don\u2019t use a mold to create the fibres,” <\/em>Menges adds. “We used the materiality of the fibre to inform the structural components.”<\/em><\/p>\n

The innovation doesn’t stop there, the structure\u00a0will be\u00a0continuously added to over the course of the V&A\u2019s Engineering Season. Sensors in the canopy fibres constantly collect data on how visitors use\u00a0the pavilion and monitor the structure\u2019s behaviour, informing how and where the pavilion\u00a0grows.<\/p>\n

What next for the Elytra material?<\/strong><\/p>\n

As the Elytra Pavilion\u00a0evolves, so will the possibilities that stem from the robust yet lightweight\u00a0material. The research team are\u00a0already looking at the possibility of\u00a0using similar techniques\u00a0to build canopies for green urban spaces and “larger-scale lightweight building envelopes,” such as stadium roofs.<\/p>\n

\"3060017-slide-06-this-robot-fabricated-pavillion\"<\/p>\n

“The really exciting aspect for me is that it’s neither an engineering aesthetic nor is it merely designed,”<\/em> says Menges. “It\u2019s really the synthesis of on the one hand being a very expressive piece of architecture, and on the other hand being an extremely materially efficient and lightweight system.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Just how lightweight is the Elytra\u00a0material?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Claims that the structure\u00a0is 100 times lighter than the brick equivalent are not exaggerated. The entire 2,000 square foot pavilion weighs just\u00a02.5 tons. The same weight of bricks would build you a structure measuring just 20 square feet.<\/p>\n

\"3060017-slide-08-this-robot-fabricated-pavillion\"<\/p>\n

During a series of special events as part of the Engineering Season, visitors will have the opportunity to witness the pavilion\u2019s construction live, as new components are fabricated on-site by a KUKA robot. The pavilion remains on display at the V&A until November 6th, 2016.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new building material, woven by robots, has been used to construct a ground-breaking structure that is on display at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. The Elytra Filament Pavilion is fabricated from strands of glass and carbon fibre, resulting in a durable structure that weighs 100 times less than brick. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1312,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1247"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1247\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cclresourcecentre.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}