CHAPTER 1

3D Concrete Printing for

Construction Applications
Jay G. Sanjayan and Behzad Nematollahi
Centre for Sustainable Infrastructure, Faculty of Science, Engineering and Technology, Swinburne
University of Technology, Hawthorn, VIC, Australia

1.1 INTRODUCTION
Construction is one of the largest sectors of the global economy with
construction-related spending at $10 trillion globally, equivalent to 13%
of GDP. However, construction has shown remarkably poor productivity
gains relative to other sectors. Under these conditions, the global infra-
structure and housing construction industry will lag behind and not meet
the global demand [1]. This situation is further exacerbated in Australia,
for example, by inefficiencies and difficulties of delivering appropriate
infrastructure in remote areas. The cost of building an average house in
remote communities in Australia is, on average, USD 600k [2], which is
much more expensive than in urban regions.
Since the discovery of modern concrete in the 19th century, many
researchers have sought to automate concrete construction without much
success. Thomas Edison’s attempt to create a machine to build concrete
houses in a single pour, which he patented in 1917 (Fig. 1.1), was a well-
documented failure due to technological challenges in concrete. The great
inventor is said to have spent as much time with his concrete house proj-
ect as with his other inventions, but the complexity of concrete eluded
him. Concrete as a construction material appears deceptively simple, but
has many hidden challenges. Many advancements in concrete construction
technologies have been made since then, including innovative develop-
ment in concrete pumping technologies and admixture technologies.
However, it is also commonplace to find construction sites transporting,
placing, compacting, and curing concrete using technologies that are
more than 100 years old. Concrete construction remains labor intensive,
costly, and highly accident prone.

3D Concrete Printing Technology Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Inc.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-815481-6.00001-4 All rights reserved. 1
2 3D Concrete Printing Technology

Figure 1.1 Thomas Edison with his single pour concrete house.

Annual production of concrete is reaching nearly 30 billion tons world-

wide [3], making it the most widely used construction material. However,
the concrete itself plays only a partial role since the formwork represents
35% 60% of the overall cost of concrete construction [4]. Formwork is
the temporary structure and mold for pouring wet concrete into and is
typically built with timber. Formwork represents a significant source of
waste, given that all formwork is discarded sooner or later, contributing to
the generally increasing amount of waste worldwide. According to a study
from 2011 [5], 80% of the total worldwide waste is generated in the con-
struction industry, with significant contributions from formwork timber
which has limited reuse value. Further, pouring concrete into formworks
limits the creativity of architects to build in various geometries unless very
high costs are paid for bespoke formworks. Unlike the conventional
approach of casting into a mold, 3D concrete printing (3DCP) is an
emerging technology that combines digital technologies and new insights
from materials technologies to allow free-form construction without the
use of formwork. 3DCP is a type of additive manufacturing technique
where the construction is through layer-by-layer addition of material.
 3D Concrete Printing for Construction Applications 3

Two state-of-the-art processes currently leading the 3DCP field are

[6]: (1) The Single Deposition Nozzle Concrete Printer which is similar
to fused deposition modeling. Contour Crafting is another technology
where concrete is extruded against trowel; and (2) powder deposition
process where the “ink” is deposited on a powder bed. There is no clear
winner at this stage. Further research in materials and structural forms will
eventually decide the direction of the technology for the future. It is,
therefore, important for researchers to experiment with both leading
3DCP technologies.
The lack in underpinning concrete materials technology research has
been identified as hampering progress in 3DCP [7]. The four key charac-
teristics of the fresh concrete relevant to 3D printing identified by Le
et al. [8] are: (1) Pumpability: the ease and reliability with which material
is moved through the delivery system; (2) Printability: the ease and reli-
ability of depositing material through a deposition device; (3) Buildability:
the resistance of deposited wet material to deformation under load; and
(4) Open time: the period where these properties are consistent within
acceptable tolerances.

1.2 3D PRINTING IN CONSTRUCTION

Pegna [9] was the first successful researcher who tried to adopt additive
manufacturing in construction applications. The process was in the form
of making structures with sand and then using cement as an adhesive.
When compared with conventional construction processes, the application
of 3D printing techniques in concrete construction may offer excellent
advantages including:
1. Reduction of construction costs by eliminating formwork.
2. Reduction of injury rates by eliminating dangerous jobs (e.g., working
at heights), which would result in an increased level of safety in
construction.
3. Creation of high-end, technology-based jobs.
4. Reduction of onsite construction time by operating at a constant rate.
5. Minimizing the chance of errors by precise material deposition.
6. Increasing sustainability in construction by reducing wastages of
formwork.
7. Increasing architectural freedom, which would enable more sophisti-
cated designs for structural and esthetic purposes.
4 3D Concrete Printing Technology

8. Enabling the potential of multifunctionality for structural/architectural

elements by taking advantage of the complex geometry [10,11].

1.3 EXTRUSION-BASED 3D CONCRETE PRINTING

The extrusion-based 3DCP is similar to the fused deposition modeling
used in polymer and metal technologies. Contour crafting is one of the
proprietary terminologies used for the layered fabrication technology that
has been under development for almost 15 years [12]. It is based on
extruding a cement-based concrete against a trowel that allows a smooth
surface finish created through the build-up of subsequent layers. The cur-
rent deposition head is capable of laying down material to create a full-
width structural wall (Fig. 1.2). Contour Crafting technology allows a
variety of materials (such as mortar, concrete, cement pastes and fiber-
reinforced concrete) to be investigated (Fig. 1.2). Contour Crafting was
selected by NASA for its Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) to
explore the use of building a Lunar Settlement infrastructure [13].
Another fused deposition modeling type technology that was intro-
duced during the early stages is led by the 3DCP group at Loughborough
University which conducted a series of early trials on this technology [6].

1.3.1 Current Examples of Extrusion-Based 3D Concrete

Printing Elements/Structures
In 2014, the Chinese Winsun company claimed to have built 10 basic
houses in less than a day, with the area and cost of each being about

Figure 1.2 Extrusion-based 3D concrete printing [9].

 3D Concrete Printing for Construction Applications 5

195 m2 and US$4800, respectively. The company used a large extrusion-

based 3D printer to manufacture the basic house components separately
offsite before they were transported and assembled on site [14]. In 2015,
the company built a five-story apartment building with an area of about
1100 m2, currently the tallest 3D printed structure. The company also
claimed to have built a stand-alone concrete villa with interior fittings for
a cost of about US$160,000. The company claimed to 3D print the walls
and other components of the structure offsite and then assembled them
together onsite [15].
The Chinese Huashang Tengda company in Beijing has recently
claimed to 3D print an entire 400 m2 two-story villa onsite within 45
days (see Fig. 1.3A). Unlike the Winsun company, the Huashang Tengda
company used a unique process allowing to print an “entire house,”
“onsite” in “one go.” The frame of the house, including conventioinal
steel reinforcements and plumbing pipes, were first erected. Then, ordi-
nary Class C30 concrete-containing coarse aggregates was extruded into
the framework and around the rebars through the use of a novel nozzle
design and a gigantic 3D printer [16]. The Huashang Tengda project
seemingly eliminated one of the major challenges of 3DCP which is the
incorporation of conventional steel reinforcements when structural con-
crete is to be 3D printed. The company claimed that the two-story villa is
durable enough to withstand an earthquake measuring 8.0 on the Richter
scale. Their giant 3D printer has a sort of forked nozzle (see Fig. 1.3B)
that simultaneously lays concrete on both sides of the rebars, swallowing
it up, and encasing it securely within the walls [16].
The researchers at the University Federico II of Naples, Italy used a
4 m high BIGDELTA WASP (World’s Advanced Saving Project) printer
to build the first modular, reinforced-concrete beam of about 3 m long

Figure 1.3 (A) The two-story villa 3D printed by Huashang Tengda company; and (B)
the novel nozzle of the giant 3D printer [16].
6 3D Concrete Printing Technology

Figure 1.4 The first 3D printed modular reinforced concrete beam of about 3 m [17].

Figure 1.5 The Y-Box Pavilion, 21st-century Cave 3 m tall structure [18].

(see Fig. 1.4). With this WASP printer, the researchers have developed a
system to produce concrete elements that can be assembled with steel bars
and beams or can compose pillars in reinforced concrete [17].
As a result of collaboration between Supermachine Studio and the
Siam Cement Group (SCG), a 3 m tall cave structure called the “Y-Box
Pavilion, 21st-century Cave” was built in Thailand using the 4 m high
BIGDELTA WASP printer (see Fig. 1.5). The components of the pavil-
ion were 3D printed offsite at the SCG factory and then all the compo-
nents were assembled together. The cost of manufacture of the pavilion
was reported to be about US$28,000 [18].
In December 2016, the Apis Core company announced to have built
the first onsite house in Russia using a mobile 3D concrete printer in just
 3D Concrete Printing for Construction Applications 7

Figure 1.6 Onsite 3D printed house by Apis Core. (A) Construction using a mobile
3D concrete printer; (B) house exterior [19].

24 hours (see Fig. 1.6). The entire 38 m2 house was 3D printed onsite.
The total construction cost was claimed to be US$10,134 [19].

1.4 POWDER-BED-BASED 3D CONCRETE PRINTING

In the powder-bed process, a thin layer of powder is spread over the
powder bed surface first. Once a layer is completed, binder droplets are
selectively applied on the powder layer by a print-head causing powder
particles to bind each other. By repeating these steps, the built part is
completed and removed after a certain setting time. The unbound pow-
der is then removed by using an air blower.
The D-shape 3D printing construction technology was introduced
by Enrico Dini in Italy [20]. This process uses a powder deposition
process by which the powder is selectively hardened using a binder in
much the same way as the Z-Corp 3D printing process [21]. Each layer
of building material is laid to the desired thickness, compacted and then
the nozzles mounted on a gantry frame deposit the binder. The binders
are deposited only in places where the building material should become
solid and the rest is kept loose and removed at a later stage. Once a
part is complete it is then dug out of the loose powder bed. The pro-
cess has been used to create 1.6 m high architectural pieces called
“Radiolaria” (Fig. 1.7).

1.5 EMERGING OBJECTS

The Emerging Objects technology developed in the United States uses the
powder-based technique to selectively harden a proprietary cement com-
posite formulation by deposition of a binding agent [22]. The technology
8 3D Concrete Printing Technology

Figure 1.7 Sculpture by D-shape process [20].

Figure 1.8 (A) Bloom [22] and (B) Shed [23] printed by Emerging Objects.

was used to manufacture Bloom (see Fig. 1.8A). Bloom is a 2.74 m tall,
freestanding tempietto with a footprint that measures approximately
3.66 m by 3.66 m and is composed of 840 customized 3D printed blocks.
Each block is printed using a farm of 11 powder 3D printers with a proprie-
tary cement composite formulation comprised chiefly of iron oxide-free
 3D Concrete Printing for Construction Applications 9

OPC. The blocks are held in place using stainless steel hardware and assem-
bled into 16 large, lightweight, prefabricated panels that can be assembled
in just a few hours. The technology was also used to manufacture Shed
(see Fig. 1.8B). Shed is a small 3D printed prototype building constructed
with Picoroco Blocks, modular 3D printed building blocks for wall fabrica-
tion printed from sand measuring 0.3 3 0.3 3 0.3 m [23].

1.6 FUTURE DIRECTIONS AND CHALLENGES

Researchers and industry professionals currently working on 3D printing
using concrete envision the technology to be a major disruptor to the
construction industry. The vision for futuristic house construction
(Fig. 1.9) and multistory buildings using 3DCP technology (Fig. 1.10) are
some examples of the aspirations of those who are currently working in
this field.
Western countries, in general, have higher levels of safety regulations
in construction work than developing countries, with a significant cost to
the construction industry. Despite this, the injury rate in the construction
sector is still one of the highest when compared to other sectors.
According to the 2014 data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 52
workers in 1000 were injured in construction sector. Similarly, in the
United States this number was 40 in 1000. One of the main benefits of
automated construction is its potential to meaningfully decrease the num-
ber of injuries and deaths in the construction sector by avoiding many of
the dangerous and laborious tasks.

Figure 1.9 A vision for house construction.

10 3D Concrete Printing Technology

Figure 1.10 A vision of multistory construction.

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