In-Situ Robotic Fabrication of Spatial Glulam Structures

Abstract

While current approaches in timber construction stress the advantages of off-site prefabrication, glued laminated timber(glulam) structures is limited to the constraints of standardized, prefabricated mostly linear elements, which also lends itself only to building typologies that offer an increased level of standardization and regularity. The design freedom of timber structures is incomparable to that of reinforced concrete structures, which mostly gains from the insitu fabrication process. An in-situ robotic timber fabrication platform allows the on-site construction of glulam structures with highly differentiated networks of beams composed of robotically assembled discrete linear elements. Based on the possibilities of such mobile robotic fabrication process, this paper explores novel architectural typologies of spatial glulam structures. The research is conducted from several aspects including joint tectonics, design method, and robotic fabrication process. A large-scale pavilion is designed and fabricated to verify the feasibility of the proposed system. This research could provide a novel mode of in-situ robotic timber fabrication and corresponding glulam structure system for timber construction.

Plastic Design of Bespoke Interlocking Timber-to-Timber Connections for Robotic Assembly

“…Thanks to the major developments in Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machines, the production of complex and customized timber geometries is no longer a major challenge. Moreover, much scientific research has been carried out in the field of robotic assembly of timber structures made of plates and linear elements [1] [2] [3]. In this context, the CantiBox project demonstrates two novel contributions for jointed timber structures: (a) the application of the static method of limit analysis for designing interlocking timber-to-timber connections, which allows the adjustment of individual joint geometries based on real-time performance assessment; (b) the use of distributed mechanical tools operated by a robotic arm to achieve a fully automatic assembly process.…”