3D printing a house is starting to be open sourced
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Unfortunately, projects like these are where "makers" and engineers part ways. It's the boring bits of engineering that always get people: costs, safety standards, and scalability. In this case, for example, where does the foundation for the house come from? You can't 3D print it. You need an earth mover or a bunch of Mexicans with shovels to dig it out. Ok there goes one of your biggest costs. Now on to printing your house. Concrete is pricey even before you create a fancy mix design that can be extruded and not slump. Any cost savings here? probably not. Now your house needs a roof. Well, if you can't print overcuts with plastic you're not doing it with concrete, so a standard truss it is. Again, no cost savings. If you've got this far, you haven't saved any money and we don't even know if your house will pass structural/safety muster. I hate to be a downer, but a lot of these idea are just bad. If you want cheap construction, we'll have to look elsewhere.
Immigration. This is a real kicker. Folks living in large coastal cities can't see it because for better or worse they are used to the faces they see every day being multi-ethnic. If you live in a smallish American city, you can see it in real time. Without getting into any racial politics, if you live in a city that was lily white 15 years ago and today it is filled with Spanish speaking immigrants, you know that something has changed.
If you look at the housing situation in these small cities, the "poorer" parts of town that used to be a family's first option for a starter home are filled with illegals renting from boomers and yuppies. South Park's "they took our jerbs!" is a lot less funny on the housing side of economics if you're a tax paying working class American trying to find a home for your family.
Cheap construction would be better achieved by factories the size of cities building pre-fab homes in sections and having them shipped to the location. Then the only real on site work would be the foundation
You have just described single (and double) wide trailers. And they do tend to be among the cheapest (if not the cheapest) way to go on a cost per square foot basis and can be built to local building codes and therefore be equivalent in construction to a site-built house. But "only dumb rednecks live in those", so people look for any solution that isn't that.
Neighbor just set one up. Had poured a slab on his property that I walked by every day wondering what it was for, then one day there was a double-wide plopped down on it. Looks good.
So what's the hang up on "trailers"? Because I admit I feel a bit judgmental myself.
Traditionally they are legally classified as "trailers" and are built to a separate Federal code (colloquially referred to as the "HUD code/standard" because it's maintained by the Department of Housing and Urban Development). There are two issues with this:
But nowadays most manufacturers will build them to either HUD code or building code, and in the latter case they are built to exactly the same standards as if the house were built on-site and in a lot of states are legally classified the same as a "traditionally" built house.
Of course there's the larger issue of perception and the simple fact that any method of "cheap construction" is going to be seen as low status. In large part by definition, because it's going to attract a lot of people who can't afford any other option
They don't hold their value like real houses, so financially it's more like renting.
That concept applied to smaller, customizable sections for everything from high rises to regular houses
Problem is that inflation, Gubmint regulations and supply chain issues have struck the trailer market too. Singlewides are 60k, and doublewides are 120+.
Yeah nothing's immune to inflation, but that also affects site-built houses and even raw materials if you were going to build one with unconventional materials.
I agree, though I am loath to support Amazon Home.
Yeah that's a bad idea
There's plenty of alternative house designs (especially for tiny houses but also full size) that could be far cheaper than 3D printing, and are often made from recycled materials, such as container homes. There are outdated regulations that protect the housebuilding industry, or laws that literally ban certain types of structures. There's also the issue of current homebuilders just not knowing how or not wanting to put up designs they are unfamiliar with. This problem was known way back with the Buckminster Fuller Dymaxion House.
There are some 3D printed houses in Austin and they cost significantly more than traditional houses of similar size. Really you're just building the walls and that's a pretty small part of the construction.
I can see 3D printing for components and prototypes but a whole house? I would question the structural integrity.
Concrete is so overkill for a house that a lot can go wrong with it and still it would stand forever.
I prefer overkill than 'that'll do' when it comes to buildings
I mean, just look at China..
"Chinese Concrete" is stucco veneer painted over styrofoam and crunched up newspaper clippings.
Different devices, same idea.