The Future of Construction with Robots

Robots make everything better, don’t they? Sure they do. The engineers and architects related to the construction industry think so as well. Construct-o-bots (or similar) have existed in science fiction forever. However, construction and architecture have been the least automated industries until recently. The nature of the work required to build a structure has always required a human mind to drive it, and the sheer number of steps to construct a simple thing and the varieties of tasks to be undertaken for a building translates into doing it manually. Over time, we have started to use machines for each step or task that can be automated or had to be mechanized, for example, concrete mixing, or pumping it far away. But to actually use Artificial Intelligence to make a simple wall has been impossible due to its intricacies. Well, up until now.

It is not like that construction work does not have scope for robotics and automation in it. On the contrary, there are plenty of jobs in a building site that are repetitive but not complex. Also, there are many occasions in a building site where humans would be in great danger. However manual labor has always been plentiful and heavy robotics hasn’t been making much headway until the last decade.

But we have come far indeed. From using pullies and mixing drums, we are now using cranes and dozers operated by joysticks or even by remote. New technologies are opening up new doors in modern constructions. Only in the last decade, we have seen various prototypes like robots to carry stuff, drones to survey, autonomous vehicles for transport, 3D printing for modeling, exoskeletons to augment worker strength and much more. Recently shortages of manual labor and low unemployment in the country are driving modern constructors to consider more mechanized solutions than ever.

Many tasks in construction can be taken care of by robots, including bricklaying, painting, loading, carrying, and bulldozing. In fact, in the transportation field, there are already many AGV’s (Automated Guided Vehicles) and AMR’s (Autonomous Mobile Robots) hard at work, and we can expect to see their numbers multiply significantly in a short while. There are three key factors that are driving the need for more robots in the construction industry. One, that robots can protect or replace human workers in a hazardous work environment. Secondly, increased usage of robots will decrease workplace injuries drastically. Not to mention that a gap in the manpower left by labor shortage can be filled by work bots.

There are already some incredible examples of machines driven by set data taking over large portions in the building sites. Today let us look at a few of some awesome examples of using robots in construction.

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Published By

Rajib Dey

www.constructioncost.co

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How to analyze rate for brick masonry work

While analyzing the rate of brickwork, it is essential to ascertain the quantities of materials (bricks and mortar) and labors. There are different types of ratios for mortar which range from 1:2, 1:4, 1:6, 1:8 etc. Go through the following like to determine the quantity of mortar.

Estimating the quantity of bricks is necessary for the rate analysis.

Quantity Estimation for Brick Masonry - To analyze the rate of brick masonry, 1m3 of brick masonry is taken:

1. Number of bricks for 1 cubic meter of brick masonry:
For 1m3 of brick masonry, the number of typical size of bricks must be 494.

2. Quantity of mortar for 1m3 of brick masonry:

For 1m3 of brickwork, the quantity of the mortar should be 25 – 30%, i.e. 0.25m3 – 0.3m3 of cement masonry. For this purpose, cement mortar is selected as 0.3m3 .

Labor Estimation for Brick Masonry:
Labors which are essential for brick masonry belong to mason for brick work, labours for transmitting materials (sand, cement, bricks, and water), mixing and transporting mortar.

The quantity of labor is provided as requirement of labour in longer period for 1m3 of brick masonry.

1. Mason: The quantity of mason necessary for 1m3 of brickwork is provided as 0.94 days.
2. Labor: The quantity of labor for different types of works like carriage of materials, blending of mortar, carrying of mortar etc. are amassed. The labour necessary for 1m3 of brick masonry is for 1.57 days.

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Published By
Rajib Dey
www.constructioncost.co
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How to prevent segregation of concrete

Definition of Segregation of Concrete?
Major components of concrete are cement, sand, aggregate, and water. Normally, a coating is made to concrete aggregate with cement and sand for developing the consistent mass disjointing of these constituent materials of concrete from each other. It is known as segregation of concrete.

Type of segregation:

1. Partition of course aggregate from the paste.
2. Partition of course agreement paste from the concrete.
3. Partition of water from the cement mix which is also known as bleeding.

The segregation contains unwanted properties in the hardened concrete. It also leads to honeycombing in concrete. Segregation also adversely impacts on stability, compressive strength and all other characteristics of concrete. It also results in forming cavities in the concrete surface.

Reasons for segregation:

The segregation mainly occurs due to the variation in specific gravity and size of its constituent material. Specific gravity of water is 1. Specific gravity of cement is approx 3.15 whereas that of aggregate is 2.6 to 2.7. Because of the variation in specific gravity, lighter particle goes upwards and heavier particle goes downwards and consequently the segregation of concrete occurs.

Other reasons range from greater water cement ratio in concrete. Besides, when excessive water is added at the time of mixing concrete, it results in segregation. Improper vibration for a long period on wet mix of concrete also causes heavy material to setting down and lighter cement sand paste to move upwards. Imperfectly proportioned mix and inappropriate placing on site may also lead to segregation.

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Published By
Rajib Dey
www.constructioncost.co
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Steps included in concrete manufacturing

The concrete quality depends on the manufacturing process of concrete. The manufacturing process involves the following steps :- Batching or measurement of materials, Mixing, Transportation, Placing, Compacting, Curing.

Batching of Material: To maintain the standard of concrete, the quantities of the materials should be perfect. The cement, aggregates and water should have utilized along with 3 percent of batching quantity and the admixture along with the 5 percent of batching quantity. Generally, two types of batching like the volume batch and the weight batch are utilized. The selection of batching method is influenced by the size of job, necessary production rate, and required standards of batching performance.

Volume Batching: Volume batch is suitable for the small works only. The amount of concrete materials is calculated with loose volume by means of standard box alias volume gauge box made of wood or metal. The amount of solid granular material in a cubic meter will be considered as an indefinite quantity. As for instance, the volume of moist sand in a loose condition weights much less as compared to the identical volume of dry compacted sand. Cement is calculated with weight in spite of the methods of batching. The cement is always calculated in terms of weight. The volume of one bag cement (50 kg) is 0.035 m.

Weight Batching: For all types of larger works, weight batching is recommended. There are several types of weight batches.

For small works, manually weight batch is ideal. All the materials are calculated manually by weight. The weight is taken in ordinary weight platform machine. The buckets are applied for large works. The bucket releases the materials directly into the mixture machine. For small to large works, manually or electrically operated automatic batching plants are used.

Mixing: The strength of the concrete relies on the mixing of materials. Standardized mixing process allows to mix the cement to aggregates in a proper way. There should be a coating of cement past on all the aggregate particles and all the materials of the concrete should be mixed into a homogeneous mass when the mixing is performed either by hand or machine.

Transportation of concrete: The concrete can be transported either by normally of mechanically. The concrete is transported manually through pans, wheel carts for small works whereas for large and enormous works, the concrete is transported through buckets or by pumps controlled mechanically.

Placing of concrete: Placing of concrete means arranging the concrete in its desired position. Concrete should be set in position in a perfect way as rapidly as possible within the initial setting time of the cement. Occasionally, admixture is utilized to raise the initial setting time.

Compaction of concrete: Compaction stands for the method for elimination of air voids from the concrete since air voids in concrete creates the vacuum and it reduces the concrete strength significantly. Compaction is performed manually or mechanically. The damping rods are employed in manual system. In mechanical process, vibrators are utilized. The manual compaction system is effective for small size of works. The vibrators are recommended for large size works. Vibrators are categorized into three types, internal vibrators, external vibrators and table vibrators.

Curing of concrete: Curing is vital for strength development and stability of concrete. Curing is started right away after placing and finishing of concrete, and entails maintenance of desired moisture and temperature conditions, both at depth and adjacent to the surface, for elongated periods of time. Properly cured concrete contains a sufficient amount of moisture for continued hydration and formation of strength, volume stability, endurance to freezing and thawing, and abrasion and scaling resistance.

For ordinary Portland cement, the period of curing time is from 7 days to 14 days. In case of rapid cement, the curing time is decreased.

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Published By
Rajib Dey
www.constructioncost.co
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