SE.10 – Elective Seminar
Advanced Robotic Fabrication
Robotic wood upcycling
Faculty: Alexandre Dubor, Aldo Sollazzo
Fabrication expert: Kunaljit Chadha
Technology development support : Raimund Krenmüller
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In a context of demographic explosion, resource scarcity and global warming, the construction sector needs to evolve towards faster, cleaner, more efficient and more customisable building systems. On the other hand, the current trend of Industry 4.0 promises groundbreaking technologies: robotics, accurate sensors, computational design, AI and cyber physical systems that could potentially transform the way we design, build and inhabit tomorrow.
Focusing on the wood industry, huge quantity of leftover pieces from sawmill and manufacturing are considered waste, often used for energy recovery by burning it, or worth, just discarded in landfills. On the other hand, computer vision could allow to catalogue this “waste” and allow it to be integrated in flexible digital production system such as robotic ones.
This project propose to explore the design potential lying in an heterogeneous stock of recycled wood that could be upcycled into a constructive project using computer vision, computational design and robotic fabrication ; creating an automated the process that add value to a material normally considered as waste.
Students can expect to learn about the necessary technology to execute the project (Image recognition algorithms, stock nesting, computational design of wood assembly, Pick & Place Robotic path planning, wood process that can be automated) while having the possibility to design and make their own assembly.