Auxiliary robot prints out construction plans
Rugged Robotics wants to revolutionize building construction with a building plan robot. Instead of drawing on paper, the machine draws the construction plan on the unfinished floor, including detailed instructions for the construction workers.
Slowly, it scans the area where walls are to go up and prints out the blueprint so masons know where to stack their bricks and don't forget to leave doors clear in the designated spots: The U.S. company Rugged Robotics, founded by NASA researchers, has partnered with U.S. construction company Consigli.
"We had a construction job that was pretty complicated," says Jack Moran of Consigli. "It was a high-rise building with a lot of strange shapes, a real challenge for us." Nevertheless, the ten-story building with a floor area of 3700 square meters went up easily with the help of Rugged's drawing robot.
"Layout is the most important task in the building process," explains Rugged founder and CEO Derrick Morse. "The key is to mark the places where the standard is left, such as windows and doors. A mistake made during layout affects the entire building process and leads to rework, delays and additional costs."
High demand for printing service
In practice, the Rugged team travels to the construction site with one of the three robots commissioned so far and feeds it the architect's plans. Then it oversees the execution. "We have high demand for our service. Several customers with multibillion-dollar contracts are planning pilot and demonstration projects with us," Morse says.
Over the next twelve months, the company is expected to grow and new robots will be built. "We will probably need additional capital. We're going to grow the organization and the fleet over the next twelve months and probably bring in additional capital to enable that growth," Morse said. In 2019, the company had already raised $2.5 million to bring the robot to production readiness.
