A 3D printer builds the first two-story home of its kind in the United States

A two-story house of 376 square meters is taking shape on a suburban street in Houston. At first, the construction went unnoticed except for one detail: it The first two-story home built with a 3D printer in the United States of America.

Another novelty is that the three-bedroom house is being built according to a hybrid design Combines wood and concrete structure. Materials, unfamiliar to the area, are introduced to deal with hurricanesand strong storms and other weather phenomena that have become common in that part of Texas.

Talking to Reuters Co-founder of HANNAH Design Studio Leslie Locke explained, “When designing this home, we not only considered general floor plans and usage, but also We design the actual printing path, how the printer will print, where it starts and where it ends“.

How was the two-story house 3D printed?

Building the house is a lot like the work done by desktop 3D printers, said Roberto Montemayor, project manager at PERI 3D Construction, which is building the property in partnership with HANNAH and construction company CIVE. The differences – In addition to the printer’s weight of 12 tons – Is that the “cartridges” here are filled with concrete.

According to Lok, because the printer does the heavy lifting for the layers of concrete, there are fewer workers on the job site. “It’s a much faster build process, too It only requires four to five people on site to print a full houseShe told the news agency.

The work is due to be delivered in the second half of 2023. Builders are excited about the prospect The development potential of the new technologyto build multi-family homes quickly and economically.