Applications of Additive Manufacturing in Construction and Historic Building Restoration/Rehabilitation

The term “Additive Manufacturing” is described as the layered production of parts from a 3D file. Over the past century, this technology has evolved from a complement tool for conventional product development into an independent production method. Whereas high technology industries such as aerospace and medicine were already embraced additive manufacturing, structural engineering and architecture are lagging. Additive manufacturing has the potential to revolutionize the construction and restoration of historic buildings, with foreseeable benefits including highly complex and efficient structures with the reduction in material use and wastage, streamlining and expedition of the design-build process, improved customization. However, there are also challenges and demands: a new way of thinking for design and verifications for stability and serviceability of printed elements, the cost, the need for well-educated engineers. In this dissertation, the current state of additive manufacturing in construction and historic building restoration/rehabilitation is reviewed as a combination of qualitative and quantitative-based studies. The research aims to give confidence to additive manufacturing applicability in these fields and stimulate further research. The opportunities and challenges are discussed by analysing concrete, polymer, and metal-based processes and their applications of additive manufacturing in the construction sector. A review of structural and non-structural applications in restoration projects, possible future applications in terms of structural strengthening are analysed and opportunities and challenges are identified and discussed. Based on the literature review and experimental lab tests, the outcome was obtained as the tensile mechanical properties are adequate for structural engineering applications. However, further interdisciplinary research on additive manufacturing is necessary to build confidence in structural engineers and architects.