Adrian Bowyer reveals a new production method using assembly robots

Adrian Bowyer – the legendary creator of the RepRap project, since abandoning the amateur 3D printers business in 2016, devoted himself entirely to doing what made him famous – inventing new things and sharing them with hobbyists and amateurs of new technologies under open-source licenses. In mid-2019, Bowyer presented the concept of “instant” 3D printing using electric current, and now presents an idea for a new production method using the so-called “assembly robots”.

The source of inspiration is the project of Benjamin Jenett and Neil Gershenfeld from the Boston MIT – their robot moves on the structure it builds, placing identical standard cubic blocks anywhere. Can build large-scale constructions – objects much larger than themselves.

After learning about it, Bowyer came to conclusion that there is quite a lot of room for more innovation here:

• the robot could be made of blocks that are the same as those from which it builds the structure; robot blocks would be active: one type could rotate around the center plane of the block, and the other would be able to rotate around one axis through the center of a pair of opposing surfaces
• electricity and signals would flow through the blocks (e.g. for movement or assembly instructions); in this way, the robot would not have to be powered by itself, but only draw power from the structure being constructed at the same time
• the robot would have two fastening mechanisms: magnets that would fasten individual blocks and at the same time allow their subsequent removal and assembly elsewhere, and an adhesive that would permanently stick them together; glue would only be applied when the block would be in its final location.

The first concept does not look very encouraging at the moment, but let’s remember that Adrian Bowyer is behind it – a man thanks to whom ~95% of you have the opportunity to work on 3D printers:

The red and green blocks are to be movable and will rotate the gray ones – passive blocks that perform the building function. This type of robot will be able to build a copy of itself and stick all the parts together. The individual parts of which the blocks will be composed, of course, are to be printed on a RepRap 3D printer and the only thing you will need is of course motors and electronics.

These are the prototypes of passive blocks:

The blocks have two types of surfaces: three with three embedded balls, which are magnets with a diameter of 5 mm, and three with eight embedded nuts, which are used to mount magnets in any of four possible orientations. The elements were printed flat and then joined together along their edges. Wedge-shaped cavities are also left on each edge, on which a small amount of cyanoacrylate glue can be applied to permanently bond the structure.

The octagonal holes in the center of each wall, in turn, are used to attach a 15 mm2 thick PCB with four springy contacts to connect the cubes together. Two of them will be powered and two will be responsible for data transfer both during and after assembly.

The Bowyer project is extremely ambitious because robots will not only have to use advanced coordination software, but also be equipped with a selective adhesive application system. If the system of self-building and replicating robots can be implemented, it can lead to more advanced versions that can lead to a revolution in the construction of structures in virtually any area.

The project is developed naturally under an open-source license.

Source: www.reprapltd.com