Concrete

To transport our concrete to the print head, we first wanted to build a piston pump, using 2 pistons, working against each other to pump the concrete. Because of multiple disadvantages with this type of pump, we chose a peristaltic pump. These machines are using several wheels inside the pump case to squeeze the flexible tube and therefore pushing the materials from the entrance to the exit of the pump. The rotation causes negative pressure on the entrance and sucks the material in. At the exit the material gets pushed out with a constant fluidity.

In our project we did not focuse on a perfect concrete mixture. However we had to do some experiments to simulate a possible Contruction Printing technology.