There have been many variations on building houses with prefab forms, going all the way back to Edison. Works fine, but the result is a concrete box. The shell is not the big cost item in homes.
If you want a small, low-cost box structure, there are companies that will sell you one. Concrete.[1] Metal.[2] Steel frame with wood siding.[3]
I still dont understand why people keep talking about "House". When 90% of area that needs urgent "housing" are in needs of Tower Blocks / High Rise Residential Buildings. We Need to find a way to quickly and cost effectively build a lot of mid to high quality apartments. Better heat isolation. Network Pipes ready rather than relying on WiFi.
Note: Yes, I know zoning and planning etc are still the biggest hurdle.
I remember coming across a video of a product from Europe where the entire wall assembly is sold as one piece (outer wall, insulation, inner wall). I'm not sure if this type of product is common in Europe.
If you then have wire conduits and junction boxes built-in, you are a lot closer to a livable home. Perhaps floor assemblies with hookups for plumbing.
I'm not sure why these things aren't standardized to be the point of plug-n-play. A lot less work for the tradespeople maybe.
The most expensive bit in a building is the land it sits on. The denser the cluster of people the more expensive the land becomes. People cluster around jobs. The more the jobs get distributed geographically the less people need to cluster and the more affordable housing becomes.
Remote work is the way to solve the housing crisis. There can be smaller regional clusters of people working in shared offices or small offices but there’s no real need for cramming people in offices in densely populated cities.
Free range chicken and cattle farms have minimum space requirements, yet human farms require people to sit in overcrowded spaces at least 8 hours a day every day usually limited to the space of a seat and a desk.
In what way is concrete a sustainable building material? It's a huge carbon emitter, a poor insulator, concrete production is devastating to natural habitats turned into sand quarries, etc. Plant-based construction materials, e.g. hemp, seem to be vastly superior on every ecological consideration.
Plus, an unreinforced concrete dome has to be one of the inherently least population dense structures, and density potential is probably as important a consideration in sustainability as actual construction techniques.
Edit: not necessarily a dome, but also not able to safely scale the structure very high with this technique without losing the only purported advantage, the low labor cost.
While not sustainable concrete made from fly-ash locks up ongoing and historic waste from coal fired power stations.
We're phasing out our 60 year old coal station given the sheer amount of solar power we now generate in W.Australia - but we still have 60 years of fly ash to deal with.
Agreed about the concrete. Fortunately there are efforts to replace concrete (in general) with other materials - some organic (fungi).
> Plus, an unreinforced concrete dome
This is not a dome. It could conceivable be more population dense if/when they figure out how to magically get rebar into it :P. But that's not going to happen; and the real future benefits are likely going to be along the "working with nature" approach (where you use natural growing/expanding processes and direct them to suit your needs).
In terms of future human survival, I'm surprised there's so little shown or seen regarding underground living. While obviously more complex due to the excavation and reinforcement processes, the survival and energy benefits are much higher. And with modern light gathering/direction tech, it doesn't have to be devoid of daylight.
Well concrete is not waterproof (generally) so they are technically also using the form as waterproofing. It's pretty clever IMO but you'd need rebar at the very least for any structure worth building...
I would advocate more research into learning how to "encourage" fungi growth to suit our needs without genetically modifying it. We just _never_ know the long term effects of our genetically modified creations (never as in "not in our lifetimes" usually).
I imagine someday there will be a combination of organic growths which will be combined in a creative way to produce something greater than the sum of parts and which also suits our needs. This might involve fast growing things, things which can be grown in a directed fashion, and combinations of organic substances which react in a beneficial way (such as improving durability or strength characteristics).
Hemp grows really fast and has really strong fibers. Bamboo does as well. Fungi grows fairly quickly and is directable. There are probably many more things out there which can be used. Then it's a matter of refining the processes to get the results we want and then testing and developing combinations.
The structural frame is easy. Stick frame, CLT, SIPs already exist and are better than this basically everything except a blockwork structure already takes less than a week. Insulation, airtightness and services integration is hard. Services takes way longer than the frame.
That's a cool link thanks for sharing. Seems pretty thermally efficient and they mentioned being quieter than wood walls. Curious what data they're looking at for "withstanding natural disasters"
Is concrete actually a good building material for homes? It doesn't seem like it'd be insulating, and you're definitely not getting internal plumbing/wiring. And concrete is actively bad for the environment. It all feels like the shipping container home -- seems great at a glance, but doesn't really pan out to be lived in.
Ikea style flatpacked prefabs still seems like a vastly better option to me.
It can be. Concrete isn't a great insulator, but it can moderate temperature changes, so if you have big swings between the day and night, it will keep things cooler in the day and warmer at night, which can be helpful. But if you get a heat wave where it stays hot at night, you're going to be real warm inside the next day too.
This article mentions 100 and 200 square feet buildings, so I don't think there's gonna be much in the way of internal structure. I could see an inflatable structure with 'tubes' at certain places for wiring and plumbing to pass through, which would save cutting holes later.
But like everyone else says, there's easier ways to get the frame up faster. What makes construction slow is coordination between the many different trades that need to work in the same area. With many parts in sequence, and each trade having high utilization, scheduling is difficult --- either you plan with large gaps between trades, or you blow up everyone's schedule when one trade falls behind for whatever reason.
Cement production is one of the biggest carbon emitters. There's also the issue of using PVC for the form. None of this seems eco-friendly.
Why not 3d print homes at that point? At least you can get the rebar and other forms in place ahead of the print, and you get more flexibility in the final design of the structure.
Monolithic Dome has been doing this for years. Precast concrete vaults are made very efficiently and can be used for this purpose with much better quality control. Neither are popular solutions.
Housing construction is pretty cheap. The materials are mass produced on thin margins and in the US we’ve insourced the cheapest labor available on the continent to put it together. If you’re really on a budget, you can get a pre-manufactured mobile home for very little. Even living in Soviet style concrete multi-family housing, like a human factory farm, is actually an option for most of us if we’re to move. People seem to avoid these choices when they have the option though.
I find it very conspicuous that in the commentary around this issue, finance and the market distortions they create never seem to get any blame.
It seems like a ton of these prefab projects show up on HN, but does anyone know of any that produce houses/structures that actually… look nice? It seems like everything I’ve seen on here have all the aesthetics of a shipping container. (Or, to be more on the nose, a concrete box).
That's a good point, hopefully this inflatable form method could yield structures that "look good" (whatever that means) but seems they'd need to get good at quickly producing/customizing the inflatable forms into ones that "look good". Maybe they could steel reinforce it too?
edit: point being - it seems easy to pump concrete into a form, but the problem is making forms - at scale - that look/function a certain way, and in this case are made from an inflatable.
Many quick build and prefab projects are intended to be used to provide rapid (short/medium term) housing for people affected by natural disasters (or man made ones, for that matter).
I'm not at all impressed in this particular one, but in general it matters not what the aesthetics are when it's a survival issue.
Hmmm, so I'm aware that a significant difficulty in normal concrete construction is ensuring that all the concrete gets everywhere it needs to go - and that's with relatively direct access a lot of the time.
I'm also not entirely clear what the saving is here - you still have to get concrete from somewhere to the construction site, to somewhere that presumably already has some local material that could be use instead?
Also if it's just making a box, that's not the problem - people have already have shelter. Where things break down are access to clean water, food, and similar. But I guess those don't sound sexy and so don't get funding.
What good is more housing without more schools, new parks, wider roads, more public infrastructure, etc? Net net it becomes a step-backwards for the group when just adding more housing alone
Startups like this are extremely guilty of offloading massive externals costs on the communities they sell to
[+] [-] Animats|3 years ago|reply
If you want a small, low-cost box structure, there are companies that will sell you one. Concrete.[1] Metal.[2] Steel frame with wood siding.[3]
[1] https://precastbuildings.com
[2] https://www.butlermfg.com/
[3] https://www.homedepot.com/p/Rose-Cottage-2-Beds-443-3-sq-ft-...
[+] [-] ksec|3 years ago|reply
Note: Yes, I know zoning and planning etc are still the biggest hurdle.
[+] [-] byw|3 years ago|reply
If you then have wire conduits and junction boxes built-in, you are a lot closer to a livable home. Perhaps floor assemblies with hookups for plumbing.
I'm not sure why these things aren't standardized to be the point of plug-n-play. A lot less work for the tradespeople maybe.
[+] [-] yrgulation|3 years ago|reply
Remote work is the way to solve the housing crisis. There can be smaller regional clusters of people working in shared offices or small offices but there’s no real need for cramming people in offices in densely populated cities.
Free range chicken and cattle farms have minimum space requirements, yet human farms require people to sit in overcrowded spaces at least 8 hours a day every day usually limited to the space of a seat and a desk.
[+] [-] raisin_churn|3 years ago|reply
Plus, an unreinforced concrete dome has to be one of the inherently least population dense structures, and density potential is probably as important a consideration in sustainability as actual construction techniques.
Edit: not necessarily a dome, but also not able to safely scale the structure very high with this technique without losing the only purported advantage, the low labor cost.
[+] [-] defrost|3 years ago|reply
We're phasing out our 60 year old coal station given the sheer amount of solar power we now generate in W.Australia - but we still have 60 years of fly ash to deal with.
[1] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-18/geopolymer-concrete-c...
[2] https://www.mediastatements.wa.gov.au/Pages/McGowan/2022/08/...
[3] https://colliecrete.com.au/
[+] [-] z9znz|3 years ago|reply
> Plus, an unreinforced concrete dome
This is not a dome. It could conceivable be more population dense if/when they figure out how to magically get rebar into it :P. But that's not going to happen; and the real future benefits are likely going to be along the "working with nature" approach (where you use natural growing/expanding processes and direct them to suit your needs).
In terms of future human survival, I'm surprised there's so little shown or seen regarding underground living. While obviously more complex due to the excavation and reinforcement processes, the survival and energy benefits are much higher. And with modern light gathering/direction tech, it doesn't have to be devoid of daylight.
[+] [-] imgabe|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jeffrallen|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nlawalker|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] netfl0|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] reneherse|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] booi|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zbrozek|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] totetsu|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] z9znz|3 years ago|reply
I imagine someday there will be a combination of organic growths which will be combined in a creative way to produce something greater than the sum of parts and which also suits our needs. This might involve fast growing things, things which can be grown in a directed fashion, and combinations of organic substances which react in a beneficial way (such as improving durability or strength characteristics).
Hemp grows really fast and has really strong fibers. Bamboo does as well. Fungi grows fairly quickly and is directable. There are probably many more things out there which can be used. Then it's a matter of refining the processes to get the results we want and then testing and developing combinations.
[+] [-] ArchitectAnon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lettergram|3 years ago|reply
https://www.concretecontractornc.com/a-house-built-with-styr...
[+] [-] dieselgate|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thanatos519|3 years ago|reply
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/621986.Barbapapa_s_New_H...
[+] [-] mNovak|3 years ago|reply
Ikea style flatpacked prefabs still seems like a vastly better option to me.
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] toast0|3 years ago|reply
This article mentions 100 and 200 square feet buildings, so I don't think there's gonna be much in the way of internal structure. I could see an inflatable structure with 'tubes' at certain places for wiring and plumbing to pass through, which would save cutting holes later.
But like everyone else says, there's easier ways to get the frame up faster. What makes construction slow is coordination between the many different trades that need to work in the same area. With many parts in sequence, and each trade having high utilization, scheduling is difficult --- either you plan with large gaps between trades, or you blow up everyone's schedule when one trade falls behind for whatever reason.
[+] [-] codalan|3 years ago|reply
Why not 3d print homes at that point? At least you can get the rebar and other forms in place ahead of the print, and you get more flexibility in the final design of the structure.
[+] [-] bombcar|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] francoisfeugeas|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tomthe|3 years ago|reply
But without reinforcement, this is only a toy. But I find it interesting nonetheless.
[+] [-] halffaday|3 years ago|reply
Housing construction is pretty cheap. The materials are mass produced on thin margins and in the US we’ve insourced the cheapest labor available on the continent to put it together. If you’re really on a budget, you can get a pre-manufactured mobile home for very little. Even living in Soviet style concrete multi-family housing, like a human factory farm, is actually an option for most of us if we’re to move. People seem to avoid these choices when they have the option though.
I find it very conspicuous that in the commentary around this issue, finance and the market distortions they create never seem to get any blame.
[+] [-] themmes|3 years ago|reply
Difference is that they produced a canvas containing everything needed for the concrete, only requires to add water and blow it up.
[1] https://youtu.be/Vb1pdvvoVoQ
[+] [-] atty|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dieselgate|3 years ago|reply
edit: point being - it seems easy to pump concrete into a form, but the problem is making forms - at scale - that look/function a certain way, and in this case are made from an inflatable.
[+] [-] z9znz|3 years ago|reply
I'm not at all impressed in this particular one, but in general it matters not what the aesthetics are when it's a survival issue.
[+] [-] mattferderer|3 years ago|reply
For anyone interested in building materials, ICF & SIP seem to be the most interesting methods to me.
[+] [-] olliej|3 years ago|reply
I'm also not entirely clear what the saving is here - you still have to get concrete from somewhere to the construction site, to somewhere that presumably already has some local material that could be use instead?
Also if it's just making a box, that's not the problem - people have already have shelter. Where things break down are access to clean water, food, and similar. But I guess those don't sound sexy and so don't get funding.
[+] [-] mrcartmeneses|3 years ago|reply
Surely it would be better to call these injection moulded homes?
[+] [-] booi|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yardie|3 years ago|reply
Without these you have a weak shell not a liveable structure. Concrete doesn't have tensile strength for shear and compressive loads.
I watch a new building go up nearby. It was 4-5 days of welding rebar and pouring concrete took 4-5 hours.
[+] [-] lastofthemojito|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] imapeopleperson|3 years ago|reply
Startups like this are extremely guilty of offloading massive externals costs on the communities they sell to