gradual assemblies

a robotically fabricated sun shading structure for the Istituto Svizzero in Rome together with all MAS DFAB students at ETH Zürich with Gramazio Kohler Research

the goal was to create this structure with a novel wood to wood connection system using dowels between wooden beams

a sequential algorithmic design engine was developed in rhino, grasshopper and python which takes all fabrication parameters of this system into account

the chosen design then was segmented according to production and assembly constraints and transferred to the production setup in grasshopper and python

this setup allowed us to send commands to two ABB robotic arms in the Robotic Fabrication Laboratory at ETH Zürich – one equipped with a gripper and one equipped with a drill

in a human-robotic collaborative process all 22 segments were produced and shipped to Rome, where they were assembled together to form the finished structure

the complete project was done in 10 weeks with 19 days production and one week assembly on site

Picture1 curveGrowth0145 curveTween0088 branching0339 network0171 beamsdowels0149 final drawings.3dm final drawings.3dm segmentation17 fabrication38 RFL_SETUP_2 RFL01 Gradual02 Gradual05 Gradual08