Development of a mechanism for continuous insertion of reinforcement of different lengths and thicknesses into laminated mortar

Abstract

Structures built using 3D concrete printers (3DCP) for construction have emerged in recent years, However, structures built using this technology have the problem that the reinforcing rebars cannot be employed like of conventional reinforced concrete structures. To solve this problem, This study fabricated a mechanism that automatically inserts reinforcing short bars in conjunction with existing 3DCPs, Its performance was evaluated through reinforcement experiments on large scale specimens. As a result, as many as 440 reinforcing short bars could successfully be inserted, confirming the effectiveness of the reinforcement.