A robotics company 3D printed nearly a hundred homes in Texas

It took nearly two years, but a master-planned community of homes made with a giant 3D printer in Georgetown, Texas, is nearly complete.

Reuters reports that the homes, which are part of a community called Wolf Ranch, are being built with a large 3D printer called a Vulcan, which is 50 feet wide and weighs more than 4.75 tons. The project is part of a joint venture with 3D printing construction developer ICON and homebuilder Lennar. It started in November 2022 and teams are close to completing their goal of building 100 homes with Vulcan by the end of the summer. Homeowners have already started moving into some of the completed 3D-printed homes, which range in price from $450,000 to $600,000. More than a quarter of the homes have been sold.

ICON’s 3D printer uses a mixture of concrete powder, water, sand and other materials to arrange piles of concrete into a tube shape to build walls and, eventually, an entire house. The houses are single-story dwellings with three to four bedrooms that take about three weeks to print. The foundation and metal roofs are made the old-fashioned way with human crews.

Once printed, the walls look like giant stretches of corduroy, but they are designed to be strong and sustainable even in extreme weather conditions. They are also water resistant and energy saving. The contemporary ranch-style designs for the homes were provided by architectural firm BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group, according to a press release from ICON. The construction process was also simplified throughout the project. ICON Senior Project Manager Conner Jenkins said Reuters This build started with five different construction crews, but has since been whittled down to just one crew and a robotic printer.

The only disadvantage is that the thickness of the walls interferes with WiFi signals. Residents had to use mesh internet routers with broadcast signals located throughout the home rather than just a single router.

ICON isn’t just using its large-scale 3D printer to build homes on Earth. NASA is reportedly interested in using the technology to build structures on the Moon for its Artemis Moon Exploration Program scheduled to launch its first crew in September 2025.