Automation in construction: an off-site case study of the FASTtruss system with DES
Ideas could include:.
MMC is the collective term for the innovative construction methods that can be deployed by the DfMA designer.MMC can be considered as the DfMA designer’s “toolkit”.
The DfMA designer finds the most suitable innovations in the MMC toolkit (or develops new innovations) to meet a project’s unique challenges..There are many construction innovations that can be considered MMC.The UK’s Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) recently established a Joint Industry Working Group on MMC which proposed the following categorisation: 3D primary structural systems, 2D primary structural systems, Non-system components, Additive Manufacturing, Assemblies and sub-assemblies, Material and Product Innovations and Site Process Innovations.
This categorisation is quite diverse and includes a range of pre-manufactured and pre-assembled systems but also non-system components, site-based material innovations and process innovations..There is no fixed list of MMC methods in each category.
There is great scope for the construction industry to innovate and develop new MMC methods to expand the toolkit and enhance the DfMA designer’s ability to achieve benefits on future construction projects..
Under the MHCLG categorisation, volumetric modular construction (known in Singapore as Prefabricated Prefinished Volumetric Construction or PPVC and in Hong Kong as Modular Integrated Construction or MiC) is an example of a 3D primary structural system..We have a strong background in technology, engineering and construction.
The result of this is that we do not need to design to approximations and allowances – we can be precise from the outset.. Design from the inside out.Fundamental to our design approach is that we start from the client’s requirements, which we establish during a series of early workshops.
Designing a complex project does not always evolve in a linear fashion, so to deliver a quality design solution we must identify in the early stages of the design the details (technical, organisational, etc.)that have a big impact.