How 3D Printed Homes Could Solve Australia’s Housing Crisis | ft. Tom Macrokanis (Macro 3D)

What if homes could be built faster, cheaper, and with less labor… using a robot?

In this episode of Level Up, Duayne Pearce sits down with Tom from Macro 3D, the company behind Australia’s groundbreaking 3D printed homes and the viral 3D printed pool houses featured on The Block.

From building custom 3D printing machines in Australia to printing full-scale concrete structures in days, this conversation dives deep into the future of construction, housing affordability, automation, and what’s next for the building industry.

We cover:
• How 3D printed homes actually work
• The real cost of 3D printed construction
• How long it takes to print a house
• Structural strength & building codes
• Reinforcement, insulation & waterproofing
• Why Australia is behind the rest of the world
• The future of affordable housing
• How robotics & automation are changing construction forever

If you’re a builder, developer, investor, architect, or just curious about the future of housing, this episode is packed with insights.

Transcript

Welcome And Why 3D Homes

SPEAKER_03 0:05

G'day guys, welcome back to another episode of Level Up. We are back in the new studio this afternoon for another cracking episode. And look, this one's actually one that I've been uh hanging out for a long time and been trying to reach out to so many different people to get an expert on to talk to us about 3D printed homes. So uh today we've got the pleasure of having Tom from Macro Construction Group here. Um he's actually been the guy that um did the 3D printed pool houses on the block. So uh I've got so many questions, got a lot of lot to talk about, so we'll get stuck into it. But if you've uh ever wanted to know more about 3D printed homes, this is definitely the episode for you. So uh how are you, mate? Good, thank you. Thanks for having me. Mate, I really appreciate you um coming up. So you've flew up from Melbourne, you've got some business going on up here in Brisbane.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Yeah, yeah, we've got um obviously off the back of the block, we've had a a lot of interest from all around the country and yeah, a number of number of people up here are looking at you know whether it's machines or whether it's um uh jobs, 3D printed pools, 3D printed retaining walls, houses, all sorts of things.

SPEAKER_03 1:08

So we do. Well I didn't I'll that's I'm gonna come back to that because I didn't realise you could do pools and stuff as well. But um mate, before we jump into all the juicy stuff and talk about the 3D printing and stuff, just give us a little bit of a background of of yourself and how you've got to where you are now. Sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:23

So I s I'm obviously a young guy, and so uh not long ago I left school and um was very interested in software and the world of crypto and the way that the the blockchain sort of systems worked and um followed that as sort of a career path out of school and was doing a lot of software for different companies and um one of the programs that I wrote I tried to go and raise money for and I met this guy who ran a business consultancy and he sort of turned around to me and was like, Hey Tom, like you you got great ambition and like what you're trying to do is really cool, but you know nothing about business. So so take a moment, come and work for me, take a year off whatever you're doing, and just focus on learning as much as you can, and then at the end of that year, you know, if it the idea is still there, you know, hopefully, hopefully it is, you'll be able to go off and do it, and you'll have the the experience and the knowledge that you need to at least have some fundamental understanding of what you're doing.

SPEAKER_03 2:21

So, did you do that?

SPEAKER_00 2:22

Yes, I did that.

SPEAKER_03 2:23

So that's a massive step because a lot of young people, and I don't want to offend people, but most young people are just so ambitious trying to get there and they wouldn't take a step back to to do that.

SPEAKER_00 2:33

Yeah, yeah. So I took that on, and my role in that company sort of changed a little bit throughout, but really I was an intern and my job was to look at new technology, write a report on it,

From Software To Construction

SPEAKER_00 2:45

and then sort of talk about it to the other business, uh the business community that they had. Um one of the reports that I happened to write was on 3D printing, and this was uh it was a general 3D printing report, so we touched on metals and plastics and and obviously concrete. And when I was looking at it, I was like, hey, no one's really doing this. And um, this is you know, you're going back eight years, eight, nine, ten years now. And so no one was doing it at all in the country. And I reached out to a few of the companies to try and get more information and sort of said has anyone from Australia like reached out to you yet? And they were all said the same thing. They were like, No. I was like, okay, well, how much is a machine and could we bring one here? And they were like, Yeah, sure, like here's the information, here's the quotes, and jumped on a plane um sort of the following year. Um, went over to Europe, spent some time with a couple of the companies over there learning how their machines worked.

SPEAKER_03 3:34

And so what when was this? Like, how old were you in the day?

SPEAKER_00 3:37

I would have been 19, 20 when I went over there. So yeah, quite quite young, quite green, and you know, just excited about the world. So yeah, it was it was a it was a fun couple trips and went and saw yeah, how these machines worked and what they were able to build, and was like this is something that I think I can bring back. You know, I've got mates who are builders, that sounds like that sounds like step one, you've got your customer, and then you know, I've got the knowledge, you know, I could build software systems and um my dad being a mechanic, I've always been around sort of mechanical stuff. So understanding how a robot works from a mechanical point of view, yes, there's the electrical side, but you know, you you can pick that up, it's nothing that can't be learnt. So yeah, just went headfirst into it and tried to make it work, and yeah, we ended up eventually getting to a point where we'd put together a deal with one of the companies to be their reseller. And so I was trying to resell machines here in Australia, um, and we sold one to RMIT, so that was RMIT's first um concrete 3D printing system. That was um yeah, thanks to one of the Dutch companies, and anyway, the Dutch company turned around and sort of was like, Yeah, no, this is not gonna cement the relationship. You need to actually buy one. And I was like, Well, but that wasn't the deal. The deal that we had was I get you a machine sale and you give me the resellership signed on on the doted line and commission paid. So that was sort of my first real lesson into international business was you know, unless the contract's really bulletproof, you know, you you sort of left left hung out to dry at times. So that's what happened.

SPEAKER_03 5:14

It's um look I've been interested in 3D printing for such a long time. Like uh I've watched a lot of shit on YouTube and that sort of stuff. I personally I think there's a big spot in the market for it. Of um I know overseas they do do a lot of it, but we just don't seem to have taken it up here.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

Yeah, I think a lot of that comes from the fact that the building styles of overseas suits it a fair bit more, and like so many people in Australia have no idea how the rest of the w world builds. The rest of the world builds with you know blocks and bricks, and there's a lot of double brick, the walls are thicker because it's colder in a lot of these places. And so to go and print those walls over there makes a whole lot of sense because you're swapping a double brick home for a double brick home, because really that's what 3D printing is, it's it's unreinforced masonry. So when you're building under codes here, you AS3700, that's the easiest way to get through the building code.

SPEAKER_02 6:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:09

Um so when you look at the reasons for not using it here in Australia, up the east coast, it sort of makes sense why it hasn't taken off. Yeah. Over in WA, that's uh really where we're getting a lot of interest because you know 90% of buildings over there are double brick.

SPEAKER_03 6:25

Yeah. So all right, so then you're what are you now, 27, 28? Yep. So uh obviously you've you've dived in the deep end, you've got involved with this sort of stuff, but you're you do other stuff as well, don't you, in the in the building industry?

SPEAKER_00 6:40

Yeah, so once that whole thing with you know the Dutch company happened, we then had the tr it then sort of COVID happened, the whole everything sort of slowed down, no one really knew what was going on, and I'd worked out roughly how to program a small like desktop robot and was like, okay, well maybe if I can do this I can do it on a bigger one. And we went and got a got a bigger one, and sure enough the program works the same on the bigger one. Um so you built your own machine. So then we built our own machine. And so then it

Why Australia Builds Differently

SPEAKER_00 7:10

was like, okay, if we can build this, we can probably sell it. That's probably an easy way to get in than you know, paying a couple hundred thousand dollars for one from overseas. Let's let's just build it. How hard can it really be? And so we spent the couple of years over COVID building the machine, working out a mixed design, um, trying to set up builds, and we're just we're probably just that little bit too early. Plus, on top of that, you've got all of the COVID stuff that was going on. Yeah, it's a very it was a very just destabilized time for everyone. So off the back of COVID, we yeah, again just kept working away, and we we sat there and I was like, I need a place that I can do this often when I want. Like I was still working a job at that time, and I was like, I need to do this in a way where I can just focus. And so um I had a had my qualification as a boilermaker, and I was like, well, I'll just turn this into a business, and eventually that'll pay for the 3D printing company. I'll just be my own investor, you know. Investing in Australia or getting investment for a hardware startup is um yeah, I'm not gonna say impossible, but it's very, very difficult.

SPEAKER_03 8:15

Yeah. Um So when when did you squeeze in getting your boilermaking trade?

SPEAKER_00 8:19

In between yeah, in between sort of COVID and yeah, yeah, and yeah. That was sort of that period there I managed to squeeze it all in and make it work.

SPEAKER_03 8:29

So very good. So you you're into your steel work and structural steel and all that sort of stuff. So that um so what you built that business up to help fund this other interest. Correct.

SPEAKER_00 8:40

Yeah. So I became our own investor, is really what we did, and just robbed Peter to pay Paul. This is really what it was. That's what it was like when you start multiple businesses. Exactly, exactly. So we did that, um, and so that business just grew ended up just growing its own set of legs, and it uh yeah, you know, we've now got uh about ten people in the business and you know we're doing reasonable reasonable size jobs now, which is good. My brother started in the company not long after because I needed another set of hands obviously, and um he remembers times where we were working on you know garden edging and handrails and you know at the moment we're putting up a uh a commercial building which has got eight shops and four offices up the top. Um it's just a completely different business a few years later. So yeah, it's very it's nice to see where it's gotten to. Um that's sort of grown into its own its own skin.

SPEAKER_03 9:35

And then you're doing so you're doing the you do fabrication, you do installation as well, but you also do slabs as well, like a bit of concrete work.

SPEAKER_00 9:42

Yeah, so we started finding over time that you know we're putting structural steel up and there's an issue here, like they've put the rebate in the wrong spot, or they put a hob somewhere, and you know, then I'm s I'm sitting there I can charge as a variation, but you know, it's like not the point. The whole point is that we turn up and the job goes seamlessly, we're in and out and not having to, you know, pester the builder too much about what about the job. So we were finding that as we took on the concrete as well, it just made the job flow better. And um obviously getting paid in the construction industry at the moment is a little bit tricky. Um so one of the things that controlling more of the job did

Building And Funding The First Machine

SPEAKER_00 10:20

for us is meant we had a bigger stake in that job. So it made it um just more chance of getting paid is really what it came down to. So we took on more, and yes, there's more risk in the city.

SPEAKER_03 10:30

I'll talk to you about getting paid, mate. You need to you need to have some strict terms and conditions, set expectations. Um I like knowing more about people's backgrounds and and what you do because I think that shows it or says a lot about bit people in business. But um the fact that you've been ambitious enough to go and build those other businesses to help fund this. I'm assuming this is a passion, this um 3D printing. It um Tom's got a bit sitting on our bench over here, but uh it's I I apart from watching YouTube clips until Tom showed up um just before, I'd never felt or seen this sort of stuff in real life. It's I'm not sure why, but in my mind, I I expect it to be real light, um like almost aerated, but like that little bit you've got there is just dense, it's like picking up a it's like picking up concrete. Yeah, well, yeah, but um so mate, let's dive into this. I've I've got a lot of questions. I've I hope I don't um leave any out um that I've been thinking about. Like I've I've woken up bloody lost sleep thinking about what I'm gonna ask you about this because I've um I think it would it we need to find something in our industry that's gonna help us build more economical homes. Yeah. Um because reality is that labor's going up and up and up, materials are going up and up and up. Um and so there's got to be a solution. And I I personally one of the reasons I've paid so much attention to this on YouTube and that, and um I've even reached out to a few American bills and stuff that I've seen doing it, is because I I think it it has a role to play in that. So, and and you I'm assuming you do as well.

SPEAKER_00 12:04

Yeah, I I don't think it's it's not the it's not the ultimate answer to everything, and you know, people sit there and they're like, oh, what about prefab or what about this? I'm like, yeah, they they all actually are the part of the solution. The the solution is we have to add automation, but what that automation looks like, whether it's past partly built in the factory or wholly built on site with with with a 3D printer, or you know, even even some of the the those containerized um light gauge steel framing machines that people are starting to bring out it's popular over in the US, uh I believe from what I've seen. Yeah. So even those sorts of things, like it starts to become a whole solution that has to come together. Yeah. And it's not just also on the construction side, like you know, you you've got the finance side of things too, like how can we get more creative with the way that we finance a build? There's yeah, the policy side, like it's it's a combination of issues that has to all be fixed. But yeah, like I think you start with something that you can control, and for us, we can control what technology is being used on site. So yeah, start there and work the rest out later.

SPEAKER_03 13:08

Yeah, well mate, look, I hope my my thing is no question is a silly question, but uh so hopefully you think none none of these are silly, but like to start with, is it is it load bearing?

SPEAKER_00 13:18

Uh not yet. So the way that we get through the we have to we have to work within the building code. So unlike when you go and invent a piece of software or you know you you come up with some other um some other piece of technology, typically you don't have a lot of standards that you've got to meet. With the hardware technology as well as uh construction technology, you've got obviously stuff that you've got to keep up with. So for us to deal with the building code, we've found that building under AS3700, like I said last time, is uh the fastest and easiest way. Therefore, we're unreinforced masonry. So to build like that, you need to put some sort of load-bearing element into that wall, whether that's core filling it, whether that's um putting uh putting a steel column in or something along those lines. There's there's a number of different options to do that.

SPEAKER_03 14:13

So is it it's strong enough? So it is a is it always two layers or Yes.

SPEAKER_00 14:19

So you print uh uh an internal skin and an external skin, and then we run like a tie, like a brick tie almost between the two skins, and that's that's the the fastest and easiest way to do it at the moment.

SPEAKER_03 14:31

Um And does that is that does that cavity vary or is it pretty set size?

SPEAKER_00 14:36

We can vary it to whatever you want. That's the that's the beautiful part about it. But when you start giving people so many options, they start freaking out a little bit. So what we've what we've done is focused on let's keep things as uh as standard as possible. Because if if you're not as standard, you're then spending you you're eroding the the cost benefit that comes from 3D printing. You're then sitting there going, Well, I've got to now get custom uh window reveals, I've got to get custom door jams, like I need custom this and custom that, and it just adds up and blows out.

SPEAKER_03 15:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:07

What's the point?

SPEAKER_03 15:08

So any reason I ask this question, because my mind's down and memory mine's now, like like core filling it is awesome, you make it structural, but like then where does the insulation go and all that type of thing?

SPEAKER_00 15:20

So um we sort we sort of focus on building like a a post and beam type building is sort of the way that we we focus on doing it. At least in Victoria, that's that's sort of been our our focus on how we do it. Yeah, so we'll go and pour pockets worth of columns um throughout the building. Um and for that you

Automation As Part Of The Fix

SPEAKER_00 15:40

know you might have to double back on that section so that you don't have the thermal bridging coming through from the uh from the outside, but there's there's there are ways that we're able to do that and just depends build to build.

SPEAKER_03 15:51

Yeah, and then so how like how does it go? Like we're we're real big at the moment on like all these cavity battens systems and I'm not sure if you're up to speed with it, but um like how if that's a finished product on the outside, like is it like is it permeable? Does does vapor and air move through it, or is it solid? Like how's all that sort of things work?

SPEAKER_00 16:16

So we're this particular material that we're using is it's a 60 MPA concrete, and now under the building code from everything that we understand, that sort of defines it as being somewhat waterproof. Now under masonry codes, we still have to have wee poles and we still have to build with a um with a uh with a rebate, and so using those couple of things plus the damp course, that's really where we're at in terms of our our building code. It's just copy double brick and that's exactly what we're doing.

SPEAKER_03 16:50

Yeah. That's interesting. The um I'm just trying to think in my mind how all that works, but um like at the end of the day, like if like 60 MPA concrete should be waterproof.

SPEAKER_00 17:00

Yeah. But um and that's what's ridiculous coming back to the structural thing, that's what's kind of ridiculous about the building code for us, is you know, you've got this you've got this product that is ten times stronger than a brick. Like a b let's say a brick's six six MPA and this is sixty, but we can't go and you know, load bear on top of this thing. So eventually I'm sure things will catch up, but yeah, for the moment it's you know, build with what we've got and fit within the codes, follow the rules and Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 17:30

Because I I really love like the whole texture and everything of it. Like is are people leaving it exposed or are they rendering it or what what's the most it's a real fifty-fifty. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

Um half the people turn around and say, Hey, I I really love it, like like you're saying there, like I I love the ribs through it, and you know, uh if I just put a paint on it, then that'll work too. Or um the lady I just met with before, her and her husband are looking to build a uh home up in uh up in qu up in Harvey Bay area. Um th there's a pigment or like an oxide that you can run through it, so you can just like drop scoops of of this oxide through

Structural Reality And Building Code

SPEAKER_00 18:05

it, and then you get like this nice marble type texture um type colour through the wall. So there's options for that, but then other people turn around and go, look, I just want it cheaper, and so therefore, can you just plaster over the top of the the the wall? And can you like put weatherboards on the outside and it's like, yeah, we can yeah, we can do that.

SPEAKER_03 18:24

It defeats the purpose, but if I if I was to do something with it, I would be exposing it everywhere I could, like obviously, depending on other things, like because you've got to obviously take thermal bridging and energy efficiency and all those types of things into account. But um so I guess back to the cavity, um in the standard size cavity that you have, is that enough to run services?

SPEAKER_00 18:46

Yeah, yeah. So that's one of our most common questions and knocks that we get online is like where where do all the services go? And I'm like, Well, if you've built a house before, the services come through the slab, typically, if you're if you're looking at plumbing, and then it pops up in certain spots. From there, we then print around those, and then you just make a hole in our wall and pull it pull it through. Similar with electrical, electrical comes through the roof and from there drops down the walls, and then there unlike when you're working with double brick, you're not having to cut into the bricks or anything like that, you actually run it through the cavity because the cavity is wide enough. Like you're printing a 50mm external course, 50 mil internal course, and then that cavity can be anywhere from you know 20 mil out to 200, 300, 400mm, depending on what you're looking to do.

SPEAKER_03 19:32

So you um how's that work? Like you're putting GPA boxes and stuff in your layers as you as you go up.

SPEAKER_00 19:38

Yeah, so we'll just get to a point and then it'll it'll be printing coming around. It's still soft enough, sort of three or four layers down. We're just getting there with a with a little trowel, cut that out, pull that little piece out, like sort of that sort of size, pull that out and um just replace it with a box and it just comes and prints straight back over the top of it.

SPEAKER_02 19:54

Yeah, right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:55

Um so what what's the common questions you're getting from people that are look thinking of building that with this?

SPEAKER_00 20:02

It's it's things like the plumbing thing, it's what are the finish options, it's is it structural? Um sort of the stuff that you've asked so far. It's how fast can it go, you know, what's the cost savings on it, and part of the problem like as you'd know when you go and quote a quota bill for a house, you know, how much is a house going to cost? Well, I don't know, I need to see the plans. Like, you know, we can work on some rough pricing and we've been able to sort of put together a rough square meter price so we've got a comparison compared to like traditional methods. Like if you're looking at double brick in Victoria, double brick in Victoria is around 350 bucks a square meter.

SPEAKER_03 20:41

Holy shit.

SPEAKER_00 20:42

Yeah, it's expensive. No one does it. And so if you look at brick veneer, you're talking 250 bucks a square metre, um if not 270. So we've got to be around 270, 250, 270 is sort of where we have to be to be competitive in the market. And so that's where we've we've sort of sat. We're about 250 bucks a square meter. Yeah. Depending on a range of different things, like site conditions, what we're actually printing, are we printing the whole job, are we printing part of it? You know, there's all sorts of different things to take into consideration.

SPEAKER_03 21:15

And so what tell us a little bit about the time, like how does it compare to like obviously you get a a gang of brickies on site that can smash out a house reasonably quickly. Like, is is there savings in time with doing that?

SPEAKER_00 21:28

Yeah, there is. Um so when we did the w we did the block this year as you touched on earlier, and for that we were printing one pool house a day. Um a total pool house in terms of the square metres of of of print that we were having to do was fifty square metres.

SPEAKER_03 21:43

So that fifty square metres of wall.

SPEAKER_00 21:46

Yeah. So when I talk about square meter price for us too, yeah, I'm talking about the square meters of wall.

SPEAKER_03 21:51

Yeah. So does that include the two layers?

SPEAKER_00 21:54

Yeah, that's internal and external.

SPEAKER_03 21:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:56

Um the square meter price is yeah, internal, external, so it's the material. It's the pump, it's the labour, so there's no extra cost really added for those sorts of things. Yeah. Yeah, your extra costs are around do we have power on site? Do we have access to good water?

SPEAKER_03 22:11

Um, those are the sorts of things that start to And does the costs come down like if it's a larger job and it's like generally there's efficiencies in size. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:21

Yeah, if you're printing a you know thousand square meter build, we can probably work out a bit of a better rate and material. That's the that's because that's obviously the most important um the most expensive part at the moment. You're dealing with concrete companies who don't necessarily want to take on something new. Like this has been one of the really interesting things is we're trying to sell their product. It was trying to sell cement or you know, trying to sell aggregates on their behalf. And they're giving us prices that are you know really, really quite high for the fact that they can make money off this. So the concrete companies sort of sit there and go, we're only gonna do X amount of uh our minimum order quantity is gonna be X. And at the moment, minimum order quantity for us is like 20 tonnes if we want to do a job. Um but the minimum order that they're sort of talking about is way higher than that. We're talking like a thousand tons or a hundred tons.

SPEAKER_03 23:13

So are you buying the you're only buying raw materials.

SPEAKER_00 23:17

So you are you mixing on site? Yeah, so we get the stuff pre-blended. So we've got you know your your sands and your cements and all the other stuff that goes into the mix, that gets pre-blended, put in a bag, a one ton bulk of bag, and that gets dropped off to us at site. We then put that into a silo, that then runs into a like a uh mixing and uh mixing and cavity pump system, and then that gets pumped out through the through the extrusion head.

SPEAKER_03 23:44

Yeah. The um and so how much like is is there any recycled materials in it?

SPEAKER_00 23:50

Yeah, so at the moment um the particular mix here that's got uh that's got about 40% recycled material in it at the moment.

SPEAKER_03 23:58

Yeah, and what what sort of materials are you putting in there that are recycled?

SPEAKER_00 24:02

You've got um your yeah, blast furnace slag, fly ash, these sorts of things. Um the semantic the common cemetitious replacements um that people are using at the moment. Um we're doing some stuff around uh around recycled glass, trying to get that in there, try and strip out some of the sand content, because like a a large majority of the mix is sort of a fine dried sand, so um that's obviously quite expensive. How can we reduce some of that? Well, you know, use use recycled recycled glass is a good way to do it.

SPEAKER_03 24:34

Um so what tell us a bit about the time frame. So like you've touched on you can do a pool house in in a day.

SPEAKER_01 24:40

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 24:40

But um like say I'm not sure about down Melbourne and that, like here in Brisbane, your average new home is probably well, like a volume-built home is probably two twenty, two hundred and forty square metres of of floor area. Yep. Like what sort of time frame would you knock up one of those?

SPEAKER_00 24:59

So looking at that, you're talking two if you're talking two forty square meters, for example, uh the roughly you'd say there's another hundred square meters in terms of wall. Like let's say we're just building a single story. Um let's say there's three hundred and fifty square meters of wall, and we're printing on average between forty and fifty square meters. So to keep it nice and round, yeah, you know, let's 350 um divided by 50, you know, you've got seven. So about you you'd say you'd say seven days, but you turn it into two weeks by the time you're set up, by the time you actually, you know, do your set out, allow for some weather, allow for you know some clean outs. The the the starting of a print's very much like a rocket launch. You've got you've got like a whole heap of things that you're trying to tune in not a lot of time because you're trying to get the mix exactly right so that it comes out um at the at the perfect slump, um, at the perfect speed, and it all sort of

Finish Options Services And Insulation

SPEAKER_00 25:55

you know it marries up and once it's running, it's really quite boring. Like the the once once we got through the first uh two, three um pool houses, the last couple were just like, okay, can we like can we go any faster? Like how can we make this go off go off quicker? Um was sort of the the the thing we were trying to work out. But yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:13

I'll c I'll come back to that in a minute because it's I think there's something interesting there. But um so if you're if you can do let's say a 240 square metre house, roughly 350 square metres of wall area in seven or let's say ten days. Yeah, ten days. And that's like I find the same thing, uh we're having the same sort of issues. So we're really trying to push the boundaries and really break into the or become the leader in like healthy home space. So we're doing um we've got quite a few jobs coming up with CLT, cross-leminated timber. Yep. And look, I personally I've I've got lots of ways, I've worked with them, I've worked with their clients, there's a lot of ways that we can build that really efficiently. But then through the design process and and people making different selections and things, it gets to a point where they end up covering it all up. And as you you touched on it before, as soon as you do that, you've taken all the efficiency out of it.

unknown 27:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:13

And you've added in more product, more labour, more like it's just it it's silly.

SPEAKER_01 27:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:18

But um, like to me, like hearing you talk about it now, like if that's the case, 240 square metre house, 350 square metres of wall in 10 days, if you're happy, like if that meets your requirements, your expectations, and you leave those walls bare, like that's a shitload of time saving.

SPEAKER_01 27:37

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:39

But no, no wall linings, no external claddings, brickwork. Like, obviously you've got to paint it, but um, like on that size home, you're probably gonna have the plaster on site. Like you're still gonna have to do your ceilings, I'm assuming. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:52

Yeah, still trust trust ceiling.

SPEAKER_03 27:54

So But yeah, like your your plastering on that size job is probably your plaster team's probably gonna be there for maybe five or six days all up. Um, so that might cut down to two by the time they do all the ceilings, or maybe three by the time they're set and everything. Um your your bricklayer's gonna be on site for probably a week. Um so that's gone.

SPEAKER_01 28:14

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 28:15

Um I'm just trying to work through the build process. Like, do you do you put windows in as you go or do you in you put windows in the holes later?

SPEAKER_00 28:24

We've done both. So the job at um the job at s in South Australia, the first one that we did, that one we did sort of put it in as we go, and a lot of that was because it was just just me on site. So like I did that 90% of that build just as me and the machine. Yeah. Now that was not on purpose, it was because I couldn't afford anyone else to come with me. Um but when we went and did the one in um in Dalesford uh for the block, that was you know three operators and we just focused on printing. Uh we just printed, we weren't worrying about putting windows and doors and that sort of stuff in. It was just get in, print, move on to the next one. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:01

You you really can do either. Uh I'm trying to figure out how you how like how do you how would you yeah, you death the scheduling? No, well even just sealing around your windows, like it's all when you put the window in the hole, you've obviously got to set all your flashings up and correct deal with all your your moisture management and that sort of thing. But um look I I'm I'm super keen, mate, to to um keep the conversation going and definitely keen to visit a site and see what it's like um in real time. But all right guys, I want to introduce you to a really exciting new product that I believe is going to play a massive role in Australia building healthier homes. As you all know, I am extremely passionate about healthy homes and I'm doing a lot of research and putting a lot of time and effort into making sure my construction business is leading the way when it comes to building healthy homes here in Australia. We've teamed up with the guys from Highwood Timber. Highwood Timber are pioneering condensation management with their high flow ventilated LVL baton system. High flow battons give builders a stronger, straighter, and smarter way to create a ventilated cavity behind cladding and underneath roofs without compromising on structural performance. While tackling condensation to improve building health and ease of insulation, highwood battons are built to perform. When it comes to dealing with condensation and ventilation, high flow battons will help you create continuous ventilated cavities behind all your cladding and underneath your roof sheeting. They reduce condensation risk and support healthier, longer lasting buildings. Highwood timber batttons are also in alignment with the proposed NCC condensation management requirements as well as passive house ventilation requirements. Being an engineered LVL product, they are stronger, straighter, and more dimensionally

Sponsor Highwood Timber Battens

SPEAKER_03 30:50

stable than a solid material such as pine. This helps resist warping, twisting, and shrinkage, ensuring more consistent installs less prone to splitting than solid timber. Howard timber battens are precisely manufactured, meaning that your installation will be faster and easier than other products on the market. The part that I like the most about these batons are they are H3 treated for long-term protection against decay and turmoiles. They use a waterborne H3 treatment which reduces reactivity with membranes and adhesives when compared to LOSP. These are the exact battens that you want to be using on your homes and your builds if you are considering building healthier homes or passive homes. Check them out. Highwood Timber products. Look with the mixing. So you you mentioned before that it's like a rocket launch, like so I imagine that's pretty tricky, like because different every day is going to be different temperature, different environment, different humidity, and that's going to affect the strength and consistency of your material.

SPEAKER_01 31:50

Correct.

SPEAKER_03 31:51

So yeah, I'm it's probably a silly question, but like how do you deal with all that?

SPEAKER_00 31:56

Um at the moment, a lot of it's a lot of it's uh experience and understanding the equipment and how you need the mix to react. Um there's some things that we've put in place where we've got sensors to understand what's going on so that you know you you're not completely looking in the dark. Like our very first pump had none of that. And it had a a little dial tap on it, and it had this, you know, like the float gauges for the pre for the uh water being delivered. And so for that it was plus or minus a hundred litres, and I'm just I'm sitting there like slowly tweaking it to try and bring the mix back within something that's printable, and you know, you look at some of our first prints, and I'm like, damn, that's that's that's not great looking, but hey, it worked. You know, we got it up. Um but you look at what we use now, and you know, you've got set pressures, so we know a lot about how the mix is performing based on the pressure. Um we've got better water control on the pump where you know you've got plus or minus five litres, which makes a makes a massive difference. So as it gets hotter in the day, and plus it it's also really important for building

Speed Pricing And Site Logistics

SPEAKER_00 33:00

it into the mix design itself. Like you've got a mix design that's got tolerances plus or minus on the water content, you have to operate within those because otherwise the mix is not 60 MPA anymore. The mix changes um and becomes something totally different.

SPEAKER_03 33:15

So is is there a like is there an MPA that you're aiming for? Like is there or is there something in the code that says that you have to reach a certain MPA?

SPEAKER_00 33:24

Not really. Like it's ideally you're aiming for, you know, your 40, 50, 60, but you know, the main focus is if it's more than a brick, you're probably doing okay.

SPEAKER_03 33:37

That's what I was gonna I was thinking, because yeah, if a brick if you can use bricks and they like they're not tested, then your stuff's gonna be a lot higher than them.

SPEAKER_00 33:45

Yeah, and really the only difference is bricks have been around, you know, since the Roman Empire and we're we're here just squirting out concrete now.

SPEAKER_03 33:52

Yeah. So what's the like I assume the best um substrate for it is that you you pour your slab and then you come in and and you you run your stuff on top of that.

SPEAKER_00 34:02

Yeah, at this stage, um like we're doing some work over in WA that'll be on um that'll be on like it will be on sort of soil, like we've got the ability to stabilize our machine and we'll it'll be on soil with uh with just a footing. Um but in terms of building building a home, um typically we would only be able to do it on a slab. Like there's no way you'd be able to do it on stumps or or anything like that.

SPEAKER_03 34:26

So how how are you doing it on what what what are you building on earth?

SPEAKER_00 34:31

So oh we're so we're doing like a retaining wall um type thing. So the the the applications for 3D printing are obviously not limited to housing. You've got options with furniture and reefs and bridges and seats and um yeah, you can if you can draw it, you can probably you can probably print it. Like we've seen guys print stairs and all sorts of things like that. And the it's like if you've ever played with a plastic plastic printer, you just sort of find uses for it. And it's like if I've got a if I've got a particular fitting or um something that I might need, well maybe I can quickly draw it up and then that's the exact fitting that I'll use and I either machine that out of uh out of steel because I might need it for you know for a coupling of some description.

SPEAKER_03 35:17

You could ought to do water tanks out of it. I got I got some price I f or uh one of our farms we um we were looking, I found this company, like we we wanted to build some just really different accommodation, and I found this company that did like I think they're like 12 or 14 meter round off-form concrete tanks. Yeah, right. And I thought, oh that's that'll be fairly economical, it's just a water tank. But holy shit mate, like I got a quote off them, it was through the roof. And like I don't know if you could build a water tank out of your stuff, I'm sure you can.

SPEAKER_00 35:48

Look, there's always the thing with engineering is there's always a way to do it. It's whether the costs stack up for it. Um and that has really been what's driven us the whole way through is like what's what's the thing that we're gonna spend the time on because that's what firstly the customers are asking for, but secondly it's what financially makes sense to go and do. Um and for us, you know, that the housing side of things is we're being competitive. We we may not be completely winning yet on in terms of the um in terms of the cost, but when you start adding in there the speed at which it gets done, you add in there the quality of product that gets produced. Like you you look at any home throughout Beverly Hills or anything, any of these really nice places, Turak and Melbourne, like those homes aren't built with timber. Like they're not they're not they're not um a stick with with a brick veneer or anything like that. Typically they're a a concrete or a double brick or a stone, like they're a they're a heavy, long-lasting material. And so that's sort of what 3D printing brings to to the masses is this ability to have access to a product where previously um it was probably financially out of reach for a lot of people. And you see that with technology over and over again. That's that's what it does, it opens it up to many people.

SPEAKER_03 37:01

So you've obviously seen a big improvement or with just what you've talked about with being able to um obviously control your mixing and stuff more. So it's I assume it's like everything, like your your sensors are getting better, your your data's getting better, you're using data to be able to make this constantly improve it.

SPEAKER_01 37:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:18

Um so what it what do you think is the big holdbacks? Why do you think it's not taken off more?

SPEAKER_00 37:24

I think it's an education thing more than anything. It's people not realizing that it's around. Like the amount of people I speak to, even like the last few months, so like we haven't actually advertised at all that this is an available product to people until uh I think we started in Feb to uh sort of list our machines and say that people can can actually buy them and you know that we can go and do 3D printed projects for them. Um before that we sort of just stayed quiet and that was okay. But um I think now that people can see that this is a real thing, that's why we're getting the amount of you know contact that people are making with us. And I think slowly this year we'll start to see a lot more buildings start to pop up that are 3D printed. And there's also more companies starting to pop up doing it too. You know, you've got probably five of us who are who are actually printing stuff at the moment in Australia. In Australia, yeah. Um and of that probably two of us actually manufacture machines, everyone else or everyone else buys a machine from overseas or um or something like that, which look to buy a machine I if I could have my time again and you know go back to go back to when the I if I could have bought that Dutch machine at the time and gone and brought that here to go and do it, I probably would have done that. There's a lot less headache involved. Like, but obviously there's things that have happened off the back of building our own equipment and the things we can go and design and develop um now moving into the future, like there's some there's some pretty exciting stuff. Like still Aussie made, mate. Yeah, yeah, sort of. It's Aussie assembled.

SPEAKER_03 39:01

So look I yeah, I see huge um benefits to it. I'm I'm really really keen to see where you end up with it because I'm yeah, we've we've got to find solutions. Like we can't just keep building the old way that we always have. Um and yeah, lightweight framing is very time consuming and can take up a lot of material.

SPEAKER_00 39:21

It's so hard to get straight. Like one of the things that obviously we offer this as as a product as well, and it's like it's great up until the point where you've got to straighten the thing because you can't buzz it. There's there's no way to straighten it apart from actually putting it up straight. So yeah, there's there are pros and cons to those sorts of things. It's but there's pros and cons.

SPEAKER_03 39:42

Yeah, look, I'm I'm even just sitting here looking at that sample over there, I've got a million ideas running through my head where I could use that. But um obviously look the efficiency is in size. Like you I'm assuming you probably get contacted by people to do feature walls or just bits and pieces, but there's in that cost we were talking about before, like is that cost cover the entire job, or is like there an establishment fee or a setup cost or no, so for for us we're the same as a bricklayer.

SPEAKER_00 40:12

You know, we we turn up, we do the job, we go home. You pay for the material, you're paying for the labour, and you're paying for machine hire. Very, very simple model. There's um yes, there's you know, shipping fees and that sort of thing to cart them cart the machine to site, but it's no different to when you're dealing with an excavator operator, they've got float too. Just you know, typically we're putting our machine in a in a container and shipping it to another state. There's more cost involved with that sort of thing. But as we start to get more machines rolled out around the country and as people start taking on the role of being a 3D print operator, you can see where that starts to get really quite efficient. And um, you know, I I can see a world one day where we've got small machines that people can tow around um on the trailer. Um we've organized the m the material to be delivered to site. Um they hook up their you know vacuum feed to to their pump, um, they go

Mix Control Sensors And Quality

SPEAKER_00 41:10

and reference their machine and they start printing for the day. And that's that's that's someone's job. You've got yeah, father and son going out and and printing houses for the day. Um they pack up at the end of the day, wash out, off they go to the next site the following day, and that's that becomes someone's living.

SPEAKER_03 41:25

So is is there a limitation on size or like if the if the house is big, I'd assume you just you keep moving the machine?

SPEAKER_00 41:31

Yeah, you just keep moving it until you're finished. And that was my thesis the whole way through is I don't want to go down the gantry path. Because we you've got different styles of 3D printing machine. You've got a gantry system which is like a uh it's either typically you're building a structure that goes around the structure that you're going to build. Whereas when we're 3D printing using our robots, we will um place it in position A, and that position will then print that wall segment, drive it to the next one, print that wall segment. Um then you've also got guys who have got sort of crane type setups where you've got a big uh a big solid base in the middle and that stretches out a long way. Um again that setup times and that sort of thing that's involved. That was something we've always focused on avoiding is is setup time.

SPEAKER_03 42:23

So what what size wall can you do in one position?

SPEAKER_00 42:26

We'll print if you're just talking about what's directly in front, you can print three metres by three and a half meters. Yeah. So not many not many houses go sort of bigger than that on uh on a single story, so um that was sort of what we we focused on when we designed the machine. Um we're looking at ways that we can extend the the print reach um in like uh in front of itself to do sort of six metres, because if you again go back to the building code, every six net every six meters you need some sort of expansion joint. So there's no point in having ten, twenty metres reach. You just stick with six. Yeah. That way you're just printing your parcels that you can. Um when you start looking at printing around corners, that's where you can pick up a bit more a bit more uh distance as well. So you you might be able to do three metres by three metres, so now you're doing a much, much larger wall.

SPEAKER_03 43:17

Yeah. And like I'm gonna have to check it out more. I I saw a little bit of your stuff, but to you um have you put more stuff on social since we spoke? Uh a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 43:29

Like we're the the thing with 3D printing is it'll take a little bit longer to get the jobs ready to go out.

SPEAKER_02 43:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:36

And that's what we're finding at the moment is cause that you do have to do the engineering and for us, we're only, you know, a few people. We have to go and hand hold the engineer and the builder through the process so that we can go, it's okay, like this is how we do it. You know, you've got a question around waterproofing, let's say. Like how do how do we how do we waterproof this particular thing? Okay, well. Here's how we've done it previously. Do you are you happy with that? And it's just that back and forth to to come up with the solutions to do it. It's just that little bit of extra thinking and it just takes a little bit longer. But we're putting together a set of um like standardized details that hopefully over the next twelve months as we start doing more and more projects will get thicker and thicker and cover more and more situations and scenarios. So that'll then make next year when we start doing jobs, it's like, here you go, Dwayne, here's the book, you know, pick whichever one you want from them.

SPEAKER_03 44:30

Yeah. How um like what sort of kickback are you getting from I guess certifiers and that type of thing? Like what's I'm sure there's some obstacles that people need to overcome.

SPEAKER_00 44:39

Yeah, the biggest one's been around how how do we determine that the material is actually printed properly. And that's why we've been developing this particular type, this particular technology. Um it tracks the the print from the from the time when it's mixed to the time when it's extruded, um, and sort of calculates what the evaporation rates are and all this sort of thing to make sure that what's coming out and what's going in is is actually the the correct mix. And therefore when it comes time to uh certify the building, we've actually got something that a regular house doesn't have. And that's a complete digital twin of how we've built that building. Um from like actually how it's been laid. Not not just, you know, you've got digital twins now which are this is what I've drawn and this is what I've built, but it's it's not not exactly the same. Yeah. Whereas this is actually the the data of how it's been built.

SPEAKER_03 45:33

So the machine's tracking all the data. So like is it giving you things like the weather for the day and all the like time of day and all that sort of stuff?

SPEAKER_00 45:41

So you time of day, weather, humidity, uh, wind, wind speed, because wind speed's obviously a big factor when you've got drying concrete. Um speed the machine's going at, yeah, moistures in terms of the the mix itself, condensation, because again it's just another form of moisture that we're trying to trying to pick up on. So yeah, it's it's a very it's become a bit more technical, but again, I look I come back to the thesis behind the machine is you're trying to build a machine that is focused on giving father and son a job in the future. So you've got to look at who those people are probably gonna be. They're probably not gonna be computer scientists, they're probably not gonna be robotics guys, they're gonna be machine operators.

SPEAKER_02 46:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:27

So you need to make sure that that machine is as simple as possible. It has parts that swap in and out really easily, the parts have got to be available. It's a whole it's it's not just a 3D printing robot, it's you've got to think of the whole supply chain. And that's you know, I've had eight years to think about it, so I've I've come up with fair few fair few options for that, but yeah, I think the machines that we're building today and the machine that we'll release probably at the end of this year, um, I think that's gonna be really exciting for for everyone.

SPEAKER_03 46:57

So with like if you're tracking all that data, so does that mean that you're like at the moment you build at home, you've got to um like we've got to provide form 15s, 16s, 21s, all those types of things. Like do you prov have to provide a form to say that your wall, the walls that you've built meet a certain criteria?

SPEAKER_00 47:14

Um because we're building as a subcontractor to a builder, again, that's still something that the builder would be taking care of. And so for us, it's like when you go and build with a bricklayer. Like when you build with a bricklayer, do they fill those forms out?

SPEAKER_03 47:31

No, I'm just trying to think, because it's so we like we get we buy windows, you your glazing company's got to provide a certificate, your plumbers got to provide a certificate. Yeah. There's a

Certification Education And Digital Twins

SPEAKER_03 47:40

lot of things in the build that provide a certificate. Obviously, um bricklayers aren't one of those. Yeah. Um concrete is aren't generally one of those, but like um and then as a builder we've got to sign off on the whole job. But yes. Like if where if we were to engage you to build all of our walls, you would do something. Do we get something that says, hey, it's been built to it's it's yeah, it's MPA 50, it's this, it's that.

SPEAKER_00 48:04

Like it's similar to when uh when a concrete truck turns up, the concrete truck turns up and it's got its batching certificate. So we get that for the dry powder to make sure obviously that the dry powder that we're using is correct. And then there was a disconnect then between the dry powder and what actually was being pumped out. And so that's partly what drove that that innovation in you know, trying to work out how to how to prove that what we're actually doing comes out correct. And I think over you know, over the next six to twelve months, as we start to roll that out into our machinery, that's where you know certifiers will get more and more comfortable and it'll be easier to go into different locations. At the moment, we just have a you know, we have to hold the building surveyor's hand through the job and sort of say, hey, it's okay, like come watch us print. Like, you see, this is this is the mix now, and in three hours' time, this is the mix that's still pumping the same, isn't it? It looks still looks the same, still feels the same. Yep, yep, yep, it's all good. That's that's sort of how we have to do it at the moment, and that's again coming back to your point around it, uh, why hasn't it been adopted so quickly? I think that's probably part of it as well.

SPEAKER_03 49:10

You know, you've Australia's got so much red tape. Yeah, there's just so much rubbish in our industry. Like, and look, it to be honest, it it needs more like they they put it in the wrong places. Like it we need a lot more checks and measures on other things that aren't getting checked, and then a lot of the shit that we have to do isn't making a difference. Like I feel like a lot of people, well, I know a lot of people in our that control our industry don't understand it. Couldn't it? And uh they think by these forms and shit things that they require, it's making the industry better, but in fact it's just holding it up and costing everyone money. It's just paperwork. Yeah, yeah. The um so what what are some things that you could see that would make this more um or just make it happen more, like get more printed homes?

SPEAKER_00 49:57

I think it takes it takes builders wanting so at any stage throughout history when a technology has sort of taken over, it's been because they've gotten to a point where the the pain is so great that they have to change. And I think part of the regulations and that sort of thing and everything that our industry is seeing at the moment, I think we're sort of getting to that point where people are like, I just have to find something else. Like I can't get I can't get people, the build cost is too high, like there's just a there's just a large list of reasons not to build stuff anymore.

SPEAKER_03 50:32

Oh mate, labour's look if if we don't start taking things like this more seriously, like we're just gonna get left behind. Like there's there are so many people that need houses, we've got a growing population, we've got people wanting to move to Australia, we've got even just state to state, like there's no one's keeping up. So um it's it's absolutely crazy that these new ideas, like it's obviously there's lots of new ideas out there, and some of them are terrible. But yeah, you get stuff like this that is well worth looking into, and I I definitely think it's got legs, I'm super keen to see where it ends up. But um before we wrap it up, like what is there anything else that I've forgotten to ask about that people would like to know about 3D printed houses?

SPEAKER_00 51:16

I think one of the other questions that we get a lot is around second stories. Like obviously not every home is single story, there and the more we look at you can start doing a whole nother you you could do a whole another podcast on you know population, locations, and demographics and what's going to happen in terms of where people are gonna be living, because it's all well and good that we can keep building out, but we need to build up at some stage. If you look at any other country, they go up because people need facilities and um things to things to do and that sort of thing. So with us building second stories at the moment, now the current machine weighs about three tons, so it it's heavy, it's fat. Like we we have to build on the suspended slab is really the only way to do this. So when we look at um trying to go up higher and higher, for us, it's how do we how do we reduce that weight so that we can actually go and do those sorts of jobs? Because building people a few years ago were really looking at building a uh you know high-rise type buildings with 3D printing that works to a point, but having um having a gantry system that fits around that site and builds the whole building, again, it's a waste of money. You're talking about a million dollar machine sitting there and doing nothing for a few uh like a few months, it doesn't make much sense. So again, coming back to a smaller style machine, more flexibility, more maneuverability, I think that's where you then start to see more and more of this take um take effect because you're still using um you you're still you're still using block work in a lot of these buildings. So how do we strip the block work out? Block work's heavy, no one wants to lift it.

SPEAKER_03 52:59

Um well then there's just no one coming through the trade. They're getting less and less. But mate, one thing I've just remembered that I wanted to ask you about, so reinforcement. So does the actual product itself, like do you put any fiberglass resins or anything in it to help bind it?

SPEAKER_00 53:17

Um so the the binding of it is really just it's done through a standard sort of chemical reaction with um with cement. Like that's that's the the main binding ingredient that's used. When when we talk about um the other structural properties of of the material, what we focus on is uh obviously we have to tie each wall to each other, so we we do put brick ties throughout. Um and then we also have to put uh horizontal reinforcement through it as well. So for that, in the in the bead itself that we print, um we actually do lay reinforcement in there. Um and so that way, you know, you you've got that little bit of extra strength.

SPEAKER_03 53:58

That's what I was curious about. Like where where because obviously concrete cracks. So um yeah, how did you get it all to tie together? So what what sort of like what sort of layers are you laying bar in?

SPEAKER_00 54:09

So we typically lay every every 300. Um again, this this is where a question like that is there there are standards for it from you know what we've started to do, but there isn't really a set a set rule yet. You know, we might find over tet over the next ten years that it becomes every six hundred or it might be might be every meter. But at the moment we sort of do every 300 um and similar for our our um our tires as well. Every 300, every 300 up. And it just keeps it nice and simple. What size bar are you laying in that? Just a s we're we're using a fiberglass um reinforcement. Um we found that that gave us um a better finished product because you could use a a thinner bar without

Future Machines Second Storeys Reinforcement

SPEAKER_00 54:55

needing to um because when you when you lay these things and then you print over the top of it, you end up getting bulges. Because you're talking like a it's a few mil different to what the next layer is. And so you when we were testing, we started to see that every few layers something would bulge out, and we're like, well, that's doesn't look that great. We're then having to go back and fix it, and because there's ways to fix the wall as you're going, like if you make a little mistake, this is probably something else we should touch on too, is like when there's a mistake, how do you fix it? Um but to answer your question around the the the fiberglass stuff, like we we were using the fiberglass reinforcement because it's very, very strong. You can use uh thinner, thinner type material, and you know who knows what other things people start to come up with in terms of alternatives. Like there's testing that's done at universities all the time on what fibers they put in it, steel fibers and um different synthetics and that sort of thing that can help with the strength of the material.

SPEAKER_03 55:49

Yeah. Definitely keen to yeah, defects.

SPEAKER_00 55:51

What how do you deal with that? So there's different options around fixing defects, like depending on what the defect is. We've developed some tools um that you know scrape in the in the scrape the fingers uh of it to sort of give you the that same um that same finish so that you because it's like it does become quite tricky to to patch over. You you you've got it.

SPEAKER_03 56:16

Oh it's a wicked it's a wicked texture like it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 56:19

But um Yeah, so you we we developed the tool that you know it's actually a 3D printed tool out of plastic. And so you just grab that and you just scrape it across and that gives you your layers back back to how they used to be. And um again you can cut stuff out with trails and reprint sections, set sections in there and sort of patch that back in. So it it's it's really quite similar to dealing with bricks.

SPEAKER_03 56:40

Um I imagine you like a lot of what you're going to be dealing with is people's expectations. Yeah. Like we um again, we've seen it a lot with the CLT stuff that we're really getting involved with, but um like people say they want an all timber home and they're happy with it, and they love the knots and they love the feel, and but um one thing I do with all the clients that are coming to us for CLT is um generally like we'll get to the the design to the first stage with a designer, and then I sort of say, look, there's no point going any further unless you actually really love this product. So let's go and have a look at a real finished home. And and uh we've had a few people that have gone, oh yeah, no, I didn't realise it was gonna look like this. Done look like this in the photos, but like to me, whether it's CRT or whether it's using your product, my appeal to like it's appealing to me because of the look. Like concrete's a natural product, like why not it's got a materiality to it. Celebrate it, like yeah. Um I think it's horrible that people use products like yours and CLT and stuff and then go and cover it all up. Like it's just what's the point? Yeah, what's the point?

SPEAKER_00 57:47

Just build build the old way. Yeah, like that that that's the cost to do it that way, and the cost to do it this way is this. Yeah, that's your that's your direct there's no direct comparison. That they're different products. Like you don't compare bricks and timber.

SPEAKER_03 57:59

Yeah, yeah. Um mate, I I really appreciate your time coming up. I'm super keen to see where you go. Like we'll share your links and um everything in this podcast so people can check you out. But like where's your main location?

SPEAKER_00 58:13

So we're based based in Packenham, down in Victoria. Um we're obviously slowly expanding, got different machines going to different parts of the country. Um yeah, at this stage to to sort of find us, the best way to find us is just on socials and um yeah, reach out on the website, reach out to me directly, like yeah, I'm socials. Uh just mac macro 3D, yeah, at macro 3D on on pretty much every every social.

SPEAKER_02 58:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 58:40

Um but yeah, reach out to me as well. Like I'm more than happy to answer questions. And uh people don't people don't understand this unless they ask questions. And so I'm happy to sit there and this sort of this sort of format where I can sit and speak a lot about it is is important because I answer a lot of these questions. I have you know a couple phone calls a day usually with someone who wants to know these answers. So yeah, having these sorts of conversations is really important. So appreciate it.

SPEAKER_03 59:05

No, I love it, mate. Look, I'm all for supporting, especially young people like yourself that are really having a crack. I think it's fantastic. But um look, guys, make sure you get behind Tom support um 3D printing. I'm I'm really keen to see this um taken up more in Australia, and um we'll continue the conversation. Look, I'm definitely keen to learn more about the efficiencies of it and energy efficiencies as well. Um, we didn't really touch too much on that, but um, I know you you were saying you you're getting some testing and stuff done on that.

SPEAKER_00 59:32

So plenty more testing, plenty more things to come.

SPEAKER_03 59:35

Yeah, so we'll I look forward to and we might get you back once you sort of know more about that because I know sustainability and energy efficiency that that's pretty big on people's radars these days, so it'd be good to know more about that. But

Expectations Defects And What’s Next

SPEAKER_03 59:45

um guys, as always, make sure you like, subscribe, follow, share with all your friends so we can continue to make this Australia's number one construction podcast. Um go to DuanePierce.com, make sure you get on board with your level up merch and help us continue to um push the level up movement. Last thing, mate, before we get out of here, what does level up mean to you?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:03

Leveling up for me is just doing that 1% every single day. It's actually just getting a little bit better every day. That's what levelling up is because eventually you do level up. Excellent, love it. Look forward to seeing you on the next ones, guys.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:16

Take it easy.