Adaptive Prefabricated Retrofit Insulation Panels Using Industrial Robots

This video showcases the outcome of Adonis Lau’s Master of Architecture thesis project. He developed a design to digital fabrication process using industrial robotics for prefabricated retrofit insulation panels for highly deformed existing buildings.

The process takes any scan of an existing building as an input to generate a panelized façade design that adapts to the building openings. The structure of the panels consists of bespoke vertical trusses that follow the existing surface deformations.

Due to the available equipment, various tasks were completed collaboratively between the robot and human. However, in a full-scale production process, several tasks have the potential to be fully automated and optimized.

This proto-process shows the flexibility of a small-scale industrial robot in the prototyping environment where various processes can easily be tested before scaling up to large-scale testing and production.