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Materials
“ What they are doing is pretty much the same thing we are seeing for large-scale commercial buildings ,” explains Mark . “ In fact , the new Tesla plant in Austin has a very similar sandwich panel design , and they go up like a big Erector Set .”
However , the residential concept from Nonquit Homes is also aiming to eliminate some of the traditional shortcomings of commercial concrete construction . To begin with , the prestressed sandwich panels can be poured on site , thus eliminating the need to be transported in from a precast manufacturer , which reduces both cost and time .
Driving down construction costs
“ What we are seeing in the concrete industry today is incredible . The things we thought would be horribly expensive just five years ago , we ’ re doing every day now ,” says Mark Sinicrope , Precast Specialist at Master Builders , a provider of chemical solutions for concrete construction . Mark has more than 40 years of experience working with precast and prestressed concrete products in applications ranging from bridge beams to parking garages . While most of the advancements and cost cutting to date has been on the commercial side , he is starting to see those innovations flow into residential concrete home construction . For example , Mark recently helped Texas-based Nonquit Homes with a concrete mix design used to develop tilt-up , prestressed concrete panels for residential construction .
Time
“ In construction , it is all about how fast you can go ,” adds Mark . “ Let ’ s say I wanted to put up a parking garage today . We could have it up in two or three weeks , but it might take a year or more because we have to wait for someone to actually produce all those concrete panels and then ship them to the jobsite .” Costs are further trimmed by reducing the size of the panels so there is no need to bring in expensive cranes to move large panels around the jobsite . Instead , the panels can be maneuvered by forklifts , further cutting down on labor .
“ I can see an entire house going up with just three or four people onsite to tilt up the panels and set them in place ,” says Terrell Wiggins from Nonquit Homes , who along with engineer Alonso Forcado , designed and built the first residential home outside of Atlanta using this style of construction . “ Plus , you ’ re not sitting there waiting on the framer or struggling to schedule all the different trades required to build the actual house . For a builder , that is huge .”
Depending on the size , a typical woodframed home can take six months to a year to complete . However , once a builder gets going and perfects this new concrete building process , they could greatly reduce that build time . modernhb . com 23