Construction Disruption Collection: Robots, CNC Routing, and 3D Printing

3D Printing is hereby put on notice that it is not the disruptive sweetheart of the construction world anymore. ROBOTS are everywhere.

Robots are slipping into more segments of construction: bricklaying, tile-setting, layout, many carpentry tasks, and repetitive stuff like hole-drilling and CNC routing for 'custom' carvings and moldings. Most of this robotization is applicable to commercial work. Today.

But it is not hard to see that a robot can make a pallet, and then it can hang the drywall. It can most certainly tape and finish drywall better than most of us, and, with the help of an operator, can do just about anything else it is needed to do.

if you want to stay ahead of the disruptive process in construction, look past what you are doing right now and look at where you will be one, three, and five years out. Also, look at what the industry is doing.

You get paid for what you do and what you know. If what you do now can be outsourced tomorrow to a robot, it is time to begin knowing more.

—Dan Morrison, editor/producer