Fastbrick Robotics is a start-up company that is revolutionising the brick laying industry by using mobile robotic technology. The system uses a pre-existing plan of the building and environment, and with laser guidance (a mature technology), it is able to accurately and quickly lay out the bricks [AAS18].

Fastbrick Robotics have developed a truck mounted robot that works in conjunction with their proprietary building design software and has the capability to lay the bricks for a render ready, standard home in approximately 15 hours (around 1,000 bricks per hour).

The truck is fitted with a brick handling system which will cut and rout the bricks as required then send them along a 25-metre boom to a specially designed lay head. The lay head will apply a dedicated adhesive and lay the bricks to within 0.5mm of design specification under a laser guidance system, which manages any dynamic interferences (vibration, wind etc).

The safety of this system has been carefully designed and analysed to comply with the requirements of Australian Workplace Health and Safety legislation (minimising risk by design) and relevant standards (e.g., AS 4024.1-2014 Safety of Machinery and AS 62061 Functional safety of safety-related electrical, electronic and programmable electronic control systems).

Although fully automated while in operation, the machine is designed to be managed by trained operators. Safety of humans is fully assured by the system design.

Fastbrick Robotics has received worldwide attention for this highly innovative robotic system and have recently signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOUs) with Caterpillar and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, highlighting the global interest in this unique Australian robot. The KSA MOU is for the construction of 50,000 homes by 2022 and is estimated to require at least 100 bricklaying robots.