The newest pour from Starbucks is a 3D printed store that’s set to open this week in Texas. The giant coffee chain with over 17,000 locations across the U.S. says the new drive-thru opening Friday in Brownsville will be its first in the U.S. using the technology.
Casting concrete requires building formwork to cast the concrete into. For any standardised shape constructing the formwork is easy: Just assemble it from the parts you have. Straight sections? The most common case. Rounded corners? As long as you’re fine with “should be round” and don’t require some very specific radius, those are probably also at hand. A gargoyle? Well that’s not an easy form to produce but once you have it, you can cast 1000 gargoyles.
Where 3d printing comes in is places where you have a shape that’s literally or nearly unique, where building the formwork would be a PITA. In all other cases, the traditional method is quicker and cheaper.
Also interesting is stuff like solar sintering plain sand.