Smart bricks for real building-Kite Bricks introduces the Smart Lego bricks

Lego bricks were supposed to be playthings for kids. But a company called Kite Bricks have turned the tables or rather the bricks to come up with a brilliant construction plan. Smart Bricks or S-Bricks are Kite Bricks’s new products that are touted to put the old brick to shame. These new ones are made out of high-strength concrete that would enable builders to construct buildings cheaply, rapidly and energy efficiently.

Kite Bricks’s haven’t got the patent to the bricks yet, but seeing as their development would be a major boost to the construction business, the patent won’t be late in coming. The bricks look very much like the Legos of old and come in various shapes that can connect with each other quite easily.

There are rows of knobs along the top face that can fit into the voids at the bottom of other bricks. Moreover, a special adhesive is used to cement the blocks together; this means there won’t be any cement used in the construction.

Kite Bricks at Construction Sites

The bricks can be brought to the construction site in a kit that already contains the doors and windows, so the structure can be built with minimum labour and rubble. Like in the use of reinforced concrete, steel bars can be slotted through the allotted channels in the bricks to provide support.

Since these bricks have internal spaces for insulation, the buildings made from them would require lesser amount of energy for cooling and heating. Additionally, these spaces would allow laying down of plumbing and wiring systems inside them. Presence of removable panels will enable access to the infrastructure elements without much fuss and tearing down of walls.

Benefits

Bricks are designed to be easily joined together. Kite Bricks says their bricks can be easily joined together and used to make floorings, ceilings and walls. The construction of building using their bricks would save around 30 percent energy when compared with traditional construction methods. The company also claims that that the cost of construction would reduce by 50 percent, which is quite cost-efficient.

Ronnie Zohar is the brain behind Kite Bricks and he also manages another company that applies the layers of film over windows to provide insulation. Zohar realised that buildings encounter insulation problems mainly due to the concrete with the steel inside that can get hot or cold.

This led him to look for an alternative that would let the air flow to provide insulation. Three years of research lead him to the bricks made of concrete that’s “light and strong like steel”.

He says that the idea didn’t rise up from Lego bricks and that he was always looking to focus on the insulation and strength. The design which allows the blocks to connect was a secondary feature.

“I’d like people in Africa and other places in the world to be able to build with our brick and get a thermally-insulated house using the same money they would have spent on tin,” says Zohar.

In order to bring the bricks into the market, Zohar needs around $3 million funding. As of now the company only has a prototype and IP protection.