How it works on your site

The Dusty Robotics FieldPrinter 2 is a compact battery-powered layout robot that prints the coordinated BIM/CAD model at full scale in inkjet ink on concrete slabs, plywood and OSB decks and steel casting beds, positioned by a Leica laser tracker to a maker-stated 1/16-inch accuracy. In one pass it lays out wall lines, openings, MEP points, finish boundaries, text, tags and QR codes for every trade; vertical surfaces, ceilings and as-built survey stay with the crew. Dusty sells it in North America as a usage-based subscription or through certified layout partners.

Door and Window Opening Layout

The robot prints door and window opening positions in the same multi-trade pass that lays out walls, mechanical, electrical and plumbing. Trade files (.dwg, .rvt, CSV) merge into one coordinated print file in the Dusty Portal, so openings print alongside every other trade with no separate hand mark-up.

Finish Boundary Marking

Finish boundary lines (flooring transitions, tile edges, carpet borders) print alongside other trade layout in the same coordinated pass. The crew reads printed boundaries rather than interpreting field measurements against drawings.

MEP Penetration Marking

MEP penetration points print in the same pass as wall and opening layout. The operator loads the coordinated model, and the robot prints penetration locations alongside all other trade markings without requiring a separate setup or crew.

Wall Line Marking

The FieldPrinter drives itself between print areas and prints wall lines at 1:1 scale while one operator watches from the Dusty iPad app. Three infrared time-of-flight sensors and obstacles the operator scans in from the app route it around columns and staged material, and it keeps printing for about a second when an obstruction blocks the laser tracker's line of sight.

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Field outcomes

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Turner Construction laid out 3,902 m² of walls, soffits and duct openings at New Canaan Library in five days with a crew of one.

New Canaan Library, USA

FieldPrinter 2Turner Construction
Image: Dusty Robotics

Robins & Morton printed every trade's layout for 1,858 m² of the Huntsville Hospital Madison Street Tower in five days.

Huntsville Hospital Madison Street Tower vertical expansion, USA

FieldPrinter 2Robins & Morton
Image: Dusty Robotics

KHS&S West used Dusty Robotics' FieldPrinter 2 to lay out the freestanding elliptical lobby dome at Fontainebleau Las Vegas, printing 3,563 tick marks in one week, about 10 times faster than traditional layout.

Fontainebleau Las Vegas, USA

FieldPrinter 2KHS&S West
Image: Dusty Robotics

GLY tested Dusty Robotics' FieldPrinter 2 for three months, laying out interior buildouts from 3D models for corporate office and healthcare clients across 100,000 square feet of floor area.

Three-month evaluation - interior buildouts for corporate office + healthcare clients, USA

FieldPrinter 2GLY
Image: Dusty Robotics

Blackboard Studio used FieldPrinter 2 to print 23,000 square feet of multi-trade layout in two days on the 55th floor of The Spiral at Hudson Yards.

The Spiral, 50th floor fit-out

FieldPrinter 2Blackboard Studio

Who has run it

57 deployments · 37 companies · 1 country

Will it work on your site

Surface: Flat, rigid, stable surfaces: concrete (broom-finished, troweled, green, sealed) in everyday use; plywood and OSB subfloors on wood-frame and elevated-deck jobs; steel, including precast casting beds; PVC and other non-porous surfaces with solvent ink; TPO roofing in solar-layout pilots
Site preparation: Broom-swept floor per vendor; operation on typical construction debris observed independently (AECbytes, Feb 2024); minimum 3 surveyed control points; coordinated BIM/CAD model
Power: Two Milwaukee M18 5.0 Ah batteries supplied (compatible to 8.0 Ah); 2 to 3 hours per battery in continuous use, about 2 hours to charge; hot-swap holds power for 30 seconds mid-job; customer supplies overnight charging power
BIM/CAD requirements: Dusty Portal accepts .dusty, .dwg, .rvt and CSV files and merges trades into one print file; Dusty for AutoCAD plugin (AutoCAD and AutoCAD Architecture 2021 to 2026, Windows only, not LT, MEP or Civil 3D) on the Autodesk App Store
Positional accuracy: 1/16 in (1.6 mm) to the model, laser-tracker guided
Navigation: Dusty-supplied Leica Absolute Laser Tracker (AT500 or AT930), no GPS; three non-collinear control points per station, spaced 50 to 150 ft; prints up to 160 ft indoors, 120 ft outdoors; about one second of printing without line of sight

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Autonomy: Autonomous mobile layout robot: drives between print areas and prints on its own, routing around scanned obstacles; one operator with no survey background runs it from the Dusty iPad app (stationing, print selection) and repositions it by joystick
Control interface: Dusty iPad app for single-operator control, handheld joystick for maneuvering, Dusty Portal web dashboard for prep and reporting
Environment: Indoor or outdoor on dry or damp slabs; no printing in active rain or standing water (IP51, not waterproof); 5 to 110 F with the AT500 tracker; wind above 15 to 20 mph drifts the ink; slopes up to about 10%
Fleet management: Multiple robots on one floor observed (two, AECbytes Feb 2024) with trade-separated ink colours; no fleet-management software documented
Site connectivity: The robot carries its own Wi-Fi for the iPad link, so a loaded job prints with no site connectivity; onboard LTE pulls the latest file and pushes production data to the Dusty Portal; the laser tracker is linked by a Dusty radio box
Weight: 23 lb (10.4 kg) including battery
Speed: Prints 2.5 ft/s on lines, 1.6 ft/s on text; vendor: 10,000 to 15,000 sq ft/day, up to 10X faster than manual; case studies 500 to 939 linear ft/hr, 150 to 250 MEP points/hr; daily output set by density, obstacles, stationing
What it prints: Lines, arcs, text in any language, symbols, QR codes, SVG logos and points; two 1 in print heads at 308 DPI print dual lines in one pass; line width 1/64 to 1/2 in, text 1/2, 1 or 2 in high
Training: Onsite operator training and virtual VDC training included; Dusty Academy self-serve courses and certification; independent study reports 2 days minimum, about a week preferred for a crew of four
Generation: FieldPrinter 2 (Jan 2024) succeeded FieldPrinter 1 (production ~2020 to 2023); FieldPrint Platform Gen 2 software
Other capabilities: Floor Elevation: measures slab height deviations with the same tracker setup while it drives or prints, 1/16 in accuracy, heatmap per 4 x 4 in grid, point elevations from a CSV, PDF and CSV reports in Portal (GA Oct 2024)
Safety design: Three infrared time-of-flight obstacle sensors (about 3 ft forward range); four cliff sensors trigger at a 6 in drop; operator scans unmodeled obstacles in the app; Class 2 laser; edge protection required near unprotected edges
Certifications: Class 2 laser trackers under IEC 60825-1; ingress protection equivalent to IP51; solvent ink ships as a Class 3 flammable liquid (UN1210); tracker radio certified in the US, EU/EEA, Canada and Japan, approval required elsewhere

As the maker states it.

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