Ultra-High Performance Concrete (UHPC) offers significant potential to open up new application areas for efficient, slender structures due to its fine microstructure and high strength. Despite extensive research, UHPC has seen little use in construction practice. Key reasons include the lack of standardized regulations and insufficient preparedness of the construction industry. Conventional flat and linear formwork systems used for slabs, columns, plates, and walls do not exploit UHPC’s material potential or economic advantages. While free-form components are technically feasible, they typically require complex and costly custom solutions.
This research project addresses these challenges by developing a novel, universal formwork technology that enables the economical and highly precise production of concrete components—especially UHPC, but also normal and lightweight concretes—in nearly any geometrically complex shape. Sustainability is a core objective, aiming for the complete avoidance of waste. Industrial wax is used as the form-giving material, as it can be fully recycled by remelting.
Building on earlier work within the DFG Priority Program SPP 1542, where wax-based formworks were tested on a small scale, the project investigates the scalability of this technology for larger and more complex components. Two applications are explored: external wax formworks and internal wax cores for creating cavities. The two-year project combines expertise in structural design and advanced manufacturing to deliver transferable results for research and practice.
The Non-Waste-Wax-Formwork technology won the 2017 Innovation Award for the Concrete Components Supply Industry: Prof. Harald Kloft and Jeldrik Mainka from the ITE at the Technical University of Braunschweig
2019 | Mainka, Jeldrik L. C.: Non-Waste-Wachsschalungstechnologie, 2019 10.24355/dbbs.084-201906111155-0 https://leopard.tu-braunschweig.de/receive/dbbs_mods_00066682 - Dissertation
2016 | Mainka J, Kloft H, | Non-Waste-Wachsschalungen: Neuartige Präzisionsschalungen aus recycelbaren Industriewachsen. - Wissenschaftlicher Artikel
2016 | Mainka J, Kloft H, Ledderose L, Neudecker S, Petri J, | Hochleistungswerkstoff - Bauen mit Beton im Zeitalter digitaler Planung und Fertigung
2015 | Mainka J, Kloft H, Stein E, | A novel precise formwork-technology based on CNC milled recyclable industrial wax for the casting of geometrically complex concrete elements
2014 | Mainka J, Lehmberg S, Ledderose L, Budelmann H, Kloft H, | Neuartige Verbindungen für geometrisch komplexe Flächen- und Stabwerkelemente aus UHPFRC
2014 | Mainka J, Kloft H, Heinemann T, | A novel recyclable wax formwork-system for high-precision free-form UHPC members and joints
2014 | Mainka J, Ledderose L, Lehmberg S, Budelmann H, Kloft H, | Non-Standard Joints for lightweight modular spatial and shell structures made from UHPFRC
