COBOD BOD2 Level 1 — 3D Construction Printing

Course competency

On completing this course you can describe how a COBOD BOD2 gantry printer, its slicing software, its concrete and its material delivery system work as one machine rather than four; explain why a decision taken in a digital model becomes a physical outcome that cannot be corrected later; identify the components and axes of the printer by name, which is a safety requirement before it is anything else; recognise the common failure modes of 3D printing concrete and of the delivery system, and say which of them you are authorised to act on and which you must escalate; and state, without hesitating, the boundary of your own authority on a live print.

That last one is the point of Level 1. Everything else in this course is in service of it.

What this certification is, and what it is not

Level 1 is theoretical and preparatory. It does not authorise independent installation, slicing, material modification, printer operation, or troubleshooting outside approved supervision.

A BOD2 is a gantry several metres across, moving under power, delivering concrete through a pressurised hose. It can injure somebody. The industry's answer to that is not a longer manual — it is a strict separation between the people who understand the machine and the people authorised to change its behaviour. Level 1 puts you firmly in the first group and tells you so repeatedly, on purpose.

What the certificate does: it records that you have completed COBOD's Level 1 material and passed a cross-module examination on it. It is the prerequisite for Level 2 on-site training, where authority to operate is earned under supervision, on a machine, in person.

What it does not do: it does not make you an operator. It is not a licence, a trade qualification, or a permit. It does not authorise you to touch a printer that is not yours, and it does not transfer to another manufacturer's equipment.

Who this is for

• Someone joining a crew that runs or is about to run a BOD2, who needs to be useful and safe on site before the machine arrives
• A builder or contractor evaluating whether 3D construction printing belongs in their work, who would rather find out from the operating discipline than from a brochure
• A designer or engineer who will hand geometry to a printer and wants to understand what the printer will actually do with it
• A Pangea Academy student heading for a field session where a printer is on site

No construction background is assumed. No prior 3D printing experience is assumed. What is assumed is that you will take the authority limits seriously, because the rest of the course is built on them.

What it costs, and who can take it

$250, once. Not a subscription, and not part of one.

This course is not included in the curriculum subscription. The fourteen self-paced courses on regenerative building are one product; this is manufacturer training on specific hardware, it gates on-site training, and places in the Level 2 programme that follows are limited by how many printers exist. It is enrolled and priced separately, and holding a subscription does not open it. If you hold one, nothing about it changes.

Level 1 is open to anyone. No construction background, no prior 3D printing experience, and no route to a printer required. You do not need to work for a company that owns a BOD2, and you do not need one lined up. If the subject interests you, that is enough.

Your access does not expire. One payment, the course is yours, and so is the certificate — including whatever revisions COBOD's material goes through later.

How long it takes

About five hours of work, and there is no time limit.

That is roughly two and a half hours of reading across the six lessons, plus the seventy assessed questions and however much re-reading they send you back for. Most people do it across a week of evenings. Some do it in a day; the material does not punish either.

Nothing expires and nothing is scheduled. There is no cohort to keep up with and no window to finish in. The one thing worth not rushing is the examination, which is thirty questions across all five lessons and rewards having actually read them.

Course structure

Each of lessons 1–5 ends in an eight-question review that must be passed at 80 percent before the next lesson opens. Lesson 6 is the certification examination: thirty questions drawn from all five lessons, also at 80 percent. Retakes are unlimited and your best attempt stands. The certificate is issued when every lesson is complete, and not before.

A note on where this material came from

The five lessons are COBOD's own Level 1 documentation. Where this course adds something — the additional review questions, the final examination, the authority-limit appendix — it is marked as the Academy's rather than COBOD's, because on a certification for a machine that can hurt someone, the provenance of a question matters as much as its answer.