—I assemble, disassemble and create things. I design what life puts in front of me.
This is how he describes himself Marco Agustín Secchi on his Instagram account. The 29-year-old Argentinean, originally from the province of Salta, invented the «magnetic cement»a magnetizable construction system with endless possible uses.
Since he shared the first videos on his social networks presenting the product to the world, he attracted thousands of followers. And it not only sparked curiosity, but also a heated debate.
Marco studies a degree in Industrial Designbut as he said in a television interview with the program Perfect Nap from channel 10 TV in Salta, his vocation manifested itself since he was a child.
Without knowing it, he had the soul of an inventor, and he asked himself many questions about the functioning of everything he saw. «I took apart the appliances in my house, I wanted to see what made them work and how they were made inside,» he said.
He grew up in a house where science was present in everyday conversations. His mother is a nutritionist and his father is a cardiologist. He went to an industrial technical secondary school and then had many doubts about what to study.
He liked architecture, engineering, and even biomedicine, but none of them quite fit what he wanted: to create and design objects to provide solutions, through the three classic stages of research, development and manufacturing.
The future industrial designer is now focused on the next phase of his project, which has commercialization prospects in the construction field.
What is IronPlac, the «magnetic cement» created by Marco Secchi
His invention already has a name, IronPlac, and he defines it on his website as «a construction system that transforms walls into active and functional surfaces.»
Basically, as seen in the demo videos, objects appear to «float» when you place them on the wall, whether they are pictures, tools, or kitchen utensils. Something similar to what happens when we move the magnets on the refrigerator.
«I questioned myself Why do I have to make a hole every time I want to hang something on the wall?. I wrote down the idea and a year and a half later I confirmed that this magnetizable construction system was possible,» he revealed during the talk with Channel 10 in Salta.
«Through a special formulation with mineral and ferrous fillers we achieved magnetizable surfaces that maintain the look and feel of a traditional wall, but with the ability to hold items using high power magnetic fixation«, he described the composition of the mixture that he plans to market by bag, just like traditional cement.
You just have to add the correct amount of water and then cover the surface, like any classic fine plaster. «The mixture is 100% passive, it does not emit any magnetic field»Marco clarified.
Once placed and after respecting the drying times, the elements that have an attached magnet can be hung and moved to any part of the wall where the mixture has been applied.
He assured that the invention can be applied both in wet work and in steel framing and its objective is that The walls stop being «passive» and become interactive.
«It’s a way of configure walls without damaging them and that they adapt to the interaction we have in the space we live in,» explained the young man.
Imagine that it could be useful for educational sectors – nurseries and kindergartens, for example -, offices and workshops, to be able to move objects in a more didactic, functional and playful way.
Once the product has been applied and coated with the desired paint, it is complemented by a system of hooks, supports and neodymium magnets calibrated for different workloads.
«It is applied as a fine technical revocation. It does not matter if the work is new or existing: IronPlac adapts,» guarantees the young inventor. He also analyzed putties and finishing paints that optimize adhesion and protect the active surface.
Marco usually describes this system on his social networks as «flexible architecture without invasive work«. To protect the intellectual property, which is in the process of patenting through the international PCT system, it clarifies that it cannot reveal the proportions or the exact recipe for its creation.
The debate on the networks: one by one, the doubts answered by Marco Secchi
«Everything starts with an intuition, questions or a combination of ideas and the order depends on each person,» he says on his Instagram, under the username «@marco.secchi», about his philosophy of life.
Their product is not yet commercialized, but it is an invention in an advanced stage that has demonstration surfaces installed in real construction sites.
He reached the final stage, where he invites collaborators and professionals who are interested in being part of the project, whom he calls «the first IronPlac testers.»
In parallel it searches financing for the production and launch of the first units on the market. While opening dialogue with some companies in the sector, he is also dedicated to disseminating his idea and clearing up doubts from Internet users.
«What would the function be? What did you think of it for? I mean what differentiates it from current materials,» asked an Instagram user who commented on one of his publications.
«The function is to solve something that does not exist today in traditional materials: convert a common wall into a functional surface without drilling it,» Marco replied.
And he added: «This material enables flexibility, reversibility and daily use, without intervening on the wall each time. It is about adding functionality to a wall without perforating it; today, if you want to hang, organize or modify something, you depend on holes, dowels, double-sided tapes, glues or added sheets«.
Another follower asked him about the release of «EMIs», referring to the Minimum Ignition Energy (EMI or MIE in English), that is, the minimum amount of electrical energy released as a spark necessary to ignite a flammable mixture of gas, vapor or dust with air.
«Regarding EMIs, there is no emission or energy circulating, it is a passive material with magnetic response on the surface.»guaranteed the creator.
He also addressed questions about product response to high temperatures. «If the magnetizing function is real, it should react the same as a normal magnet to heat or cold, that is, heat above the Curie point removes the magnetism, while intense cold makes it more stable,» said one follower.
«The material is not designed to operate near the Curie point. In a home, even outdoors and in full sun, the walls reach temperatures much lower than that threshold. In the usual ranges of work, for which this product is focused, the surface magnetic response remains stable,» answered the young man.
«Be careful if you have a pacemaker because you couldn’t live in that house,» another user expressed with concern. «It is not an active magnetic wall. The magnet generates the field and the wall only ‘receives’ it on the surface, nothing happens towards the interior of the house,» the inventor explained.
«You have to see in a room if it does not affect the wifi signal«, questioned another. «For a wall to block Wi-Fi signals, it would have to function like a Faraday cage, with a continuous and closed metal layer; in this case they are particles dispersed in a cementitious matrix, a passive coating with magnetic response on the surface,» Marco described.
«It cannot cause cancellation, at most some specific attenuation due to density in particular cases, as happens in some walls that have concrete mixed with more steel than recommended. But here We are talking about a surface coating and not a continuous mass, so that concept does not apply either,» he explained.
Secchi maintained that he thought of this system as a constructive platform that can evolve with the collaboration of users and not as a closed solution.
«I invite those who want to follow this path to explore professional opportunities, learn about the technical process, the development of the system and its intellectual protection frameworks,» he commented on his social networks, open to exchange with all interested parties.
