Packaging / Foam expertise

[WinterDeere]

How does the manufacturer ship that product to you? Ship it to your client the same way.

I'm the manufacturer. Most components are machined parts and sheet metal hand-delivered from local sources, strapped to pallets with paper or cardboard separators. The circuit boards come from afar, 700# and $300k on a single skid, but they're bare unassembled circuit boards... susceptible to forklift impact, but not all that fragile with regard to shake / rattle / roll.

I think I have a system figured out, that's going to work well. Finished units are 1U rack mount chasses, roughly 17" wide (19" with mounting ears) x 1.75" high x 15 to 23 inches deep. They're getting boxed in pairs, with a double corrugated cardboard separator between the two and another cardboard separator top and bottom, and the perimeter surrounded with polyurethane packing foam strips. This foam is relatively stiff, similar to the consistency of the stuff you find masons using in patio perimeter expansion joints, where the patio abuts a stone or block wall.

The boxes will be stacked on edge and strapped to the pallets like books on a shelf, in only a single row, so we don't have to deal with stacking. Each pallet gets a "no stacking" cone on top, for extra safety. The boxing in pairs described above gives us 2" of foam on the "bottom" edge, as they'll be arranged on the skids, and 1" of foam on all remaining edges.

The customer made this one easy on us, since they don't have a forklift, and don't want to deal with any pallets over 300 kg (~660#). So that basically forced us to avoid stacking multiple rows high on the same pallet, which is where my mind was when I first considered this problem.

The product is being shipped half way around the world on 3 pallets of 400 - 500 pounds each, insured for more than $600k. Anyone want to hazard a guess at that shipping bill? The insurance is going to be many times higher than the actual shipping cost, I would expect, but that's the customer's issue to handle. My liability ends when and where I place it on the truck.

Speaking of which, I guess I'd better go add some ballast to the back of the 3033r later today, as I'll be using that to pick a tall and heavy pallet off a truck tomorrow morning. Our street, where I load and unload trucks, has a bit of a hill. Nothing too terrible, but this isn't one I want to drop on the pavement!

 

[dstig1]

Dude, especially if you have consistent product size(s), like those rack components, go look up a cardboard company in your area and ask them to engineer some packaging for you. This isn't one that the brain trust at TBN is going to solve as it requires very specific specs and details that only you have... Start making calls and pay the nice man. Problem solved

 

[WinterDeere]

Dude, especially if you have consistent product size(s)...

That was the problem. I rarely have two orders that are anywhere near the same size or shape. My whole business is custom-designed assemblies, and usually we'll get an order for 1 - 10 pieces. If we ever build that assembly again, it might be years down the road.

Start making calls and pay the nice man. Problem solved

Yep, this is how I did it, back when we were shipping the same type of system over and over, for a year or two at a time. Just get foam die-cut and glued, along with a boxing system. If you're able to order at least 50 packing assemblies at a time, this can work for a reasonable cost. But in this case, it was only 12 pieces of one design and 30 of another, and a one-time deal. I'd have wasted more time on packaging salesmen, than I spent designing the packaging system myself.

The problem was solved a few days after I posted the OP, and all materials were ordered and received long ago, but others here have been keeping the thread alive. I have first units in assembly now, so it's likely only a few days or a week, before I'm able to test the packaging.

 

[sandman2234]

You may also want to put on your shipment, as you are using pallets, "DO NOT STACK"

Richard

Having been in a lot of LTL shipment centers, watching them load trailers or transfer loads from trailer to trailer, I have realized, FORKLIFT DRIVERS CAN'T READ!!!
They also can't drive, operate or give a darn about the freight they are handling.
David from jax