Shipping products with casters attached 1

[DK1990]

I was wondering if anyone has any experience with packaging products to ship with casters already installed. The items we are looking to ship are in the 200-300 pound range. I designed a special pallet for the previous large products we shipped with the casters on but I would rather not do that again. I am currently planning on using a standard pallet and supporting the unit with a Styrofoam block or corrugated boxes. Does anyone else have any experience with this?

 

[mcgyvr]

Obviously you have some reasons you "would rather not do that again"...
I've had numerous machines delivered with casters already on (just blocked up in the container so the are off the ground).. I didn't have any problems with it..
For something 2-300 lbs or more I would rather not have to spend time with my fingers under it adding casters while it is supported by a forklift/pallet jack.

 

[JNieman]

No need to reinvent the caster wheel - just block it up under the support frame and you're good to go. We use wood on the pallet, not cardboard or foam.

_________________________________________
NX8.0, Solidworks 2014, AutoCAD, Enovia V5

 

[tomwalz]

We use foam and it works just fine. Our units are, at most, 70 pounds.

A wooden box would probably be better for your weight.

Thomas J. Walz
Carbide Processors, Inc.

http://www.carbideprocessors.com

Good engineering starts with a Grainger Catalog.

 

[DK1990]

Thanks for the replies everyone. Marketing today told us that they want to stack the products during shipping so that is probably going to force me to go a different direction for packaging than I was thinking. Anyway, thanks for the help.

 

[MikeHalloran]

Marketing is, for once, right.

Shipping air across an ocean, or even across town, is expensive. Adding a layer of product to a container substantially reduces the per-unit shipping cost.

Calculating, and optimizing, the number of packed units you can stuff into a standard shipping container, and minimizing the unused volume, should become SOP as part of your product design process.

That sort of explains why things like paper shredders are packed with loose casters to be hammered in; the space saved allows an extra, what, million?, units per ship, for free.
Okay, your stuff is bigger and heavier, and asking the customer to invert it twice for assembly, might be untenable, but you get the idea.


Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

 

[SceneryDriver]

Talk to these guys:

http://www.anvilcase.com/products/

Road cases for touring productions do exactly what you're asking for. They can be made with pockets in the top to accept the casters of another stacked case. Every rock 'n roll tour since ever uses these type of cases. They're pretty bomb-proof and reliable. We don't ever worry about blocking up off the casters, and they ride, heavily loaded, in 53' trailers with no problems. The casters have to be high quality and pretty butch, but nothing crazy.

They're made to order to fit whatever you have to put in them. What kind of gear is this, exactly? Is this something you're shipping from place to place, or is this just a ship-it-to-the-customer-once deal? If the latter, a road case might be overkill.


SceneryDriver