How to ship for a tour

[TooManyToys]

I’ll throw this suggestion to you and Hugh.

With my old career I had to repetitively ship electronic equipment all over the country for vehicle testing, most of it in the $10k to $60k cost range.  So to ensure the safe transport I either bought expensive equipment cases or built wooden shipping crates.  In fact I still build wooden crates when I sell some of my amps or audio equipment like Parasound amps.  Double cardboard boxes are just not good enough.

You can Google things like Pelican cases (expensive), or companies that will build wooden boxes to your specs (moderately expensive).  The cheapest is of course is to build them yourself.  The extra cost of the box and the cost of extra shipping weight in my experience is cheap compared to bad shipping results or dealing with the shipping companies adjusters.

The boxes I make for repetitive use are with either marine grade or birch 3/8 plywood, both types are stronger due to no voids between the plies.  More expensive, but stronger then HD or Lowes typical plywood stock.  For the frames of reusable crates I used poplar rather then white pine.  Again more expensive but it’s stronger and able to handle the reuse of screws with repeated opening and closing the crates.

The other thing I do is use exterior glue between the frames and plywood, further strengthening the entire box construction.  The screws also should not be drywall screws but deck or framing screws, which are much stronger.

I’ll see if I saved any pictures of boxes I’ve made, but they are like this typical one.  I have issues with this Googled example - the exterior lock is a problem, you don't need the 4x4 under blocks unless weight requires a fork truck ( I sometimes put 2x2s under for finger clearance, but the frame members themselves are good finger holds), and the frame to plywood screws should be from the plywood side so the threads are into the deeper frame, not like this example shows.

[Hugh]

Excellent suggestion Jack.

Thanks.

That's kind of how we shipped LS9s to our customers.

I’ll throw this suggestion to you and Hugh.

With my old career I had to repetitively ship electronic equipment all over the country for vehicle testing, most of it in the $10k to $60k cost range.  So to ensure the safe transport I either bought expensive equipment cases or built wooden shipping crates.  In fact I still build wooden crates when I sell some of my amps or audio equipment like Parasound amps.  Double cardboard boxes are just not good enough.

You can Google things like Pelican cases (expensive), or companies that will build wooden boxes to your specs (moderately expensive).  The cheapest is of course is to build them yourself.  The extra cost of the box and the cost of extra shipping weight in my experience is cheap compared to bad shipping results or dealing with the shipping companies adjusters.

The boxes I make are with either marine grade or birch 3/8 plywood, both types are stronger due to no voids between the plies.  More expensive, but stronger then HD or Lowes typical stock.  For the frames of reusable crates I used poplar rather then white pine.  Again more expensive but it’s stronger and able to handle the reuse of screws with repeated opening and closing the crates.

The other thing I do is use exterior glue between the frames and plywood, further strengthening the entire box construction.  The screws also should not be drywall screws but deck or framing screws, which are much stronger.

I’ll see if I saved any pictures of boxes I’ve made, but they are like this typical one.  I have issues with this example - the exterior lock is a problem, you don't need the 4x4 under blocks unless weight requires a fork truck ( I sometimes put 2x2s under for finger clearance, but the frame members themselves are good finger holds), and the frame to plywood screws should be from the plywood side so the threads are into the deeper frame.

[woofersus]

Thanks, that's definitely something to look into.  We've found that while Melody's packaging is generally pretty good and the products have always made it to their initial destination without problem, the extra handling of shipping multiple times really starts to have an adverse affect on the boxes.  The most severely affected products are the heaviest, since they're the most likely to be dropped or set down roughly but when we shipped a bunch of stuff to CES almost ALL the boxes were punctured.   Fortunately, nothing went all the way through to the product.

Of course, with a demo tour the added shipping cost to some already very heavy products might be an obstacle.  Still, we'd really like to overcome the problem as a demo tour would be an excellent thing for us.

[TooManyToys]

...  We've found that while Melody's packaging is generally pretty good and the products have always made it to their initial destination without problem, the extra handling of shipping multiple times really starts to have an adverse affect on the boxes.  The most severely affected products are the heaviest.......

Yep, that be the problem.

Lined corrugated paper (normal boxes) is only as good as the integrity of the core, which degrades rapidly once it is crushed or there is high humidity.  If wet, "forgedaboudit".  And as you stated, several uses with weight inside tears them up, even when double boxed.

While the single wall box is great for single use shipping of an item to the customer, you can get double and triple walled cardboard which have a higher integrity then the single walled boxes.

http://www.uline.com/BL_418/275-Lb-Test-Double-Wall-Boxes

http://www.uline.com/BL_423/1100-Lb-Triple-Wall-Boxes

These prices and weights (boxes only) are not bad but get up there.  And they can be acquired from sources like Staples, or local packaging companies sometimes without getting a full pack.

Here is an expensive source for fully built crates that I’ll use for weight values:

http://www.caseworkscrating.com/store.php

I build my own for a fraction of this price, but if you compare the weights to the triple walled cardboard, they are not that bad if you are thinking about protecting equipment that is going to be shipped multiple times.  In the years of our operation I shipped equipment back and forth from NJ to LA, TX, MI, ATL, Baton Rouge, etc.  The cost of the boxes and extra shipping cost was cheap insurance in keeping everything in working order.

For the $60k equipment I shipped in these:  

http://www.casesbypelican.com/app-1660.htm

Taking Hugh’s example of an 80 lb amp shipment, UPS ground costs from LA to NJ for 80lbs in a 30x30x12 box would estimate to be $89.49.  Upping the weight with a theoretical 45lb wood crate to 125lbs changes it to $128.69, for a $39 increase one way.  Depends on your priorities, but I prefer things intact when I get somewhere.

For the GTG at Deepak’s that could easily be offset if Hugh were to fly into Philly or Atlantic City rather then Newark and spend an extra 45 minutes in a car.