AkronCrate&Plallet looking to expand business

[mbreiding]

Hello all, My name is Matthew I have recently started making crates after years of cabinet building. We have had a constant customer for years and saw an oppertunity to move away from woodworking and into the crating industry. After getting some local companies business we are having a few problems; obtaining a new customer base and finding a heat treater in the Akron, Ohio area or a place to purchase pre heat treated lumber. Any help from this community would help.

Also any feed back on our website would be helpful? Anything I should add, or take away?

anyone know a Apple(mac) based crate design program?

Thank you,
Matthew @ akron Crate & Pallet
www.akroncrateandpallet.com

[BoxALot]

I can't give you any advice in Akron but I think your web site looks good. Alot of your construction though doesn't look optimum. Your end verticals and horizontals are reversed and I've never seen headers on the outside of the box although I know customers can dictate some strange things.

I'm not sure if or why I can't see any top or end plywood from the side of the boxes. Do you size them to the ID?

I don't mean this to be negative criticism but if you're doing these things in your usual business then potential customers may shy away. I have customers that what some unusual stuff but I always approach people offering standard designs.

Maybe add a description to your web site photos saying what the customer wanted and what you built.

(MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!)

[mbreiding]

Thank for the reply and the info here is the low down on our pictures. The OSB crates are constructed for loading and unloading high performance transmissions, with a side and the top removed. The crates are screwed together with a 2x2 running vertically up the corners, then five 2x4 spacers are nailed across the interior (side to side)to brace the transmission in place.

The larger crates were also done to to a specific design each crate held over 20,000 lbs of injection molds. The request was for a older style military crate known as MIL 104c and as far as I could tell from older 1960's crate books that was how they where to be made for crane lifting. I was unable to find any newer literature that mentioned or showed any diagrams for that specific military crate.
Is the a basic current bible to crate building I am currently engulfed in PDF files and library books?

Thank you

[CBC]

Welcome to the Forum.. In regards to your request to find a better lumber resource, please send me a PM of your requirements and I will see what I can do..


Best regards,
Eric

[Admin]

Hello Mathew,

There is no definitive 'bible' on crating and in fact the sources of information are very sparse and often inaccurate. One of the most comprehensive source of information (and free at that) is here on WCO. If you visit the Standards Page, you will find a very complete collection of standards that affect you. ASTM has the latest standards on crating but they are generally rewritten and copyrighted versions of the mil specs found on our site. The MIL-C-104 that you mentioned is included on the site and has been rewritten by us to make it slightly more user friendly although it -- like the rest -- still isn't very easy to read.

We also have plans to soon start to offer consulting on container design. This is the first mention of it here, so if you're interested, you can call us at 800-577-2447 x5

The other source of information is Crate Pro. It has all the common standards written into it so when you create a new design you know that all the material sizes and orientations are correct.

Hope that help - Good luck!

[BoxALot]

Mil-C-104 is still a current standard. It's exactly the same as ASTM and is the only standard for anything enclosed over 4000#.

I wouldn't bother with anything that's not here on this site. You can pay for books from ASTM but they're all the same as the military specs. It's all been done the same way for 100 years but there are many times when there are exceptions. If there are good engineering reasons to do it different then do it different. Sometimes there are specific exceptions that need to be made and packaging is changing slightly but basically just newer materials to do the same old things.

I didn't know they did consulting but you may want to take that route. Jeff wrote Crate Pro and I doubt you will find anyone whose seen more crate styles.

[Admin]

Thanks for the compliment SBOL. You haven't heard about the consulting because we haven't started doing it yet. The plan was to start early next year.

And yes, Matthew, I wrote the first version of crating software in the mid '80s and am familiar with crating practices in various cultures around the globe as well as the history of the crating industry. SBOL is right; the standards have been around for just over 100 years. In addition to the old Mil-Specs and ASTM, there are also BS (British Standards) standards and GOST (Russian) standards but they all simply present the same construction in different ways. There is definitely a right way to design the containers and that is the foundation of Crate Pro.

Since I've hit the limit on my policy allowing self promotion in the forums, that's enough said. Feel free to call me at x706 if you would like to talk some.

[mbreiding]

So is your software or any other software mac based?

[Admin]

Sorry Matthew, it isn't, however it is written on FileMaker so there are options to making it run on Mac or you can run it through Parallels.

But we are getting off topic for this forum. Feel free to give me a call or email me at jeff@woodencrates.org and I can fill you in more, or you can contact sales at x702.

Thanks and good luck!
Jeff