Comments on: The secret history of shipping pallets

By: Dlo Burns

Dlo Burns — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 21:05:00 +0000

Egg came first because dinosaurs laid eggs.

By: dunkyboy

dunkyboy — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 20:33:00 +0000

http://youtu.be/H4HK5c7VmBw

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 20:02:00 +0000

…and forced Britain into the modern era of globalisation.

So the inventor has been voted the most hated and feared person in the history of the UK?

By: CLamb

CLamb — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 19:44:00 +0000

Make me think of a bee megacity.

By: mcheshire

mcheshire — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 19:11:00 +0000

Yep, it was originally called “Duck tape” named for the fact that it was waterproof. I googled that shit.

By: L_Mariachi

L_Mariachi — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 18:52:00 +0000

Inside of a standard container is 7’8″, reefer is 7’5″ on account of the insulation. Two 40″ pallets next to each other is 6’8″. 3 inches per gap, seems reasonable to me. Forklifts and jacks are hardly precision machining instruments.

(edited to fix uncaffeinated arithmetic)

By: digi_owl

digi_owl — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 17:44:00 +0000

Some are moving to containers these days.

By: digi_owl

digi_owl — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 17:43:00 +0000

And now they are being turned into housing even.

By: digi_owl

digi_owl — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 17:41:00 +0000

Also, this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EUR-pallet

By: digi_owl

digi_owl — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 17:36:00 +0000

Best guess is that the container size comes from road requirements, in that is can basically be plopped onto a flat bed trailer and driven away.

By: digi_owl

digi_owl — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 17:33:00 +0000

Yep, i would love to fix those two el cheapo players i have here somewhere that has yet to be trashed.

By: William Owen

William Owen — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 16:56:00 +0000

I used to work in a pallet factory doing that exact job. We’d get shipments of the pallets in, sort them by what could be re-used, what could recycled, and what was just too broken, then I tore the recycle-able pallets apart on a giant table band-saw.

By: hakuin

hakuin — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 15:41:00 +0000

O ye of little faith

By: Jorpho

Jorpho — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 15:04:00 +0000

It’s been pointed out that despite the ubiquity of crates in your typical video game first person shooter, there is a baffling lack of pallets to go with them. Truly, they need better PR.

By: ChicagoD

ChicagoD — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 14:09:00 +0000

That’s a really good book.

By: ChicagoD

ChicagoD — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 14:09:00 +0000

No. Buy the book.

By: GlyphGryph

GlyphGryph — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 14:05:00 +0000

Yeah, from what I understand, the above is the origin of the name. No one ever used them for ducts or anything, that’s just a modern corruption.

By: ChicagoD

ChicagoD — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 14:04:00 +0000

Yes, but you load and unload pallets from containers. The two are really related, since containers are WAY less useful without pallets.

Also, you *can* stack containers on trucks and trains, but you can also load pallets into trucks (even better on European side-opening trucks) and box cars. In other words, containers have several analogs, while pallets really do not.

By: PlutoniumX

PlutoniumX — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 13:42:00 +0000

Brother, I feel you! The summer I was 16, I worked in a pallet factory too! It was an under the table kind of deal for a buddies god father, so there were no workers rights!

We also had the guys who modified the nail guns and used them to shoot at things. One guy welded a bar on the front of his, so he could shoot it like a machine gun.

I lasted all summer, it was hot, hellish work in that tin roof warehouse. 100+ degrees everyday, but we were getting paid like 8.50.

It was nice to make new ones, but that rarely happened. More often than not, they would run the pallets through a machine that would cut the nails between the planks and then we would re-nail the planks around the pallet form. The older the wood, the cheaper the price for the customer. I still have scars on my shins where the nail gun blasted through the rotted wood, bounced off the metal form, and stuck into leg.

By: Funk Daddy

Funk Daddy — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 13:40:00 +0000

I used jungle hardwoods originally from pallets for all the load bearing bits of a 4′x8′ chicken tractor. That stuff can stay out in the weather for damn near ever and is still rock solid.

I’m always looking for what use I have for a bit of spare wood, the property I’m on now came with I’d estimate about 300+ pallets in various states. Some is firewood, the rest I’ll have to find a use for.

By: Funk Daddy

Funk Daddy — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 13:33:00 +0000

Pallets are a housing development in any shantytown until someone needs some fuel for the fire.

By: Mark Lamb

Mark Lamb — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 13:30:00 +0000

My uncle has roofed several buildings with mahogany plywood taken from leftover pallets that carried fruit to Florida. I’ve got a trailer decked with those panels, been exposed to the weather for at least 16 years now, still solid.

By: Ryan Brown

Ryan Brown — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 13:27:00 +0000

”Ending is better than mending. The more stitches, the less riches.”
- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World, Ch. 3

By: efergus3

efergus3 — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 12:55:00 +0000

“In 1942 Revolite, formerly a division of Johnson & Johnson, originally developed an adhesive tape made from a rubber-based adhesive applied to a durable duck cloth backing.” – Wikipedia

By: Andrew Katz

Andrew Katz — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 12:21:00 +0000

I gather certain simians have also been trained in basic ventilation engineering. A “duct ape”, if you will.

By: Web Design Vizag

Web Design Vizag — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 12:02:00 +0000

“Poet Roger McGough narrates the extraordinary story of how a simple invention – the shipping container – changed the world forever and forced Britain into the modern era of globalisation.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00scpzn

By: Wreckrob8

Wreckrob8 — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 11:21:00 +0000

I am an erstwhile duct tape fundamentalist. I now see the error of my ways.

By: TheMudshark

TheMudshark — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 11:08:00 +0000

We´ll have to take a closer look at this container …

INSPECTION

By: timquinn

timquinn — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 10:51:00 +0000

only to you.

By: Mordicai

Mordicai — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 10:49:00 +0000

Now I think we’ve just reached “chicken & the egg.”