{"id":70562,"date":"2016-12-29T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-12-29T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lantechweb.wpengine.com\/blog\/how-to-anchor-a-pallet-load\/"},"modified":"2022-10-31T13:14:01","modified_gmt":"2022-10-31T17:14:01","slug":"how-to-anchor-a-pallet-load","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lantech.com\/how-to-anchor-a-pallet-load\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Anchor a Pallet Load"},"content":{"rendered":"
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We estimate 20,000,000 pallet loads slide off each year resulting in $6 billion worth or unsalable products.\u00a0Pallet wrapping uneven products (like those that are packaged in pails, barrels, or rolls) can be a challenge to keep on the pallet. Similarly, severely offset loads are also challenging to pallet wrap. When shipping these types of loads, however, sometimes distributors demand that they are not just pallet wrapped, but wrapped to the pallet.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\nThis happened to a large manufacturer of asphalt sealer who regularly shipped to a big box store.<\/p>\n
The store demanded that their product (5-gallon pails of asphalt sealer) be wrapped to the pallet. Because the big box store was their largest customer, the manufacturer needed to find a way to satisfy this demand and they needed to do it quickly.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen our largest customer said they would start rejecting our asphalt sealer if loads were not wrapped to the pallet, it got our attention,\u201d said the Production Supervisor of a large manufacturer of asphalt sealer.<\/p>\n
Pails, barrels, and rolls are easy to wrap but the key is wrapping them in such a way that they do not come off the pallet during shipping. They\u2019re usually heavy and wrapped with high levels of wrap force. Sudden stops, starts, or vibrations can cause heavy loads to slide off their pallets during shipping.<\/p>\n
The fact that companies are\u00a0putting products with circular perimeters on rectangular pallets means that the products will be either inboard or outboard at the pallet corners. In our experience, the products are overwhelmingly inboard, thus exposing the four sharp pallet corners.<\/p>\n
Breaking the problem down, there were two main issues that needed to be addressed.<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/span><\/span>Issue 1 can be addressed in a couple of ways. One of the most common ways to avoid film punctures is simply to not wrap to the bottom of the pallet, which leaves room for the forks. Pre-streched film hitting a sharp corner, at high wrap force and at 12 rpm or more, isn\u2019t a good combination. Film tends to break under those conditions. Operators find film breaks annoying so they sometimes don\u2019t wrap these loads to the pallet.<\/p>\n If a company had\u00a0a semi automatic wrapper<\/a>\u00a0or an automatic stretch wrapper<\/a> without a roping device we would recommend backing off on the wrap force and adding more layers of film particularly at the bottom of the load (and checking to see that containment force is sufficient). This solution fell flat with this company because it wasn\u2019t a good fit for issue 1 and it increased film costs.<\/p>\n Outboard loads are another problem. Once the load overhangs the pallet by more than two inches or so, a good load-to-pallet bond is hard to achieve so the load is subject sliding off the pallet during shipment. A\u00a0conventional (accordion style) rope or a rolled rope can be very helpful under these conditions.<\/p>\n Issue number 2 likewise had a few options when it came to solutions. First, they could wrap to the bottom of the pallet but add more film layers. This was not ideal in this situation, which brought them back, again, to using either a conventional (accordion style) rope or a rolled rope.<\/p>\nNew technology solving old problems<\/h2>\n