Good day Omar:
I thought that I may be of some help with regard to your pallet pack situation. I will start with several questions and then make an observation or two. Forgive me if you have already addressed these questions internally or have already investigated the items below.
- Did the static load failure occur with one or more pallets stacked on top of the pictured pallet or did the failure occur as a result of building and warehousing the single, pictured pallet?
- Did you observe any failure of the individual packages such as crushed or uneven bottle necks, bottle body wall collapse or bottle bottom roll-in or other failure?
- Jean-Francois had a good question regarding the use of layer pads. If layer pads are used, are they thick and/or rigid enough to resist the closures of the bottles from embedding in the layer pad material?
- How will the finished pallets be warehoused, as single pallets on a warehouse floor or within a warehouse racking system, as stacked pallets? If stacked, how high a stack?
- How will the finished pallets be shipped to your customers, over the road trucks, railroad, a combination of truck, rail, maybe overseas shipping? Warehousing and the mode of transportation will certainly be factors in how the total pallet package should be configured.
- Have you looked at the potential use of a pallet top cap to aid in keeping the cases in the top layer in place and positioned correctly over the next layer down?
- While I am not an expert in stretch wrapping, there may be value in evaluating the wrap mil thickness and position on the wrap as it is would around the pallet. there may be a more optimal material to sue and manner in which that material is wound around the pallet.
Jean-Francois had a good question regarding layer pads. I would add that since your package has a smaller closure diameter than the diameter of the bottle, any layer pad would need to be thick and/or stiff enough to resist the closure top from being embedded into the layer pad. Corner posts could also be helpful with improving overall pallet rigidity and resistance to layer shifting. With respect to container strength, it is always a good idea to be aware of the axial (top or crush) load of the package as well as the resistance to bottom roll-in and dent resistance of the container body.
Perhaps I can offer a few observations:
- From the pictures you provided, it appears to me that primarily the second pallet layer has shifted.
- In my experience with glass, plastic and metal food and beverage packaging, pallet failures as you encountered were generally not due to the axial strength of the individual container. Often, the type of pallet failure shown was due to an offset load situation. In those cases, either the individual (3x2 = 6 bottle) cases were stacked improperly and/or a pallet was stacked on top of the failed pallet too far to one side. In turn, the lower pallet would fail at the lower layers, but usually not the bottom layer.
- In a situation that may have involved pallet offset, a common indicator was the existence of container failure somewhere along the vertical body and/or neck (if a plastic bottle). It was found that the container failures were offset failures (the package being exposed to an offset vertical force greater than the package resistance to that force). Container resistance to offset force is generally much less than the same container's resistance to direct vertical forces (axial load or crush as stated previously).
Overall, it is my opinion that your pallet has experienced an offset load condition. The best way to address that condition is to improve the pallet layer positioning and between layer padding and to increase the rigidity of the pallet through the possible use of corner posts, a top cap and optimized stretch wrapping.
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Bill Smialek
Consultant
Fox River Grove, IL
Ph: 414-520-8749
E-mail:
smialek3@sbcglobal.net------------------------------
Original Message:
Sent: 10-30-2023 11:49
From: Omar Mohamed
Subject: Stacking Height Issue
Dear Team,
I currently have a rounded bottle with diameter 80.5mm, and bottle height is 300cm. The bottle weight is 32 grams, and the filling level is 1500ml. We apply only external shrink with configuration of 3*2 bottles (6 bottles per shrink) and the dimensions L*W*H of the configuration are 187.5mm281.3mm300mm. The current pallet factor for 120cm100 cm pallet is 22 shrinks per layer 4 layers (88 shrinks), and I was requested to have 5 layers instead of 4 layers. Pallets were prepared with 5 layers but I had static load faliure in the second and third layers. Are there any options to try to have the 5 layers successful? How can I calucalte the load on the bottles at the first layer of the pallet? Please find below photos for failed trial.
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Omar Mohamed
Packaging Development Manager
Beyti- An Almarai subsidary
Cairo
010 96355560
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