Are published load ratings accurate? Recently the Nelson Technical Center compared two 48”x 40”plastic pallets for a racking application. The pallets needed to support a plastic film roll, weighing 1000 pounds and banded to the pallet horizontally, in open span racking. Pallet A had been successfully used for years. The published rack load rating was 2200 pounds.
Pallet B was a new design that the customer wanted to compare. The published load rating was 1000 pounds and the customer wanted to confirm that Pallet B was, in fact, strong enough for their application. Our rack tests were surprising – there was almost NO difference between the racking results of Pallet A and Pallet B. In the 40” direction, BOTH pallets failed. In the 48” direction, when the roll was spanning the rack supports, BOTH pallets passed. Even though Pallet A’s rating was 2.2 times higher than that of Pallet B, there was no practical difference in the rack strength with this specific load. We always recommend testing a potential new pallet to be sure it is safe for your rack application. Have you had an experience with a published load rating fail? Tell us about it by commenting below. Post by: John Clarke, Technical Director Comments are closed.
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