Moving a shop long distance

Unless your shop equipment is really heavy, it should not be a problem for the trucking / container company to pull it up onto the same hydraulic tilt bed trailers they deliver containers on.

Depending on the travel distance they could either move it on the tilt bed, or go to the terminal where the container could be put on a regular chassis.

Pete C.

Depending on what you want to move, you should at least consider selling a lot of stuff in Florida (where machine tools are scarce) and rebuying at the other end. I know, it took years to collect the stuff, but you should at least think about it.

GWE

Interesting... I've added up the big pieces and come up with approximately 20,000 pounds of weight.

I'm guessing that there'll be another 5,000 pounds in little stuff I could put in there, too.

Is that something they could pull up onto a trailer and move 1450 miles?

Thanks,

Weyland

I can appreciate the logic in that, but the only machines I could reasonably part with would be the manual Bridgeport and the benchtop CNC I made.

I'm not really willing to try and find the other stuff all over again. (most especially a V2XT with 24 hours on it...) (:>)

Thanks,

Weyland

I moved from chicago to las vegas in 2003 a 1750 mile trip, shipped everything i wanted to keep via:

A sealed trailer shipment, 28 foot trailer and 31,000 pounds. Total cost

2,800.00 including 500k insurance on the load. They spoted the trailer and it took a day to load with a rented fork lift, 4 days transit time. They spoted the trailer in front of my new house and i unloaded it with a rented fork lift in one day. Won't do it any other way, no hasstle, no lodging, no driving, no liability in case of an accident. When i calculated the cost of renting a truck and making the trip, lodging, fuel, food, etc. it was a no brainer for me.

Good Luck with your move. Tom.

Hi Tom,

ROCKIN'~! Thanks~! Sounds exactly like what I may need. How did you rig your machinery? Were there anchor points you could attach to in the trailer?

I don't have a loading dock, but I imagine that I could palletize all the big stuff, place it in the trailer with my forklift, and jockey it around with a pallet jack.

I could then have a flat bed tow truck pull up the forklift, level out the bed, and then drive the forklift in.

Thanks much for that link.

Anyone else have experience?

Best,

Weyland

"Weyland" wrote

I used to unload trucks at the conventions in Las Vegas. Both flatbeds and boxes. Some caveats follow from years running a forklift:

If you can load it on a flat, and have it all shrunk wrapped, or tarped over, unloading it will be really easy. Binding it down will also be a lot better because a flat won't flex as much as a box.

If you have to go with a box for some reason, palletize things with things that can be handled with a pallet jack. You just sit it up on the tail of the box, and then position it in the trailer. Reverse on unloading. If you have some really really heavy items, you would load them last where you can reach them first with the tines, or with a "grizzly", a chain device to pull the pallet to within reach of the tines.

We used to use high dollar aluminum ramps to run up and down from floor to box height. They ain't cheap, and I don't know if they rent them where you are, or not. Point is, if you can position everything in the box so that it can be muscled around with a pallet jack, or picked off the rear, that's good, too. You have less wrapping, better weather protection, and less pilferage.

Remember that you will have to have a ramp, or be parked next to a dock with a dock plate so you can run in and out of the box. You can't turn around in there with a forklift.

Keep us posted.

Steve

Just some options.

Interesting. Y'know, I've been in and out of 18 wheeler trailers more times than I can even recall or count, and can't believe that I've never taken the time to actually *look* at one.

Do the insides typically have any anchor points or provisions for tie-downs?

If you were to stick a Bridgeport or two in a box trailer, how would you secure it?

??? Really? I would think that load distribution would be important on such a large load. Is it not? I was thinking of loading the manual and CNC Bridgeports to the front part, the two lathes to the middle area, the surface grinder right behind them, and the forklift toward the rear, with everything else filling in the gaps in an effort to distribute the weight more or less evenly.

Yeah, that was my line of thought, as well.

Will do. Thanks for the insight and suggestions.

Weyland

On 30 Mar 2007 10:14:19 -0700, with neither quill nor qualm, "Weyland" quickly quoth:

That just might be your best option. You can find flatbeds CHEAP, and resell it later to recoup most of your investment.

I've heard that the new flatbed tow trucks can handle the 20 footers, but not _loaded_.

What about the rental containers?

I commonly see high value pieces secured in a trailer by using wooden blocking nailed to the floor. You could be creative and make anchor points or secure your machines on heavy wooden skids and then secure the skids to the trailer floor.

Shawn

When you order your trailer, specify a "logistics trailer".

These come with e-track on both sides, in vertical or horizontal runs, you can get serious ratchet straps and load bars that lock into the e-track. Coupled with blocking nailed into the floor, you can keep a load in place quite easily.

Stuart

I have been inside HUNDREDS of boxes. (what a box trailer towed behind a semi is called.) They usually have a good hardwood floor when new, but after the first day, it gets shoddy quick. I've been in them where you had to watch a hole that your forklift wheel could get stuck in.

They use jacks that expand side to side, or roof to floor. They CAN tie stuff off to the sides, but there is a lot more flex in those boxes than you think. They are made of thin aluminum, and they flex a LOT. They are terribly easy to poke a hole through, and the reinforcing struts are just stamped aluminum, and the whole thing is riveted together.

There's lots of give, lots of shifting, so the big thing is to pack your stuff good on a palette first, then, yes, you can tie it off. But if DOES move, and I'd think you'd have a better shot at tying it down on a flat, where you can get ahold of some real metal. There's a frame around it where those big straps are put on. Also, look next time, and see where they put on those heavy chain binders. (called boomers)

If you recall, most of the heavy stuff you've seen on semis has been on flats, right? I mean, you can't see what's inside semi boxes, and we can put some heavy stuff inside there, but not nearly what a flat will carry. Remember, you only have a 3500# capacity forklift that will fit inside a box. There are ways that us pros can load heavy boxes and oversized stuff into boxes, but it usually involves two forklifts and two very experienced operators.

What you want to do can be done, and I believe with a box. It will just take some special attention.

Steve

Yeah, I'm aware of the "flexy flier" part, and was more wondering if there were points on the floor for anchoring. I wouldn't feel overly confident in those bars (jacks?) to hold a milling machine from tipping over...

I was hoping for four points of restriction on each machine, but am having a hard time envisioning it with a box.

I agree that the flat bed would be best, but I was hoping to be able to get away with the box as I could then throw *everything* in there, stacked upon each other, including my household stuff.

I'm looking at approximately 25,000 pounds of shop stuff, I think.

I'm not clear on what you mean, here. Do you mean that the largest forklift that will fit in a box is a 3500# one, or that you think my forklift is only a 3500# one?

I was thinking along the lines of loading the machines up with my forklift, and then jockeying them around with a pallet jack. After everything is loaded, I'd put the forklift at the rear, by the doors.

Thanks,

Weyland

Palatized everyting on heavy pallets scrounged from construction site dumpsters.

Yes.

Exactly what i did, it took me 2 hours to load 14 pallets onto the trailer.

Rented a 10k # forklift with long forks for a day, i picked up my little yale fork lift and placed in the trailer and secured it to prevent rolling on the trip.

Its very important to use really good quality pallets that won't collapse under the weight of a machine. All the ones i used were the type that bricks are delivered on, got them for free for the asking from construction sites. I placed a piece of 3/4" plywood on the pallet and screwed it onto the runners with 1/4" lag bolts. Then i placed the machine on the pallet and drilled holes in the the plywood and bolted the machine onto the pallet. Next as added insurance i used steel banding to secure the machine onto the pallet. I like the sealed shipment, when the trailer arrived everyting was exactly as i packed it, nothing got lost or damaged in transit. Take pictures of your machines as you load them and a final picture of the loaded trailer, in case you need to file a claim with the insurance carrier, also make a detailed inventory list of your shipment.

Best Regards Tom.

Those containers typically handle up to some 50,000# of cargo, the container itself weighs around 10,000# (this is for a 40' container) so your load would be around half capacity. The winch on the tilt bed trailers is probably at least 20,000# capacity so it should be able to drag the container onto the trailer. If it's to move 1,450 miles they would take it to a terminal where it would be lifted by an appropriate crane onto a normal container trailer chassis for the trip. At the far end the reverse would need to be arranged.

If you have a forklift you could just get a regular trailer dropped off for a u-pack-it type move and as the last item load the forklift itself. You do that by having a regular tilt bed tow truck stop by. Load the forklift onto the tow truck, then back it up to the trailer and transfer the forklift across. The tilt bed tow truck has a hydraulic anchor bar that can lift the truck up a bit to match the trailer height.

For my 1,700 mile move I had a 53' semi trailer brought over. I rented a

24' box truck with lift gate and used it to pickup my palletized shop stuff and other big stuff from several different locations and transfer the items to the semi trailer. When all that was completed I called for a flatbed tow truck and used it to load my 3500 dually pickup and my forklift into the semi trailer to complete the load. On the far end I started by calling for the flatbed and unloading the forklift and pickup and then proceeded to unload the remainder of the stuff via forklift.

Pete C.

I just posted a little further up the thread, but what you indicate is very close to what I did on my 1,700 mile move.

Pete C>

"Weyland" wrote

There are no anchoring points on the floor. It's like the old pickup beds. An oak plank, then a strap with carriage bolts, then another plank. There ain't much to a box floor. Flats are better, and you have the frame on a flat to bind things to.

Steve

I agree. I moved my shop 600 miles from Mississippi to Titusville, FL. My situation was different in that I had no shop building in FL. I had a car hauler that I built a metal shed on whick became my new (SMALL!) shop. I had to add a third axle when it weighed in at 12K pounds. I also had to sell my great old 1/2 ton chevy pick up and buy a not so great 3/4 ton for the trip. I considered buying a 48' storage trailer (old semi trailer), and it would have been a better choice, but I had to park it in a residential area in FL, and you know that wouldn't have worked!

or

I have since built a 12 X 12 foot shed for storage and put the woodworking stuff in there and dedicated the trailer to metalworking. I have since acquired a miller 300 amp TIG that lives on another trailer under a tarp. I need a permanent shop bad! Good luck!

Ron Thompson On the Beautiful Florida Space Coast, right beside the Kennedy Space Center, USA

My hobby pages are here: Visit the castinghobby FAQ: The member map is here:

Good point. A logistics trailer can be decked, also. This means e-track load bars are fastened in the e-track on the walls and pallets or plywood is used to stack lighter weight items on.

An e-track load bar can be used in front of and behind tall machines to help stabilize them.

You can lower the center of gravity on your machines by adjusting them to their lowest profiles. Bridgeports can adjust their heads upside down, for example, and the tables lowered. Use 16P nails to fasten 2X4s around the basses of the machines. Most load shifting occurs to the front when heavy braking is applied. Keep this in mind when bracing your load.

Ron Thompson On the Beautiful Florida Space Coast, right beside the Kennedy Space Center, USA

My hobby pages are here: Visit the castinghobby FAQ: The member map is here: