Pallet racks

[mike_belben]

It seems like a sort of car crusher press would have been invented by now for air drying.  

[Crusarius]

They have those. its a laminate press. they are quite pricey.

[btulloh]

Gravity is free and relatively dependable.

[Don P]

And unusually strong today.

[firefighter ontheside]

Apparently gravity has gotten stronger as I’ve gotten older and out of shape.

If I do the rack, it will be on a very small scale.  One or two racks.  Most likely I would put the lumber up on the rack and then lift blocks up there with the loader and then I climb up and set them on the stack.

[GeneWengert-WoodDoc]

A winch system as described would indeed be beneficial, but it sounds like an expensive operation.  

Why use pallet racks with a winch at all?  I seem to be missing something with the winch system described used with pallet racks.  Seems like you would not need or use the racks.  The OP mentioned that he would load a pallet with 1500 pounds or 300 BF of stickered lumber and then put the pallet on one of the three shelves.  Can You explain?

The winch would have to be pretty hefty to lift quite a bit of weight...6000 pounds per MBF for green oak.  Would you have a winch for each rack or have a winch that could move around?  If it moves, then you would need a motor for that?

[Crusarius]

My thought was to just use the pallet racking as a tower. have the 2 ends vertical and then put 2 cross pieces at the bottom and at the top.

With the frame in place you could setup a hand winch that could raise and lower your weight that would be free hanging in between the uprights.

Set the first stack of lumber on the bottom cross braces that would be situated just off the ground for better air flow underneath. Then lower the weight on top of it. As you cut more lumber lift the weight and put another stack on the first stack then lower the weight.

Makes it so all you have to do is move stacks of lumber and not worry about the weights.

Gives you a nice clean organized place to stack lumber and set weight on top. As the stacks dry nothing needs to be adjusted such as strapping or banding.

If you really want to get fancy and have a nice smooth floor you can put casters on the racks and be able to move them around to get to the ones stacked behind the others.

Come to think about it this would work really well in a crowded showroom / lumber store. Just remove the weight.

[Crusarius]

After rereading your  post and mine I missed a key point. The only reason for the winch would be to raise and lower the weight. The tractor would be used to place the stacks of lumber on the rack.

[mike_belben]

Gene,

Perhaps the OP may not have the ground space to lay out piles of stickered wood all over the place for 6 months at a time.  Maybe there are small piles that will be stacked and unstacked at different durations and the racks will make accessibility easier without having to move one to get to the other.  Etc etc.  Why does anyone want pallet racks? To fit more stuff in a given size area.    

[firefighter ontheside]

You kind of nailed it Mike.  While I have several acres of space, I do not want to clear more land.  What I want is covered space without having to stack it out in the open.  I can set these up close to my mill.  I have a covered deck 30x14 deck and have stacked all I can fit under there.  I have had lumber stacked next to my camper, but that’s a pain and it’s in the way under the carport for the camper.  Until I build/put up other structures I’m look8ng for alternatives.  Someday I’ll build a new woodworking shop and have lean to on either side to store lumber and house the mill.  My current mill carport would become for my kids to park under.

[Don P]

I've got 3 set up in the shop, handy things. I have oddball wood stacked above and workbench space below one, the other two have big stuff on the floor and then wood on various shelves above by species. They are bolted to the walls and I made a narrow catwalk in front of them up at about 8'. We'll install two of them over in my sawing partners open sided drying shed soon, they will also be bolted to the building, overturning a top heavy unit is my concern. For odd slabs piles don't really work safely.

Hmm, if you really only need the weight of 5 layers, that isn't many psi in some type of airbag. As far as shimming up or even airbagging them, if the rails don't really lock in, and the locking mechanism on mine is pretty cheesy, you could possibly wedge the rail up and off.

[mike_belben]

Yeah thats why i said weld em.  You may be able to bolt some styles but not all.  Blind hole.  

Airbag is a clever idea but theyre a bit spendy.  I wonder how much force an air mattress can exert 

[nativewolf]

Yeah thats why i said weld em.  You may be able to bolt some styles but not all.  Blind hole.  

Airbag is a clever idea but theyre a bit spendy.  I wonder how much force an air mattress can exert  

Not as much as the kids jumping on them 
Just loan him your kids, they will be flat flat flat

[Don P]

Yeah thats why i said weld em.  You may be able to bolt some styles but not all.  Blind hole.  

Airbag is a clever idea but theyre a bit spendy.  I wonder how much force an air mattress can exert  

In reply #10 Gene mentions 75 lbs per square foot or better. Divide 75/ 144 " per square foot = about .5psi, an air mattress might get it. Or firehose/ layflat tubing between boards on top of stickers at higher pressure. You would need some kind of reservoir tank to keep them up as the pile shrinks. This is sounding sort of elaborate compared to a box o rocks, I was thinking of the weight and hassle of getting the weight up on the shelves. We had a glue press in one shop that was basically clamping with inflated firehose.

[GeneWengert-WoodDoc]

RE: Mike Belben Reply #28...my thoughts exactly.  So, I did not see how a winch (that would have each short stack sitting on top of one another, instead of separately on a shelf) would work.  Also, getting a short stack out from the middle of the pile, using the winch, would not work, so the cool idea of using the racks for air drying does not seem like a reasonable idea if using a winch.  But, I thought maybe I was missing something.

Question for firefighter...so, have you decided about how you might control warp in the top layers of each short stack?  I am thinking that even a small amount of weight might be better than using nothing.

I did see one idea where the person used a wood 4x4 that was longer than the width of the pile and extended across the width on the top, and then had a spring at each end of the 4x4 that he pulled down and clipped into the pile a few layers (Maybe 10?) below the top.  The problem with the 4x4 is that it warped a little and then applied very little weight in the middle of the pile, but lots near the edges.  He then changed to a metal I-beam to get force more uniformly along its length.  I did not go back and see this in use.  To get 70 psf, with one beam every 12" on the top with a 4’ wide pile would require about 140 pounds from each spring, so that would require a fancy way to extend and hook the spring.  I do wonder of some sort of adjustable strapping system could be used instead of a spring.

A couple of posts have talked about racks inside for displaying dried lumber ready for use or sale.  Maybe we should start a new thread about that and get some pictures too?  Safely displaying lumber is an issue for sure.

[GeneWengert-WoodDoc]

Don P.  I did see about 30 years ago several large commercial kilns that had air bags on the top between the top of the pile and the ceiling or roof.  I believe they were Irvington Moore kilns and they were patented.  They also were on the sides.  I have no idea how they worked.  The idea was to use them as baffles and not to supply weight on the top of the stack, but maybe they could supply weight if they didn’t lift the roof off the building?

[mike_belben]

Gene, a lot of ideas flying around in this one..  Winch wasnt me, i was for welded racks and tapered wedges or some mechanism that uses the rigid structure in the rack to push down on the pile like the airbag kiln you just mentioned potentially could have.  

I think id top the wood with say wax paper or some kind of scuff barrier, then a 3" C channel turned up into a U at each sticker point.. And then taper shims pounded in there from front and back.  So 4 channels would take 8 wedges.   If the rack isnt full youd need top spacers which is a downside, the weight system is better in that respect whether you are loading it by fork or some suspended cable rigging.  Id buck firewood for spacers personally just to get the length i wanted without fooling around.  

A friend of mine has a septic tank casting company.  There are always narrow rectangular reject pieces in the junk pile.  Thats where i would look for weights and hed be thrilled to load em up and send em off.


Edit: i just took a picture of what im talking about when i say wedges.



Theyre taper cuts from a handle mill.  I pound them into the pockets to keep firewood logs on the trailer, then just unstrap, knock wedges out and tip the whole trailer sideways with machine to roll them off the deck at home.

[Dave Shepard]

Air bags from trailer truck suspension would work well. Put them on regulated air and they would automatically maintain pressure as the wood dries. 

[GeneWengert-WoodDoc]

We do want the pressure to be applied rather uniformly to the top of a pile.  With stickers, this means that each sticker would carry the weight and about equal weight on each sticker and uniformly along the sticker's length.  So, with a pile that is 4' wide and 12' long with 7 stickers and a total of 70 pounds per square foot with is 70 x 48 = 3360 pounds, then the weight on each sticker would be 70 x 48 /7 = 480 pounds.  If a sticker is 1-1/2" wide and 48" long, that is about 60 psi on the sticker along the entire length.  Now, we could put a flat cover (plywood?) over the top stickers and then apply weight uniformly on the 4' x 12' cover; a total of 70 x 48 = 3360 pounds.

Would straps apply the weight on a sticker or cover uniformly?  Probably not.  Would a 6" thick slab (4' x 12') of concrete or other heavy material?  Probably yes.  Would wedges apply uniformly along the length of a sticker?

[Peter Drouin]

I looked at them, But I don't think I can fit all the lumber I have on them. So I went this way.


  


 
Works for me,