So I have had a horrible year so far and it is only getting worse. Pretty standard. Can anyone help me out with this problem below? I copied this email that I am about to send off. But I don't know shit about weight raitings per square foot. What am I doing wrong? Does anyone know? Am I right?



I purchased a Freezer Floor to sit my freezer on this past winter. It is starting to buckle up a little bit.

When I purchased it, they told me it had a 700 pound per square foot rating.

The freezer size is 12 feet by 26 feet. Each pallet that I put in this freezer weighs 1,800 pounds on a pallet that is 40 inches by 48 inches. The pallet jack that I used to take the ice pallet in there weighs 850 pounds. They are telling me it is buckly because the weight I am putting on the floor exceeds the square foot rating.

Below is an email I sent to the manufacturer and the guy that I bought it from. Maybe I am doing the Math wrong, I don’t know, but I believe I am correct. Maybe I don’t understand per square foot rating. Let me know if you can help. I don’t wanna sound like a dumbass if I sent the below email and I’m doing something totally wrong.

At 700 pounds per square foot, shouldn’t the freezer be able to withstand 218,400 pounds?

If I had 15 pallets of 1750 pounds that is 26,250 pounds. Plus the pallet jack makes it just over 27,000 pounds.

Or I did some research and you can do the math this way. A pallet takes up approximately 13 square feet. Each pallet weighs 1750 pounds. Add the pallet jack in there (even though the whole thing is not directly under the pallet, that makes it to be 2600 pounds. That is 2600 pounds for 13 square feet. If the rating is 700 pounds per square foot, it comes out to be around 9300 pounds per square foot that area should withstand.

And what about this? How the fuck do I figure out wheel weight and shit?

My thoughts are I think setting a 1750# pallet of ice on the floor was not the problem it was the distribution of 1750# of ice and 850# of pallet jack to the wheels (wheel weight) is what buckled the floor. I am not smart enough to calculate how much weight was actually riding on each wheel.

There are three bars on which the pallet sits on. Each bar is 48 inches long. Then it is 3 inchies wide and 3 inches tall.

Does that help?

And is everything that you are putting on it have somewhat an even weight distribution?

Yeah, it sounds like you have too much of the weight loaded on too small of an area. Regardless of how big things are, if all the weight is on 3 bars that are only 3x48, you are way over the max. Its math that I dont feel like doing but it sounds like a lot.

Your number of 218K seems astronomically wrong.

 

Originally Posted by BulldogCafe

the pallet alone should be ok. you're getting 3 square feet of contact, so you should be able to handle 2100 lbs

that being said, i just hit the bong

He said hes putting 27,000 lbs on it tho. idfk, i dont have time to do this now. Im leaving for NC in a few hours so I got shit to do.

There will be other geeks up in this bitch to help im sure.

High percent chance that the OP is way wrong tho. Sorry man. gl, hope someone can help.

who knew freezing water could be so complicated.

 

Originally Posted by BulldogCafe

when the jack is loaded, the 2600 pounds is prob spread over less than half a square foot

This. I am a Warehouse Operator, and have been doing this shit for over 20 years. It goes by contact with the floor. The description of your pallets seems off, so I will use a standard 48x40 pallet that we use up here. Floor contact area for those is about 4-5 sq. ft. 1800 lbs on top of that would give you about 360 - 450 lbs/sq. ft. on each skid, so you should be fine there. Your description of the pallet would work out to being approx. 900 lbs/sq. ft. and that would be a problem.

finally, as mentioned, it is most likely the pallet jack that is causing the damage. You have an 1800 lb pallet, but you contact patch is probably 1/2 a sq ft. That means 3600 lbs of force on your floor.

YMMV

i always thought pallet trucks were designed to spread the weight over an area rather than concentrating on the load per wheel - think of warehouse racking - the weight allowance is based on the span and beam construction. You couldn't possibly rate it based on the weight bearing on each post since the posts are only about 8" square. Maybe i'm drunk.

 

Originally Posted by saxman

i always thought pallet trucks were designed to spread the weight over an area rather than concentrating on the load per wheel - think of warehouse racking - the weight allowance is based on the span and beam construction. You couldn't possibly rate it based on the weight bearing on each post since the posts are only about 8" square. Maybe i'm drunk.

I was halfway there . . . but you are comparing apples to oranges when you mention racking, sax. Weight on the racks is spread across the entire beam, not just where the pallet rests. We are not talking about how the weight rests on the pallet jack, but rather how the combined weight of pallet and jack relates to the floor. Unlike the racking which is connected to the uprights, the weight of the skid puts pressure on the floor only through the wheels of the pallet jack.

did you know: there are more people alive today than ever would have been alive if all humans had OP's intellect?