Cobra 76 two 2,677 Posted March 29, 2011 Report Share Posted March 29, 2011 OK I've been meaning to post about this for a long time, just haven't made time to yet. People need to be aware that when their package gets dropped off with the nice lady at the post office (or UPS store), and she gingerly places it in the basket....that's the probably LAST time.... until the postman hand delivers it to someone's door, that it gets "handled with care". Packages get literally thrown around.... by humans and machines, and are subjected to all kinds of abnormal force...from being shaken around... to bounced off of other packages and machines...even the floor. They get sat on, squashed by other packages, tossed from one place to another...they get generally abused in a BIG way. Any time you ship an item, just putting it inside a box or envelope, where you can seal it up and no longer see it...is not enough to prepare it for what it's about to go through. That package may be going just across town, or across the country...or across the ocean...it really does not matter. It's going to go through all kinds of crap before it reaches it's destination. You need to pad, and package everything in the box, like it's going to have to withstand being played football with, by a gang of angry gorillas. If you can vigorously shake the package, and hear any movement inside...it's not packaged good enough to ensure safe passage, with no damage to the contents, or discovery of what is inside, by the time it reaches even the closest destination. They call it "packing" for a reason. You're supposed to have to actually pack down the padding around your items, to even be able to close the box up. The "packing tape" is supposed to be there the keep the box from flying open...either from it's own internal pressure from the "packed" contents, or from some hard or heavy object, that's harder than the cardboard it's boxed in...from busting out of there when the box gets thrown across the room, flies off a belt and onto a shelf, truck, plane, or ship....and slams into the next package... or the floor. The packaging is supposed to be strong enough to firmly contain whatever hard objects are inside. If there are any sharp (or small and hard) edges, protruding from the rest of the parts inside, it should probably be wrapped with extra padding and taped up, INSIDE the box. Then it should be held firmly in place within the box, to keep it from having any room at all to move around inside. IF there is any room for movement, and if there are any protruding edges of what's inside... you can pretty much plan on it....it WILL find a way the poke through the side. All loose fitting parts should be individually wrapped, to keep them from scraping and scratching up against each other, with all the bumps and bruises it's going to take in transit. If people will pay close attention to this...they can have the peace of mind that comes from pretty much knowing (unless the whole package gets lost of course...) that their mailed or shipped items will get to their destinations intact, without any damage, and there won't be any small items or parts missing because they happened to fall out of a hole that got poked through the box from the INSIDE. Seriously folks....it does happen, and quite often. Hell I received some parts in a package one time, where the box had gotten so trashed that somehow a whole 30 round steel AK mag, was completely missing...never to be recovered. It had been shaken out the hole in one end of the box from where another item had poked through and left a 3" gash. I had to just write that one off... What about Insurance you might ask? Well not many people realize this, but when you go to make an insurance claim for something like that (like I tried to do then), it's the responsibility of those involved (sender and receiver) to take care of informing the PO of the dollar amount they owe you for what is missing, and be able to provide proof. Also, and more importantly in my specific case that time... if you do move forward with said claim, you are required to surrender ALL of the misc. items in the package, in order to receive the amount the package was insured for. They don't let you insure...or make claims on, individual items within a package. It's all or none. Not really ranting, although it's definitely been one of those Mondays... I'm just hoping to shed some light here, on some little known things to a lot of people. I'll attach some pictures of a bolt & carrier package I actually received in the mail today....and a few others from the past few days... two from literally the same day....lol. Don't laugh...It's really that common. I have literally gotten scores of them like this over the past few years. Usually by the time the friendly postman brings them to the door, either he, or someone else has already pushed the bolt carrier back through the hole where it had been sticking out by as much as 8 inches...lol. Sometimes they even have put tape over the hole to keep it from coming back out....but this is rare. Like on today's package, you can see where one end of the bolt carrier (the tail end) had busted through the side, then got taped over...then sometime later during transit...the op rod had poked out through the other end. I can't find them right now...but somewhere I have pictures I took about a month or so ago, of where someone had actually tried to send a bolt and carrier inside a plain padded manilla envelope. OMG....lol. Let me just say...please don't do that. As you can see from one pic I took awhile back (when I decided to start taking some pics to use in this thread I hoped to eventually make time to post...) even a heavy duty padded envelope doesn't stand a chance with a heavy pointed object like an S-12 bolt carrier.... Fortunately at least, I can assure you that I have yet to receive even one with the piston (op rod...whatever...) poking out, that had sustained any real damage. Luckily they are pretty indestructible, but who knows what other items, or persons...lol...were injured by them during transit! I mean it's really not funny. But I sure have seen some funny looking pictures from others having similar experiences...with whole firearms even... Everyone..please feel free to keep this thread going...share any pictures you have, or have seen, of shipped items finding their way out of sealed boxes and into the light...lol. Tell your own stories of good shipments gone bad.... Maybe this will become a very informative thread. (Now watch...someone is bound to come forth with a story about how I shipped them a part, and it got out of the box somehow...LOL!) If that happened, I'm sorry, and I can assure you that Racegal didn't package that one. She does an EXCELLENT job of packing. She actually got her packing experience from packaging LIVE plants for shipping in a nursery that grows and ships exotic plants....mail order ONLY. She KNOWS how to pack things right. Maybe a pic will turn up of something received from Cobra's Custom showing just how well it was packaged. Please don't think I'm calling anyone out, or "poking" fun at anyone. It's easy to see that some people haven't had much, or any experience with shipping, so I just wanted to start a thread to help educate folks on the right way, and wrong way to do it. All us vendors love your business. We really want to make sure your parts are sent and received in a way that insures their safety. Now for the oopsies... and Saiga the cat is my witness...they are all for real....lol. These are just the ones I have bothered to take pictures of recently.....or even noticed.... Sometimes we go to reuse an old box we saved, and sure enough...there's the telltale sign of the "U" shaped hole in the side with a hinged flap where a bolt carrier or charging handle used to be poking through it from the inside. Prolly 90% of these would have still been ok if they had at least had some newspaper or foam balled up around the ends and taped in place. It's amazing how some of them arrive at all though. I mean seriously....a 1 pound, 2 ounce bolt & carrier... sealed inside a 7" x 14" x 5" (or larger) Prority Mail box, with absolutely no padding of any kind in the box.... And for the record...foam peanuts do absolutely NO good, except to add dense packing around individually padded and wrapped parts inside a box. You can't just toss some in there around a hard object and expect them to do anything but all migrate to the other end of the box....lol. ROFL! Ok that's my novel on packing and shipping woes.......carry on.... 2 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
ZeroKiller 2 Posted March 29, 2011 Report Share Posted March 29, 2011 Those pictures are the best possible illustration of why people need to pack items properly for shipping. 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Koliadko 207 Posted March 29, 2011 Report Share Posted March 29, 2011 All I guess I would add to this is pack everything like a truck will run over it cause it will look like it did when it reaches its destination a lot of the time. And something many won't want to hear but all carriers suck! When I worked at Plant Delights, we got packages from all the carriers and the only difference in how the majority of the packages arrived was how well there were packaged to begin with. If you can hear movement when you shake the box, there's a good chance what is inside will be damaged or at least the box wiil. I'm sure there has been some cursing under breath about unpacking what I ship but I take NO chances. I always assume the worst with shipping. Like I said, some people think one carrier is better than the other. They are not. Just go with who you think is the cheapest because given the opportunity, they will all destroy your package. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Snoofer 138 Posted March 29, 2011 Report Share Posted March 29, 2011 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_wGeErYTl8 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Cobra 76 two 2,677 Posted March 29, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 29, 2011 OK I've been meaning to post about this for a long time....bla bla bla....lol... Woah I just read all that. Damn y'all...sorry.... I did think this was kinda funnt though.... That one that came today....in the first pic Saiga Kitty is like....... Then the next one... after he saw both sides.....he was like...... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
DrThunder88 912 Posted March 29, 2011 Report Share Posted March 29, 2011 (edited) Good advice! I save packing materials from online orders I receive. Some of the best ones are those strings of air pillows places like Midway and Brownells use as well as the heavy kraft paper lots of vendors use. Edited March 29, 2011 by DrThunder88 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Cobra 76 two 2,677 Posted March 31, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 31, 2011 Good advice! I save packing materials from online orders I receive. Some of the best ones are those strings of air pillows places like Midway and Brownells use as well as the heavy kraft paper lots of vendors use. Yes the thick brown packing paper works great inside and out. Those bubble bags are also good as long as they are still inflated when used for packing. It's funny how people sometimes use them anyway if they're flat though.... Got this one in yesterday and I must say...WOW! Awesome! Never seen this before. A++ Then today, this one came in..... Hmmm.... I wonder what's inside this 11.5 x 13 inch box? There sure is a lot of room for movement in there... Lemme guess.... nothing but air and a bolt & carrier? Yup...pretty close.... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
physicsnerd 139 Posted March 31, 2011 Report Share Posted March 31, 2011 When I shipped my S12 to Jim Fuller he recommended using 50 square feet of bubble wrap because UPS, FedEx and USPS are very rough on their parcels. After finding an appropriate box and spare foam peanuts (the building where I work is chock full of great packing materials people are discarding) I wrapped the entire thing in 50 sq.ft. of bubble wrap then laid it into a bath of packing peanuts and taped it well all around. Jim unpacked it while I was on the phone with him and he laughed and called it "bomb proof." I wasn't about to let my S12 get damaged in transit!! I wish I'd taken pictures of the packing jobs I did on my S12 and Saiga 7.62x39. To pat myself on the back they were works of packing art. 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Ruffian72 548 Posted March 31, 2011 Report Share Posted March 31, 2011 Cobra, where's the picture of mine? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
waltham_41 52 Posted April 1, 2011 Report Share Posted April 1, 2011 A while back I received a package that UPS had managed to drop hard enough that a spam can of 440 rds of 7.62x54R ammo went through the side of the box.... they then taped it back up (I always wonder where that ammo ended up at) and dropped it off at my house. Luckily I had paid for private insurance with the shipper and they sent me another spam can. And I wont try to count the number of guns I have ordered and UPS manages to stick something through the box and gouge the wood stock. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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