Development and Experimental Investigation of Modular Crates for Industrial Packaging Applications

摘要

For the increased product varieties, engineered plywood crate production technique could not facilitate box size optimization. This paper investigates the implementation of modularity function onto the plywood crate to resize the pack cube volume on customer requirement and to reduce space wastage inside the box. This is achieved by using a new joint technique called “Flat- Post Tongue Joint”. The full-sized experimental work is carried out comprising Flexural test analysis on Flat-Post Tongue joint, Tensile test analysis on tongue joint and Box Compression Test analysis on the two developed models of modular crates namely Modifiable Reinforced Plywood Crate (MRPC) and Modifiable Plywood Crate (MPC). The test results exhibited an improved flexural strength and box compression strength in comparison to the conventional plywood crates. The findings of the research work indicates that the modular plywood crate is a performance efficient method to reduce space wastage and source material by weight and volume when accommodating variable product sizes in a product family.