British Ports Cold Comfort

The storage system has been provided by Redirack with a view to ensuring that this arrangement, designed for loads 1160 mm high, allows ABP to store three pallets in the bottom location and two pallets at each beam level. The racking can store up to six pallets deep in one block and five pallets deep in the other. The added height in the ground floor locations has the advantage of making it easy for the forklift trucks to enter and leave the racking system. In a second cold store chamber there are two smaller blocks of Drive-in racking, configured for loads 1060 mm high. Again the bottom locations can store three pallets, with two pallets being stored at each beam level. In this chamber both blocks can store up to three pallets deep at each level. Throughout the storage system the front uprights are protected from accidental damage by column protectors. A generous 1500mm bay entry helps minimise damage by making truck entry easy. 100mm kerbs at the back of each block help ensure that pallets are placed accurately and don’t overhang the support rails at the rear of the store.

Dave Cummins is ABP’s Cold Store Manager at the Port of Cardiff. “We wanted a storage system to store fruit juice on pallets up to seven pallets high. Redirack were the only supplier to come back with a different system that allowed us to achieve this by suggesting we stored three pallets in the bottom location. This gives us a number of advantages; operationally it makes things easier as it makes better use of the height available, it also reduced the cost of the system as there are only 3 tiers compared with the conventional 4 tiers. This is the first time we’ve used Redirack and we are delighted with their service. As an added bonus, our operators think the Redirack system is the easiest of all the systems we have to work; I would recommend them to anyone.”