Plastic Pallets and Safety Concerns
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Photo by Jeremy BrooksThe good aspects of plastic pallets are that they are durable and can be used many times; they can have the company name or logo pressed into the plastic form to keep them from being used by another manufacturer or stolen. Another way to identify pallets is having certain colors placed in the stripes of the pallet, and then the worker will know which pallets to take back. When finished the pallets can be recycled and turned into another useful product. There are accessories that can aide in the safety and use of the pallets.
The toughest side effect of using plastic pallets are the products sliding off the pallet and possibly hurting someone. Since this is a safety issue, we will focus on ways to make the pallets safe for the workers using them. The accessories that come with the pallets are what keep the products from slipping off. Here are a few types that were found.
Grommets can be placed in predetermined areas to stabilize a load and to keep the load from shifting off of the pallet. The grommets are made of a non skid material to hold the products set on the pallet in place. There are also anti-skid disks that are available to keep loads from sliding around on the pallet.
Seatbelt assemblies are another safety accessory for the pallets, the seatbelt attaches to the pallet and top cap to secure the loads placed on the pallet. The seatbelt is pulled tight to keep any products from sliding or shifting.
Pallets that contain a diamond pattern on top are a non skid surface that keeps the products from skidding, allowing the load to be safely transported.
There are also deck inserts that can easily be snapped into the pallet to cover the leg hole openings. When lifting the pallets with a forklift, the covers will keep the forklift from getting caught and overturning the load and causing possible injuries and destroying the product on the pallet.
Plastic divider sheets and pallet slip sheets can be placed between the pallets to keep the load secure. These dividers are reusable so they can also cut costs and waste. Fiberboard dividers are not reusable and cannot be recycled which causes more garbage in our landfills. The plastic dividers can be recycled when they are no longer needed.
Plastic pallets can be safe and is an economical answer to transporting goods. Using the accessories and common sense can keep workers and the products safe when using them as part of your plastic storage system solution.
