Southern Research Station

Title: New PDS will predict performance of pallets made with used parts

Author: Clarke, John W.; White, Marshall S.; Araman, Philip A.

Date: 2001

Source: Pallet Enterprise. 21(11): 22,24,26-29.

Description: The Pallet Design System (PDS) is a computer design program developed by Virginia Tech, the National Wooden Pallet & Container Association, and the U.S. Forest Service to quickly and accurately predict the performance of new wood pallets. PDS has been upgraded annually since its original version in 1984. All of the previous upgrades, however, have continued to improve the accuracy of new pallet performance.

So far, PDS has not been able to help pallet recyclers as they design and market used pallets. This will change with the 2002 version of PDS, which will predict the performance of pallets manufactured with used parts recovered from recycled pallets.

The pallet recycling industry continues to experience rapid growth. In 1999, an estimated 299 million pallets were received by pallet recyclers for repair, reuse, or recycling - up from 171 million in 1995.

One of the products of pallet recyclers is used pallet parts recovered from the disassembly of used pallets. These recovered parts can be used to make remanufactured pallets or combination (or "combo") pallets. Remanufactured pallets are assembled entirely from recycled pallet parts. Combo pallets are assembled with a mixture of new and recycled parts. Remanufactured and combo pallets are environmentally friendly and are an efficient use of our wood resource.

Surveys of PDS users have indicated that the ability to design these pallets and specify used parts with PDS would improve their marketing and design efforts. First, however, the physical and mechanical properties, species groupings, and grade mixes of used pallet parts had to be determined.

The objectives of this study were to determine the physical and mechanical properties of used wood pallet parts. These material properties were used to recommend practical groupings of used pallet parts for use in PDS to predict the performance of remanufactured and combo pallets.

Keywords: 

View and Print this Publication (97 KB)

Publication Notes: 

• We recommend that you also print this page and attach it to the printout of the article, to retain the full citation information.
• This article was written and prepared by U.S. Government employees on official time, and is therefore in the public domain.

 Get the latest version of the Adobe Acrobat reader or Acrobat Reader for Windows with Search and Accessibility

Citation

Clarke, John W.; White, Marshall S.; Araman, Philip A.  2001.  New PDS will predict performance of pallets made with used parts.   Pallet Enterprise. 21(11): 22,24,26-29.