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Are Folding Containers the Future of Shipping?
swellconvivialguy writes "Earlier this year Maersk ordered 20 super-size container ships—each to have '16 percent larger capacity than today's largest container vessel, Emma Maersk.' But instead of embracing the bigger/more-is-better mentality, Staxxon, a NJ-based startup, has engineered a folding steel container (it folds like a toddler's playpen), which is designed to make shipping more efficient by 'reducing the number of container ship movements.' No one has yet succeeded in the marketplace with a collapsible container, but Staxxon has made a point of learning from the mistakes of others."
Anyone else read "Staxxon" as "Saxton"?
Okay, time to stop playing TF2.
So why are we posting ads written as articles on Slashdot? I fail to see how this is news for Nerds. It really has nothing to do with the normal topics of slashdot as well as being an ad.
Looks like a cool concept, though it looks like it takes much more human contact than regular shipping containers do (when being folded). This could be a problem, as a lot of the bigger shipping yards are automated and/or move containers around using large machines.
We'll have to see if the increase in human contact is worth the space saved when shipping empty containers around.
Having to slide 4 very heavy folded containers onto those bars seems like it might be difficult. It seems like it would get a lot worse after the container has made several trips across the ocean in the salt air.
Also, the folding process seems like a drag, although high volume sites would probably have a specialized rig just to fold them and unfold them if these becomes accepted.
It's too bad shipping containers are higher than they are wide, because it would seem like flattening 5 and turning them on their side and stacking them up would be more straightforward than this rod stuff.
What happens if you only have 3 or 4, can you still fold them, or only in 5s?
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
While somewhat time consuming, I could see this being beneficial for the train and trucking industry (if they're not too heavy).
With trucks especially, you could send a convoy of 5 or so out, and then have 1 bring it back, and the other 4 haul something else. With trains, weight is less of an issue, but it's always good to use less cars just for empty space, as the frames themselves add weight.
Yes. Also, the past. They're commonly called "cardboard boxes", and they fold up quite nicely.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
We are just scratching the surface of using a storage container as a mobile or emergency house.... not to mention the use as a Faraday cage in this solar cycle.
This could lead to needed innovation in that space.
- StupidPeopleTrick
Or perhaps we could sell things to asia. If the containers going from the US to asia were not empty then there would be no need for them to fold.
That's just crazy talk.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
While this company's idea is interesting, it is still two years away from even being approved for commercial use. There are at least two competitors with easier, simpler to use technology:
Indian Shipping Company
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV-R5jlf6bQ&feature=related
Dutch variant
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHlTrOVv9gs&feature=related
The problem, so many shipping containers just pilling up unused in the Western world, and forcing the creation of countless new containers in Asia, is certainly worth solving. But so many companies have tried and failed before. For my money, the Indian or Dutch version seems that more likely to win out. India has far lower steel costs, and is at the centre of shipping between Asia, Europe, Africa and Australia.
Too late Staxxon! 3D printing will make you obsolete! Oh, where's the feedstock going to come from? Duh! Another 3D printer!
The Dutch one is too lightweight. And having the sides fold might seem like a great idea, but when you stack 4 more containers on it and go crashing through waves, you have to start wondering if it's going to fold up when it isn't supposed to.
Also, a roll-up door on the end? You must be kidding me. What happens when the contents shift? You may end up with something leaning on the door and keeping it from rolling up or just flat out bending the door so it won't roll. The sturdy doors of a standard container (or the Indian one) are stronger and open outward so you don't have to give up space inside for the door tracks and stowage space.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
You can't do that. Imbalances in amount of cargo going East vs West are inevitable because of trade imbalances, but Kirchoff's laws also apply to container ships: Every container ship going East must return West.
Say there are 5 container ships with containers full of cargo which travel from China to the U.S. On the return trip, say there's only one container ship's worth of cargo. So you load one container ship with cargo for the return trip. The containers from the other 4 ships you collapse and load onto a second ship. You've now loaded all the containers needed for the next 5 ships worth of cargo onto 2 ships heading back to China. Great! You've eliminated the need for 3 ships on the return leg, right? Wrong. Once those containers get back to China and are loaded up with cargo, you now have 5 ships worth of cargo containers, but only 2 ships to transport them. Those 3 ships you left in the U.S. have to make the return trip to China regardless of whether they're loaded or empty.
The number of container ship movements is dictated by the maximum amount of cargo traveling between two destinations one-way, not the minimum. The minimum is irrelevant since you need the empty containers and container ships to make the return trip anyway to ferry the next batch of cargo along the maximum one-way route. The only way you can reduce the number of container ship movements is to scrap the 3 container ships you left in the U.S., and replace them with 3 new ones built in China. That's just not economically feasible. You might be able to shaft some of the ship captains into having to make an empty trip back to China, but all that'll do is cause them to raise the price they charge for the next trip from China to the U.S. The net result is no reduction in container ship movements, and no reduction in fuel consumed, and no reduction in overall cost.
While boats are very efficient, even when heavily loaded, much more so than trucks or trains, it is still a *lot* cheaper (and faster) to move an empty ship around.
The ships still have to go back. Sending them back with collapsed containers and empty space rather than full stacks of empty containers doesn't seem to save much. Also, at the moment there's a shortage of empty containers.
Folder containers is not a new idea but it is not used enough.
Back about 15 years ago, I worked in a TDK plant where they made VHS cassettes, among other things. Everyday, several dozen tractor trailers would unload container loads of bulk videotape shipped in from Japan. The US plant would take that and make individual cassettes for several different brands.
The tape had to be shipped in these special blue crates to keep it from getting contaminated or loose or damaged. Each crate had special fittings and holders for giant reels of tape. Once each crate was unloaded, it was folded up and about four or five of those folded crates could fit into the space of one fully-assembled crate. The crates were designed to disassemble, interlock and fit without any extra parts needed. Meanwhile all the reel holders and things were tucked inside. It was kind of a transformer box.
The combined stacks of five took up exactly as much space as a single full crate. As one unit, that stack of five was then sent back to Japan to be reloaded with more blank tape. This saved a lot on the container space going back and meant they significantly reduced costs.
I've never again seen anything quite like those TDK crates. Sure, there are folding crates and the like, but this was something else beyond any of that. It was clearly designed to do that from the start and you don't often see that kind of integration in a process. Walmart comes close with the way they reuse cardboard boxes.
Sig for hire.
I've been thinking about shipping container architecture and the problem of empty containers for a year or so. One idea is basically to separate the rectangular frame from the side and top panels. The panels can be shipped back efficiently for re-use. The frame makes a compelling component for modular housing. They can be stacked and finished-out to create anything from a storage shed to a small apartment building. They can even be disassembled and re-combined to move or add-on. (Imagine taking your house with you when you move. Imagine building up an apartment block one unit at a time.) But you'd almost never want to keep the stock metal walls and flooring like in most of the "storage container" houses you see. They're poorly-insulated, difficult to modify, and end up looking tacky and industrial. Modular housing has a lot of potential and with a little intelligent design I think storage containers can be made more useful to this market.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
If your only moving cargo one way, but we have already solved this problem, if the container is full it goes back, otherwise it sits cause there is no real reason to send an empty box (flattened or not) back empty... cause its freaking expensive.
amazing how that works isn't it?
The way containerships are built now, empties are frequently used to balance the weight distribution of the vessel. Folding them up won't create more capacity because they aren't built with the expectation of being loaded to the brim with fully loaded containers, and condensing empties creates space but condenses weight. A containership taking on full loads will only hit about 70% of its slot capacity due to weight constraints.
Also, wear and tear on moving parts in the shipping industry should not be overlooked. Twist locks, the things that lock containers together on ships, are very simple mechanisms that are built with extreme robustness. Doesn't matter, they constantly break and have to be replaced during ship operations. This solution is much more suscpetible to breakage than twist locks.
The only thing these containers do is make trade lane management more fluid and make empty storage more efficient for shipping terminals/container yards, but at the cost of equipment maintenance, labor, and reliability. The costs won't offset the benefits until the worldwide port infastructure or shipping capacity is bursting at the seams (creating space issues and a premium on crane productivity). That simply isn't the case.
Car analogy: you can't ride your bike to the supermarket and bring the shopping back in your car.
Drive past any major port in the US. Chances are you will see acres of empty shipping containers stacked up doing nothing. Those ships are going back empty anyway because its cheaper then moving the now empty containers back to their source. Even if the collapsible containers don't return to Asia, they will certainly take up less real estate here in the USA.
WTF happened to slashdot on this article?! GODDAMMIT SLASHDOT! NOT AGAIN!
Will it ever end?
What happens if you only have 3 or 4, can you still fold them, or only in 5s?
According to TFA, yes, and it's one of these guys' major advantages.
No.
Hopefully teleportation is the future of shipping.
Beyond that, folding containers just seems stupid. They pretty much standardize shipping containers and anything to break away from that is just asking to create headaches. Companies that try to implement this and aren't shipping with high margins are going to fail where the guys who ignore it and keep on using standard practices will still be around to refuse your future folding container idea.
I mean is this really a problem that needs to be solved beyond just getting new empty containers to locations that need new empty containers? Fairly certain they have to retire shipping containers every 5-10 years anyway to keep them up to spec and safety/maintenance requirements. Looks like a mess of a problem if those bars bend and start causing the container to collapse.
Good point. Seems they need to find a way to fold ships, too.
Similar to bikes, planes and (to some extent) cars.
It doesn't work that way. Container ships usually don't run a constant continuous circuit. Hauling empty cargo containers will take up valuable shipping space until it gets back to the destination port.
Really? What makes that so? If it's labor of loading the containers onto the ship, a more labor-intensive foldable container won't help...
Really? What makes that so? If it's labor of loading the containers onto the ship, a more labor-intensive foldable container won't help...
Weight.
More weight = More inertia = More fuel to push it around. Holds true for everything, cars, planes, boats and carrying heavy boxes by hand. Over the short haul, the fuel cost is insignificant but the cost adds up significantly over long hauls.
For a transoceanic trip at 20-30kts, I'm sure it's increased drag rather than inertia, that accounts for the energy cost. The hull rides lower in the water when carrying a greater load.
Take off every 'sig' !!
Zero sum game.
Move a full ship (with folded containers) and 3 empty ones, or 4 almost empty ones (filled with empty unfolded containers).
Not much difference.
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
What is a "bike"? Is that like a type of car?
Take off every 'sig' !!
You have to look at the cost of loading and unloading containers on the vessel.
The empty containers often end up being placed on top of the full containers for stability reasons. So the vessel has to wait for empty containers to be moved so the correct containers can be unloaded.
Of course the cost of loading and unloading is smaller than the fuel cost, but it is big enough to make foldable containers interesting.
It seems that Holland Container Innovations was actually the first company that recently passed the safety regulations regarding foldable containers. http://www.hcinnovations.nl/news.html
Support Eachother, Copy Dutch Property!
Every container ship going East must return West.
The world is round...
but having a container that can be stripped down to pieces is a bit better, easily swapped out when damaged, stripped down to save space etc
The folding/unfolding is what bothers me too.
They will not make too much difference for trucking: a container truck can carry a shipping container, not much else. Not likely that if you send out two trucks that one can take back both empty boxes, and the other something else. There is just not much "something else" to carry.
Difference is made in storage yards: less space taken. And on container vessels: there is much much more volume of cargo going from China to the US and EU than the other way around, and liners routinely ship empty containers all the way back to China. Finished products simply contain much more air than raw materials, one container of raw materials can easily become five containers of finished product.
The unfolding is what bugs me most. The roof has to be pushed up and become level, then someone has to put in those heavy metal bars. And that's high up, a container is about 2m30 tall, so not easy to do. Needs machines again. Though of course this folding/unfolding will usually be done in container yards only, so then special equipment can be installed.
Emma Maersk has gone down.
The beauty of this roof/bottom collapse is that you still retain the stackability and full strength, containers are routinely stacked seven layers high. With an allowed gross weight of about 24 tons for a 20' unit, and about 28 ton for a 40' unit, that's a lot of weight the bottom container has to carry.
And according to the article 2, 3, 4 or 5 can be folded in a single unit. Just don't fold them completely wiht less than 5 units, so at least you have two walls where the outer walls should be.
An empty ship uses way less fuel to travel than a full ship. It moves way less water due to the weight not pushing the boat in deeper. In the real world, lots of containers get stuffed with less profitable goods to be transported to the far east, because that still slightly more profitable than shipping empties. The price of the return trip is usually calculated into the the price of shipping goods from the far east, so it's already paid for.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
Watching the video, there are a LOT of actions to be taken. Doing them by hand seems bound to cost someone their fingers. Doing them with a robot is going to restrict the folding to only a handful of locations.
Those who think it might restrict truck movements, this is rarely the case. Trucks haul trailers with a container on it, a new trailer with container is delivered and an old empty one is taken away. You have to be a pretty big customer to be able to afford to unload containers with what is after all a pretty big crane. Remove the container from the trailer and the trailer got to go back empty one way or another. Same amount of trucking movements, just with empty trailers unless someone comes up with a way to fold them too. An empty trailer would consume less fuel certainly so there would be a benefit but only in large operations.
The article claims companies hate to ship empty containers... but that is in the nature of business. You might as well complain about having to carry your shopping bags empty to the store. Because containers tend to remain on the trailer, in trucking there is no real savings in the number of trips unless your hauling company can't schedule to bring a full one and pick up an empty one at the same time.
For shipping, it only matters if there is a large discrepancy in when containers are delivered and when they are being shipped back. Say a ship delivers a 1000 containers full from China to the US but there are no empty containers to haul back yet. So the ship has to sail back empty for the next load, then when it is halfway another ship has to pick up the 1000 empty containers (the idea goods are shipped from the US to China is clearly laughable). That would be a waste BUT that doesn't happen, there are always empty containers waiting to go back. And because these routes are routine they balance out.
About the only saving when folding them is that you can load 5 folded empty containers faster then 5 empty unfolded ones. Loading a ship is a lot of work and the larger the ship gets, the more time it wastes at the dock waiting to be loaded. A ship doesn't make money being tied up, it needs to move to make money.
But at what cost? Look at the video again. Talk about complicated. There are easier methods out there, a dutch container folds by having the standard loading crane pull up the lid, and it then collapses. No rods to be inserted (if you ever been around a shipping container you know they suffer a lot of dents) or very narrow (read unstable as hell) walls to be slided precisely by a forklift truck moving at the very edge off its capabilty (how many companies have a forklift capable of easily lifting this kind of weight especially as it will be wanting to fall the narrow fork lift arms with its huge width. The number of times in the folding where an accident might occur is just to fucking large if they expect this to happen at your average company.
It seems like a nice idea but I think there is a reason that nobody has been successful yet with a folding container. It just ain't easy enough. Space might be costly on a ship but time is even more costly, nobody in shipping has the time to do this folding process especially as it seems to take 2 people.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
The obvious solution is foldable and stackable container ships. Duh!
I do wonder though, are container ships really that much different than container trucks? There really isn't much that you can put on a container ship other than containers, and certainly not if you're going to be putting on at least some containers anyway. So given that there's a set number of container ships floating around (assuming that China isn't just going to magick up ships that'll poof when they reach the US), is there actually a lot of benefit to folding the containers going onto the ship, since the ships on average will carry about the same number of containers (albeit, some empty) back and forth?
I know! Let's containerize ships! You send 5 ships worth of goods from China. Going backwards, you send:
* One ship of goods
* One ship of containers
* Two ships carryng the last one disassembled into containerized cargo!
It's cheaper to produce new containers not just because of weight, but because of port restrictions. Once a container with a wooden floor (i.e. most of them) has entered certain ports, it has to be gassed before it can re-enter certain other ports, allegedly to prevent the spread of certain pests. This is more expensive than just buying another container. Since people are starting to warm up to container-based architecture, there's even a use for the discarded containers.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Difference is made in storage yards: less space taken. And on container vessels: there is much much more volume of cargo going from China to the US and EU than the other way around, and liners routinely ship empty containers all the way back to China. Finished products simply contain much more air than raw materials, one container of raw materials can easily become five containers of finished product.
For trucks, there is also a potential reduction in fuel use, if empty containers have to be transported a significant distance.
Container carrying ships also can't carry much other than containers. It's hard to see the benefit, since the number of containers transported to and from each port (allowing for triangle routes and other route differences) must balance. Empty containers remain empty. Even if you came up with "disposable" containers, there would likely not be much change in the ship movements; just less load on some legs of the voyage.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
The obvious solution then is folding cargo ships!
Fortunately, handling empty containers isn't on the critical path. It doesn't affect the timing-critical part of shipping, which is getting the goods in the container to the right place.
"...allegedly to prevent the spread of certain pests"
Allegedly? Introduction of pests happens all the time, such as the brown spruce longhorn beetle introduced from wood packing materials stored at the container port in Halifax, NS. There are many similar examples. Wood packing material is a significant vector for pests.
From what I understand, the point of this is being able to handle a bunch of folded containers just like a single unfolded one.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
What is a "bike"? Is that like a type of car?
Yeah, it's a 2-wheeled cabriolet with muscle motor. :-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
People make too much of the fact that empty containers are transported from China to the US, because of the difference in trade volumes. A folding container isn't going to solve that. You will have just as many ships going back to China from the US, either with empty containers or ballast, simply because you need to get the ship back there to pick up more goods!
But the less-full ones might go longer routes. For example, you have to ship-loads of containers from A to B, and half a shipload of containers from B to C. With standard containers, this might mean: Send two ships of containers from A to B. One immediately returns with one ship-load of empty containers to A, while the other one goes to C with half of the containers full, and the other half empty. From C, it then returns with all the containers empty.
With folding containers, the first ship cannot only return its own now empty containers, but also the non-empty containers from the second ship. Therefore 1.5 ship-loads of containers return directly to A, so that the second ship goes to C with only full containers, and then back to A also with only half of its original containers empty.
Assuming that the needed energy is a fixed amount plus an amount proportional to weight, and for simplicity assuming equal distances between all three ports, we get an empty container cost of 1+0.5+1 = 2.5 units for the non-folding containers vs. 1.5+0+0.5 = 2 units for the folding containers (only considering the weight-dependent part because the fixed part is the same for both scenarios). Thus 0.5 units of energy are saved, where 1 unit is the energy difference between an empty ship and a ship filled with empty containers going between those ports.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
I think you missed the point. They are not trying to reduce the number of container ship movements, they are trying to reduce the number of container movements.
They are trying to reduce the time and energy associated with moving containers around the port. Containers get moved from a staging area, to near the ship, then onto the ship, then off the ship (but still near the ship), then out to a staging area again. And on top of that, many cargo routes include multiple ports on each continent, so ships are re-stacked multiple times -- containers that are not destined for a particular port may still need to be moved around the ship or even offloaded then reloaded.
The energy costs associated with container moves isn't covered in the same way by your analysis. I would summarize your analysis as saying that empty containers "dead head" on their trip back to Asia: -- the ship is going back to Asia anyway, so the baseline cost of moving the ship is not a factor, weight is the overwhelming determiner of marginal fuel consumption, therefore it doesn't matter how much space the containers take up, only how much weight.
But this is not the same for container moves in port, as they are not "dead heads". For these moves, we do have to include the baseline cost of the crane moving (since it wasn't otherwise going to move from this stack to that stack). Therefore, it does, indeed, take less energy to lift five collapsed containers onto a ship in one move than to lift five separately, because you save all the extra baseline energy associated with crane moving four more times.
The time savings could be an even more significant contributor to cost savings. Because it's not just the wages of the guys working the port. If you had enough of these collapsibles in the system that you could reliably reduce the length of a port call, then every item on the ship would spend less time in transit (savings to the shipper) and each ship could complete more round trips in a year (savings to the cargo line).
Where your analysis continues to be effective, however, is in the portwarehouse portion of the trip. There really is no cost savings to having these things collapsed at the warehouse. Every truck that goes to the warehouse needs to come back to the port to pick up the next container. And if you collapse the container, the chassis (wheels/undercarriage that the container goes on) needs to come back to the port anyway. Frankly, this would be a nightmare to try to do this at the warehouse, since the warehouses are almost universally NOT set up to even take the containers of the chassis in the first place.
So I think the guys in the article (and the few competitors mentioned in the comments here) have all missed the boat. What they need to develop is a super-efficient way to collapse containers. Not a system that is pretty efficient for one or two guys to do, but one is done automatically by some big machine that would be located at the port. Trucks pulling empties would pull right up in front of this machine. A crane integrated into the machine would take the container off the chassis and everything would be automated from there. The containers would be collapsed, nested and come out the other side ready to be handled like any other container. The only way collapsing empty containers creates real cost savings is if many/most of the empties are handled this way, and you're going to offset all of those savings if you've got guys manually collapsing these things using forklifts.
I used to work for a guy who invented a folding container to carry liquids. Previously toothpaste, tomato paste and sauce would be shipped in 55 gallon drums on pallets. The problem was that you are charged by the footprint of the pallet after you have emptied them and then shipped the 55 gallon drums/pallets back to get filled again.
He made a box the size of a pallet that you could fill with a plastic bag and then attach a pump at the top and it would have connectors at the bottom so you could push the liquid out. The footprint of the pallet filled with liquid let you ship more than the 4 55 gallon drums would hold, and versus the glass and wire pallets, you could throw the bag away after shipping, fold the sides of the box down, stack them up and pay for one footprint on the return to the factory.
It was fun, I remember taking apart Chevy Chevette's for their axles and wheel assemblies, making little carts and putting our containers on them and smashing them together with forklifts as stress tests.
I'm surprised they didn't come up with this.
A huge amount of non-toxic liquids gets shipped this way now. They started in a one room office and when I left I remember driving the owners corvette to the airport to pick him up when he would fly his jet in.
That's not 100% true. It would be in a flat world, or a world where all trade was between two parties, but the international system is much more complicated than that.
No one has yet succeeded in the marketplace with a collapsible container
Sure they have. Their invention is called 'cardboard boxes'.
The three laws of thermodynamics:(1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit.
Ideally you should have fair trade, and full containers going both ways.
"Kirchoff's laws also apply to container ships: Every container ship going East must return West."
you have realised that the earth is round, haven't you?
Bingo! half way down the page, we have a winner! This is a political problem, and fancy shipping containers won't fix it. The real solution is for the western Europe/US to require Chinese containers to be gassed before entering their ports, artificially increasing the cost of imports and keeping our the few remaining Asian pests we haven't imported.
How about this: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/images/blue-marlin-pic1.jpg?
The new ship design fits many more containers into a hull that's only one container wider than the previous record. They've played with the placement of the deckhouse and engines, and they've changed the hull shape.
The new design also reflects the current economic reality: it's designed for a lower top speed (22.5 instead of 25 knots), most current containers ships aren't operated anywhere near their top speed to save on fuel (and, I suspect, to fit the smaller supply of containers into the current fleet, in effect taking advantage of longer transit times).
True, a truck can take a bundle. But if you send out two trucks and let one truck carry two folded containers, the second truck has an empty trailer. And still has to go back to the yard.
Besides at the vast majority of container stuffing/unstuffing points they container will not leave the trailer, as the yard simply doesn't have the equipment. They don't need it anyway, they have a loading dock or so instead.
Send out two trucks, they both have to get back. With or without container on their trailer. And besides most unloading points don't have the equipment to take a container off a trailer, let alone do the folding. Folding and unfolding will be exclusively done in container yards (either at the dock or inland).
Finished products simply contain much more air than raw materials, one container of raw materials can easily become five containers of finished product.
Plus, many raw materials are transported in the bulk, not needing containers.
Hear, hear. I came here to post *exactly* this thought, but I wasn't clever enough to come up with "Kirchoff's Laws apply to container ships".
There is another benefit. Even if they re load the ship with the same number containers, the weight would be lower down, and should mean a more stable ship on the return trip. Not losing a few containers per trip could pay of in the long run.
All of the above was encrypted with a Quad ROT-13 method. Unauthorized decryption is in violation of the DMCA.
Seems like nobody read the articles. Don't know why I should be shocked. Here are some facts from the various articles and some additional searching around:
1. It collapses, side to side, somewhat like an accordion. There's a hinge in the middle of the roof and the floor, and (my guess) some cables linking the two. Here's video http://youtu.be/QTdgZ2YuAM8 of (an animation of) it being folded and stacked.
2. 5 folded ones fit in the space of one full one.
3. It costs roughly as much to ship an empty as a full. (This suggests to me that the thing that costs is volume rather than weight.)
4. The weight of 5 folded ones is roughly the same as one laden one, so it costs 1/5 as much to ship a folded one as an empty standard one.
5. Aside from folding, it's designed to be backward-compatible with standard containers - so all the same ships, lifts, cranes, trucks, rail cars, etc. work.
6. The design intention, based on the video above, is to use a forklift to fold it up. My guess is that a forklift is used at some point to move around the empty ones, too, so if you can take another 5 minutes and fold it to get the advantages it may be a win.
The preferred solution is to not have a problem.
not true. the world has a global spherical topology, cargo ships going east can come back east.
Nigel Tufnel: But if you keep folding it, then it keeps breaking... ...and then everything has to be folded... and then you have... this. And I don't want this.
Ian Faith: Why would you keep folding it?
Nigel Tufnel:
The Admin and the Engineer
Chuckstar - Thanks for your comment. At Staxxon, we have built our business model around reducing empty moves at storage depots, marine and inland terminals where each move has an associated cost or fee. In terms of saving carriers, shippers and maybe eventually consumers any money on freight costs, folding/nesting or collapsing has the potential to reduce the number of moves or touches. And we agree with your observation - most of the folding/nesting (and unfolding/un-nesting) would probably happen at terminals or storage depots, not at warehouses or distribution centers. Your vision of a folding/nesting system or device is close to our design. We used forklift folding/nesting to prove the concept. Now we're working on a more robust, scaleable method that takes advantage of existing terminal and storage depot workflow We don't think that folding/nesting can reduce container ship movements in the near term. Container ships run on fixed schedules just like ships did in the day before containerization. On most routes, the ships operate even if there isn't sufficient demand to make the transit profitable. In the near term, folding/nesting containers could add agility to container ship arrival/departure schedules in terms of reducing the amount of time required to stow or unload empty containers. This added agility could lead to more flexibility around steaming speed and/or improve on-time arrival of cargo which has a serious impact on the achieved retail value of most cargo. Once the agility benefits were consistently quantified and proven, there could be consideration given to reducing container ship movements assuming the same volume and tonnage could be moved on time with fewer ship moves. Very exciting to see all the comments about container logistics, re-use and innovation. Tom - tstitt@staxxon.com
Tom Stitt | tstitt@gmail.com | +1.650.523.4944 | @tstitt
Hi Solandri Since you took the time to write your thoughtful comment, I decided to try and respond on behalf of Staxxon. I don't know anything about Kirchoff's law. I do know that most container ships operate on a specific trade lane, call on a specific set of ports based on a schedule and often are part of a "string" or alliance with other container ships from other carriers brands who work together on the string to move cargo on somewhat reliable schedule. Most of the better known, higher volume/tonnage strings are "east-west" like Asia-Americas or Asia-Europe. However, there are also secondary trade lanes, often involving shorter north-south moves as well as "feeder" trade lanes. And I agree 100% with you that most container ships today move on their designated trade lane regardless of whether there is enough container cargo demand to make the move profitable for the ocean carrer. Container ships follow the same "weekly schedule" practice that has been the norm for commercial shipping for 100s of years. What could change with folding/nesting container technology? By reducing the number of moves required to stow or unload empty containers from container ships because they are folded/nested, the container ship picks up schedule agility in terms of prospective arrival/departure time and time spent at the dock or quay. This added agility could be used to implement slow or extra slow steaming (which reduces fuel consumption) and/or achieve better on-time arrival results (which achieves better retail value for the cargo, reduces retail inventory safety stock levels and reduces "expedited" land moves that typically involve trucks vs. more fuel efficient rail or barge. Over time, as the reduced stow/unload time became more reliable from folding/nesting empty containers, the number of container ship moves (not the number of container ships) might be reduced because the same volume or tonnage could be moved in the same time with fewer moves. Reducing container ship moves is distinct from reducing the number of container ships. I don't think most of the ocean carriers (Maersk might be an exception) are ready to think about seasonal and/or demand driven, variable container ship movements today. The weekly schedule is almost sacred in container maritime circles. However, as sustainability score cards move from being "nice to have" to more serious metrics of corporate performance, there will be increasing pressure on the logistics and supply chain players to adopt methods that optimize the carbon footprint and deliver the goods on time. Can it be accomplished solely with folding/nesting container technology? No. Can folding/nesting technology contribute to a more efficient, sustainable way to move containerized cargo? Yes, but the process will take time to prove and optimize. Thanks again for your comments. Tom-tstitt@staxxon.com
Tom Stitt | tstitt@gmail.com | +1.650.523.4944 | @tstitt
Hi wvmarle, Thanks for your comment. Yes, the Staxxon technology and design is "variably" folding - you can create a "nest" with 2,3,4 or 5 containers. This was part of our effort to design a system that avoided the need to have an exact number of folded or collapsed containers before you could move the set. Also a reason we chose "side to side" folding (like an accordion) vs. the collapse to ground method chosen by our competitors. We've done a fair amount of stacking, racking and load testing over the last year. Stacking tests establish the maximum number of laden containers that can be on top of a container. Racking tests evaluate the ability of the container to resist longitudinal (the long sides) and transverse (the front and back sides) racking forces at sea and on rail. Loading tests evaluate the ability of the container to handle spot loads on floor surfaces, evenly balanced loads and overweight loads. There is a regulatory process that establishes the ratings for each of these critical elements. We expect to announce the regulatory testing results very soon. Safe to assume we have very high rating targets for the stacking, racking and loading elements of the Staxxon design. The tests also address weather tightness. We've tested a few dozen different gasket and hinge systems to find one that provides optimal weather tightness when unfolded. We also have a more advanced folding/nesting system in design that will address most of the concerns about safety, elapsed time and scaleability for folding/unfolding and nesting/un-nesting. We envision most folding/nesting happening off-terminal in western ports where there are off-terminal storage depots for empty containers. Thanks again for your comment. Tom - tstitt@staxxon.com
Tom Stitt | tstitt@gmail.com | +1.650.523.4944 | @tstitt
the big cost is time and the lift on and lift off.
a good crane operator can do a steady 34 to 36 lifts per hour, so every empty has a lift on and lift off cost. plus the 2 minute cycle that might be associated with it.
Now we have more empties in the USA than in Asia, so we have to lift them and move them from the east and west coast USA for discharge Asia... so if the container folds where we can carry 2 instead of 1 on the lift, it's a 50% lift on/lift off cost, back in the 90's we had a charge call THC ( terminal handling charge ) which would cover the containers lift on, the rate was some where in the USD 120 range. also back then a 3500TEU vessel was rather large.
I had metal scrap contract with the steam ship lines back then, I would pay UDS 700ish from port newark to shanghai, huangpu, tanjian and a few other asian ports, the rate was predicated that I moved 20 metric tons max per container, and 250+ containers per vessel.
now with the super vessels like the emma mearsk, I have no clue how they can load on the east coast of the USA, I think Newport VA is the only over 45' draft port on the east coast ( I think the gulf might have one or 2 ), BUT more to the point is 9000 possible lift, it's a fucking nightmare on the logistics. I would think that something like this would really call for a dynamic change in the cranes, or more like both port and starboard load and discharge.
At the end of the day, a worthwhile, ISO certified container, that can fold and take the abuse, is well worth it. just think 500 moves saved, that's at least 2 hours port time, maybe even more.
if you see me, smile and say hello.
Sounds like they need to design folding container ships. Problem solved.
...who's responsible for the "slashdot sent me! :D" comment?
The containers sit on a special trailer in the US, but the truck (cab) can tow pretty much any kind of trailer. Which leaves the problem of having multiples of the special trailer. IIRC, the can stack those at least two or three high. (Used to be a truck driver, never did intermodal, but saw a lot on the roads)
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
And on container vessels: there is much much more volume of cargo going from China to the US and EU than the other way around, and liners routinely ship empty containers all the way back to China.
This bothers me. Why does China contain raw materials that are better than those contained in North America? The answer is that it doesn't; it's that the politics have made it cheaper to ship products from there, than to create them here. So my scientific nature would state that the politics are the part that is inefficient. And that scares me, because if science is against my politics, then we're doomed.
Of course, the other aspect to it is that China is developing nanotechnology spy devices, and are first encouraging the world to accept shipment of its trinkets. Which later will have these embedded in them, just as they've recently had melamine embedded in the pet foods.
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
If only I had mod points... You are the only one here who seems to know what's going on. I don't think anyone else in this thread has any clue about liner shipping.
You are correct that container ships that go east must go west again, in general. There are exceptions to this, such as when a service is cancelled or when a leased ship is given back to its owner in one place and a new ship is leased in another. However in general, lets assume everything going east will go west again. Even in such a situation, stackable containers will save fuel. The reason is that shipping companies are unable to transport all of the empties within their network. There are often extra ships sent purely with empties between ports at an incredible cost of money and fuel. With stackable containers, these extra sailings could be eliminated or at least greatly reduced. Another poster said:
This actually depends on the ship. Ships are designed to be run at particular drafts, so an empty ship might have to be loaded with balast water just to maintain the draft for its optimal fuel consumption. In such a case, you'd want to have cargo rather than water. Another poster said:
Wrong, they do run a continuous circuit. That's what separates liner shipping from bulk/tramp shipping. Look at the schedules that CMA-CGM or NYK Line post on their website for an example.
Round the world sailings are expensive and barely any shipper does one. Those were tried in the early days of liner shipping with little success. So far, the poster that has things most correct is Chuckstar. Reducing moves in the container port has many benefits for the environment (less CO2 / SOx production) and lowers costs.
People make too much of the fact that empty containers are transported from China to the US, because of the difference in trade volumes
I thought it was the US that exported empty containers to China, not the other way around. In fact, we seem to be doing such a fabulous job of it that we could solve the trade deficit if we could just figure out how to charge them more for the empty containers!
"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past." -- George Orwell
just in time for world depression. collapsible containers for collapsed economies
Yes you can, ships don't need to go back and forth carrying only containers, nor do they need to go "back and forth", they could go also around the world in one direction. You can load unused containers on ships already traveling to Asia with some useful goods. There may be fewer ships traveling to Asia, but now they can carry more containers and reduce the need for ships coming back empty. Ships running around the world can waste less space carrying empty containers, or can now afford to carry more empty containers the long-way around.