Q: Pallet Racking & Shelving Frequently Asked Questions
A: Adjustable pallet racking or selective pallet racking is the most common warehouse pallet racking system in use today. It is used for heavy duty palletised goods stored using a forklift truck. Upright frames support horizontal load bearing beams. The pallet is stored by placement on to the beams. Beam levels can be easily adjusted to accommodate various pallet sizes. Standard pallet racking can be used for storage of many items and can also be used as as carpet racking, barrel storage and can be adapted for storage of other heavy duty non-palletised goods.
As well as selling new racking, we are suppliers and stockists of used / second hand pallet racking. We have large stocks of most of the major UK and European manufacturers.
If you can’t find the product or service you’re looking for, get in touch on 0800 612 3210 or send us a message on our enquiry form.
Q: What type of warehouse storage do I need?
A: If you don’t know what you need to order just call us free from a landline on 0800 612 3210, local rate from a mobile on 0330 660 0321 or e-mail us. We will happily talk you through the different options for used or new pallet racking, hand loaded racking and shelving. If you are working to a budget and need a quality cheap option we specialise in second hand or used pallet racking.
Q: Racking Terminology
A: Frames – The frame is the complete upright section of the racking. It consists of 2 vertical uprights or ‘legs’ connected together with horizontal and diagonal braces.
Beams – The beams are the horizontal bearers that join the frames together. 2 beams create a ‘beam level’ that your pallet/product is stored on.
Bays – A bay is 2 frames plus the beams between them.
Runs – A run is a continuous line of joined bays. You can see below that in a run of pallet racking the frames (except those at the end of the run) are shared by 2 bays.
Q: What does UDL mean?
A: UDL stands for Uniformly Distributed Load. Pallet racking beams may be described as – “2700mm x 2t UDL” this means the beams have a clear entry (see below) of 2700mm and will take a maximum load of 2 tonnes per pair of beams if the load is evenly distributed along the beams.
Q: What does Clear Entry mean?
A: The “clear entry” measurement is often used as the length measurement of a pallet racking beam. It is actually the space the beam creates between the upright frames rather than a measurement on the beam itself.
Q: How do I measure the upright frames?
A: If your upright frames are too tall to measure easily, you can measure the “triangle” created by the bracing and then multiply it by the number of times it appears in the length of the frame to give an approximate height. For example, the image below shows a 4 metre high frame.
