maybe that's not going to work

[mrsbrown]

This truck thing again.

tenbears suggested that we use wooden tea chests and get all hirers of truck space to pack their gear in them. The closest I've come after an extensive Yellowpages search is here

There's also a bunch of places that make crates to order. This one in Fairfield would probably be fun easy to collect stuff from.

That modern world we live in has spurned the timber tea chest in favour of cardboard. Which will get soggy at Festival and be useless.

Any other suggestions for standardising packing of other peoples festival junk into a 3 tonne truck?

Criteria:

cheapish (less than $10)
able to be lifted, when full by two people
able to be easily moved with a hand trolley

Comments

[quatrefoil.livejournal.com]

I wonder whether the guy who makes the boxes might hire them? Or is storage afterwards not an issue?

[villana.livejournal.com]

They're not pretty but the good old plastic storage tub is cheap, durable, stackable and can be covered with a throw cloth when in the campsite.

[mrsbrown.livejournal.com]

The concern was that plastic tubs crack.

OTOH, they're easily obtained and, if we're anal and make people buy a particular brand, they'll stack in a truck quite easily.

[anthraxia.livejournal.com]

Which is a big bonus. Re cracking, in my experience they tend to start cracking after being exposed to lots of sunlight. Brand new, not so much. If you can get everyone to buy the same size, you can pack them securely so they don't move around, which reduces the risk significantly. And if you are getting the ones that are around the $10 mark, if they only last one Festival, it's not such an issue.

[pearl]

In terms of being able to re-use the tea chests, a lot of interstate trains (for example) don't allow them to be brought on as luggage.

Just something to keep in mind if you go to a camping event via train at some point.

Plastic crates can be expensive, my 48L ones were $10.00 and are rather cheap and nasty.

[celsa.livejournal.com]

I composed a comment here late last night but it involved such silliness as passing everyone's gear through an agricultural hay baler, so... I decided it was better to sleep first. :-P

I also thought of the plastic tubs, but their brittleness and their undesirability in medieval camping did occur to me. However, if people were to toss in a roll or two of duct tape for running repairs... or perhaps pre-tape them as reinforcement before packing them... and put the moisture-sensitive contents in plastic bags as well... and label the tubs with a ranking regarding the fragility of the contents so the truck packers know which will cope with being on the bottom if there is multiple container failure...If tables are being taken up, they can be factored in as a fail-safe layer, with gear packed chockers underneath and on top...

Sturdier and more attractive containers would be preferable, but plastic tubs probably work as a default in the case that nothing better turns up.

[stellar-muddle.livejournal.com]

basal_surge would probably suggest hoards of wooden viking chests, but not everyone is that nuts. Also the feet don't handle the combination of ox brained movers and pallets that well. Though they are generally easily moved by 2 people as long as they aren't filled with iron mongery or books.