Tag: Column

Rack Design & Installation

The Ins and Outs of Pallet Rack Anchoring

Anchoring is required and essential. Here’s what you need to know. Your racking systems are the heart of your warehousing storage, and ensuring safe use is essential. In most cases, racking holds multiple tons of pallets, representing thousands upon thousands ...
Rack Codes & StandardsRack Design & Installation

How Rotationally Rigid Connections Enhance Rack Stability In Seismic Events

Depending on where a warehouse or distribution center (DC) is located within the United States, the design and engineering of its industrial steel storage rack structures may be subject to seismic requirements. As outlined in RMI’s ANSI MH16.1: Specification for ...
Rack Design & InstallationRack Repair & Reconfiguration

Is It Okay To Cut Pallet Rack Uprights?

Sometimes a rack owner will decide to relocate an existing pallet rack structure to a different location within the same facility — only to discover that the new space has a lower ceiling height than the original site. If only ...
Rack Codes & StandardsRack Design & Installation

How Height-To-Depth Ratio Contributes To Overall Storage Rack Stability

A key objective of safe rack design is to ensure the finished structure won’t topple over when subjected to horizontal forces such as an earthquake, forklift impact, or high wind. To significantly minimize this risk, Section 8.1 of RMI’s ANSI ...
Rack Inspection & MaintenanceRack Repair & Reconfiguration

Why Column Base Plates Provide A Solid Foundation For Rack ...

When a damaged rack column is replaced or repaired, the state of the base plate (sometimes called foot plates) at the bottom of the column must also be assessed. Base plates are included at the bottom of every rack upright ...
Rack Codes & StandardsRack Design & Installation

Rack Safety, Design Pivotal In Growth Of MHI’s Oldest Industry ...

This article by Stephen Murdock originally appeared in the fourth quarter 2020 issue of MHI Solutions magazine and has been reprinted in its entirety with permission. The Rack Manufacturers Institute (RMI), officially the oldest Industry Group in MHI, has seen ...
Rack Design & InstallationRack Repair & Reconfiguration

Why You Shouldn’t Mix Rack Components From Different Manufacturers In ...

While rack columns and beams constructed by different manufacturers may appear similar, mixing components in the same structure — also sometimes called “intermembering” — is unsafe and not recommended. That’s because connecting incompatible rack components, which can erroneously occur as ...
Rack Codes & StandardsRack Design & Installation

How Point Loads And Uniformly Distributed Loads Affect Safe Rack ...

When placed in industrial steel storage racks, a uniformly distributed load is one whose weight is evenly spread over the entire surface of the rack’s beams or deck. Conversely, a point load is one with its weight significantly concentrated in ...
Rack Design & InstallationRack Inspection & Maintenance

Beware Of Leaning Or Bowed Pallet Rack Columns

While some column distortion may be acceptable in a loaded industrial steel pallet rack structure, if a column is leaning (out-of-plumb) or bowed (out-of-straight) beyond a certain point, its capacity will be significantly reduced. Those conditions are unsafe and increase ...
Rack Codes & StandardsRack Repair & Reconfiguration

Why Mixing Rack Components From Different Manufacturers Is A Bad ...

Pallet rack beams and columns from different manufacturers — while they may appear similar — in fact are not. Therefore, it is never a good idea to mix-and-match components from different racking systems within a single structure. The reason? Doing ...