Show & Tell: Building A Shippping Crate For A Flatbed Sewing Machine

[Uwe]

I decided to build a wooden shipping crate that will work for industry standard flatbed machines.

I have a Consew 225 for sale, plus my Tacsew T1563 ( a Juki 563 clone) is ready to be adopted after starring in my upcoming stitch length adjustment and forward-reverse-balancing video. I also picked up two Craiglist finds (a Juki 562 and a Juki 563-3) a few days ago that I will put up for sale after refurbishing them (to finance my future Durkopp Adler 969, haha!) So, quite a few machines with identical shapes and dimensions that may need to be shipped. Might as well figure out how to ship them securely now!

The concept is similar to the crate I built for the Adler 69, but the means of holding the machine firmly in place inside the crate is rather different.

The board attached across the flatbed keeps the machine from moving vertically. The carved-out horizontal support board in the middle keeps the machine from moving horizontally. So the machine won't move at all, no matter which side is facing up. The upper portion of the head is suspended in mid-air without additional supports. The whole affair makes a rather solid impression on me and I have high confidence that this will protect the machines sufficiently during shipment.

This wooden crate will go inside a foam board padded cardboard box as with the Adler 69.

Here are some pictures:

Here's a sketch of my initial build plan, which doesn't quite match what I actually built, because I usually make changes as I build stuff:

Edited March 7, 2016 by Uwe

[Hockeymender]

Reminds me of this video I came across a while back.

https://youtu.be/wNxhZwiThvw

[Uwe]

I hadn't seen that particular video yet - nice find! There's a few variations on the theme out there, mine is just a yet-another-crate version. My general approach is to sample and analyze various options and then pick the parts or methods that work for me, while trying to improve upon or simplify what others have done before.

The oldest sewing machine packaging footage I've seen is part of the 70-Minute long Birth of a Sewing Machine silent film from 1934 where they show how Singer packed their machines in wooden crates around the 1 hour and 3 minute mark into the film.

[Hockeymender]

Thanks for the link to the Kilbowie film. Been a couple years since seeing that. Never tire of watching those industrial movies, especially the ones dealing with sewing machines.

[jasonpotts42]

Uwe;

I am glad to see your work of sewing machine crates. Top notch as always.

Thanks to Hockeymender for the reference to my video.

I have bought several machines online and about half of them arrive damaged so the more information out there the better. Who knows, maybe one day I will receive a machine that has been shipped in a crate of your design. That would be a good day.

I especially like how on your design the crate could easily be reused even for another machine, a short coming of my method.

I will be building a crate for a Singer 134W6 Feed off the arm soon so that will be a unique challenge and definitely a "one off".

Thanks