- Joined
- Sep 20, 2005
- Messages
- 604
I’ve had a couple interesting situations of late involving shipping and heat packs.
Scenario one was with a MM rufilata I received a month or so ago, shipped overnight, less than 24 hrs in transit.
When I opened the styro box I could feel the cold air coming out, hit it with an infrared temp gun and showed 55 degrees f. Packaging was excellent, even had a cold pack taped on top of the heat pack to provide a buffer/thermo mass. The T was fine, nice and slow and easy to unpack and maneuver. Removed the (looked like a Uniheat 40hr) heat pack and it was tightly wrapped with aluminum foil and also cold. When I took the foil off it gradually went up to 90, after I put the foil back on sure enough a few hours later it was at room temp. I then poked one tiny pinhole into it. The temp stabilized at 75, about 15 above ambient. Foil back off and up to 90 again. I also tried the same thing with similar results on the heat pack from the shipment in the next scenario.
In conclusion, be careful how much you restrict air to these…
Scenario two was a box I got with a few slings, erroneously shipped priority, was in transit about two days. Also packed well but with a few exceptions, not all of which I’ll go into here as to not get off topic. You can see that in the (negative) review thread here; http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=169589
The issue started out similarly to the previous one, when I opened the styro box it felt cold inside. Like the last one I hit it with the temp gun and got 52. As I removed the contents I found to my surprise that the (60 hr) heat pack was somewhat warm at 75 and even increased to 87 after a while as it sat on the table.
As it turns out the apparent main issue was the packing material inside the styro box, a somewhat dense/finely shredded paper and very tightly packed in. It was insulating almost as well as the styro box and didn’t let the heat disperse through the interior space even though that was only about 6”x6”. To compound things even further the pack was on all the way on one side and the vials were hard up against the far corner, not sure if that was done purposefully to keep the t’s away from the pack or they just drifted over there through the packing. Never got an answer to that one…
I put everything but the t’s back together and placed the box back outside which was 40 degrees, checked it about four hours later and found 55 on the cold side and 87 on the pack itself, an even greater temp differential than originally observed. Interestingly the heat didn’t travel very far either, dropping off substantially within an inch away from the heat pack.
So watch out how much you insulate the interior of the insulated box...
I’m still not sure why the heat pack was only at 75 originally as all my subsequent attempts at duplicating the same conditions saw it stay close to 90. For one I couldn’t know what temp the package was subject to as it went through delivery.
On the Uniheat package instructions they warn not to cover the red stripe as that is where the venting holes are but I didn't notice which side of the pack was against the box. Another thought is maybe the pack didn’t get enough oxygen in the small space of the box, particularly with so much of the volume taken up by packing material. By the time I went to try sealing it up in the box for a couple days to see, the pack was on it’s way out.
I remember there was some discussion on a thread not long ago about the possibility of the pack depleting oxygen in the box and suffocating the beings inside but I think the consensus was there that they just don’t use that much. In any case I think I’ll be venting my styro boxes in some small way though…
Bill
Scenario one was with a MM rufilata I received a month or so ago, shipped overnight, less than 24 hrs in transit.
When I opened the styro box I could feel the cold air coming out, hit it with an infrared temp gun and showed 55 degrees f. Packaging was excellent, even had a cold pack taped on top of the heat pack to provide a buffer/thermo mass. The T was fine, nice and slow and easy to unpack and maneuver. Removed the (looked like a Uniheat 40hr) heat pack and it was tightly wrapped with aluminum foil and also cold. When I took the foil off it gradually went up to 90, after I put the foil back on sure enough a few hours later it was at room temp. I then poked one tiny pinhole into it. The temp stabilized at 75, about 15 above ambient. Foil back off and up to 90 again. I also tried the same thing with similar results on the heat pack from the shipment in the next scenario.
In conclusion, be careful how much you restrict air to these…
Scenario two was a box I got with a few slings, erroneously shipped priority, was in transit about two days. Also packed well but with a few exceptions, not all of which I’ll go into here as to not get off topic. You can see that in the (negative) review thread here; http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=169589
The issue started out similarly to the previous one, when I opened the styro box it felt cold inside. Like the last one I hit it with the temp gun and got 52. As I removed the contents I found to my surprise that the (60 hr) heat pack was somewhat warm at 75 and even increased to 87 after a while as it sat on the table.
As it turns out the apparent main issue was the packing material inside the styro box, a somewhat dense/finely shredded paper and very tightly packed in. It was insulating almost as well as the styro box and didn’t let the heat disperse through the interior space even though that was only about 6”x6”. To compound things even further the pack was on all the way on one side and the vials were hard up against the far corner, not sure if that was done purposefully to keep the t’s away from the pack or they just drifted over there through the packing. Never got an answer to that one…
I put everything but the t’s back together and placed the box back outside which was 40 degrees, checked it about four hours later and found 55 on the cold side and 87 on the pack itself, an even greater temp differential than originally observed. Interestingly the heat didn’t travel very far either, dropping off substantially within an inch away from the heat pack.
So watch out how much you insulate the interior of the insulated box...
I’m still not sure why the heat pack was only at 75 originally as all my subsequent attempts at duplicating the same conditions saw it stay close to 90. For one I couldn’t know what temp the package was subject to as it went through delivery.
On the Uniheat package instructions they warn not to cover the red stripe as that is where the venting holes are but I didn't notice which side of the pack was against the box. Another thought is maybe the pack didn’t get enough oxygen in the small space of the box, particularly with so much of the volume taken up by packing material. By the time I went to try sealing it up in the box for a couple days to see, the pack was on it’s way out.
I remember there was some discussion on a thread not long ago about the possibility of the pack depleting oxygen in the box and suffocating the beings inside but I think the consensus was there that they just don’t use that much. In any case I think I’ll be venting my styro boxes in some small way though…
Bill
