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Hey there,

I'm probably gonna purge a bunch of gear in the next several months — and due to COVID-19, I'm probably gonna reduce my Craigslist'ing... and I'll probably do a bunch of Ebay/Reverb/TOMB selling. I've probably got 15-20 units that need new homes... most are 1 rack unit, some are 2. So I'm looking to find appropriate cardboard shipping boxes. ULine sells stuff that seems pretty close... but the minimum purchase is something like 50 boxes and they're not cheap + you pay a ton in shipping. So I'm curious if anyone else has found a good source for shipping boxes?

USPS offers free boxes if whatever you are shipping will fit in one of their flat-rate boxes. 19" rackmount, maybe not so much...

Lowes/Home Depot, maybe even Walmart have moving boxes and bubble wrap. you may have to cut down the box to save on dimension costs (i.e., make the box not so tall). rackmount gear can be heavy and you don't want it to move around and damage the corners/ears. The foam pipe wrap insulation (has a split in it) can be good for wrapping the edges of gear and it's pretty cheap and light weight (usually sold in 5 or 6 ft lengths).

If you know any place that purchases a lot of IT/telco/networking gear, switches and such are often 1U and 2U and the boxes can be good for music gear too...

I often end up making a custom size box.

If you want the thing to arrive in good shape (no bent rack ears, etc) i have a few suggestions.

1. Remove rack ears if possible and wrap them separately (so they don’t scratch) and same for power supply/cord.

2. Wrap whole unit generously in bubble wrap.

3. Cardboard tightly around that (double thick preferable).

4. Place in another slightly larger box with few inches all around of void filler...crumpled up newspaper or newsprint works pretty well.

5. Tape it well...band strap and tape down strap is preferable but tape is generally adequate.



That probably sounds like a lot of work. It is. I’ve never had issues with damaged shipments however. You want to pack stuff like it’s going to get dropped off the back of the truck and ran over...or at least thrown around and shit stacked on top of it.

When I was building the EQs, I had a local packaging company that made a custom cardboard box. It wasn't that expensive, and the min order was something like 12. I think they were in the Yellow Pages under "paper products."

They also custom cut bubble wrap to go inside, and eventually made a die-cut foam block with notches that held rack ears in place, and a cutout for the power supply.

Wow... plethora of info! Thanks guys!

I am pricing out options, and I'll definitely look up local packaging/paper companies. We have a lot of them nearby.

Worst-case, I can buy minimum 20 & 30 boxes of the two most appropriate boxes. I'd be buying 20 x 14 x 4 for the unit + 22 x 16 x 6 to double-box each unit (I've had way to many bad shipping experiences, on both ends... to NOT be overly careful when shipping something).

Having to buy all of the boxes & get them shipped aint cheap, but it'll only eat $130 out of the ~ $1800-2400 that I might net... so, if I have to, that's not the worst thing.

1. There's almost certain to be a box place in Philly. There's a local one here in Atlanta and they treat me pretty well. I think there's also a U-Line store here--probably one in Philly as well.

2. Get 20 1/2" or 21" wide boxes. It gives you a little extra room to cushion the rack ears. 3" height works fine for 1U rack gear, 4" or 4 1/2" for 2U.

3. I tend to look for packing material ( & sometimes boxes) on trash day--people in my neighborhood buy a lot of junk online. Keeps the expenses down a bit.