Mishandling of products has always been a serious challenge for freight industry professionals around the world. Improper handling can result in dire consequences for any item during transportation. This is particularly true for items that are sensitive or fragile.
When things go wrong during transit, the business has no option other than dealing with replacements, recovery costs, and re-shipping of the items. Moreover, in most instances, it becomes impossible to figure out at what point the item was damaged. This is where shock and tilt indicators come in. These indicators provide an effective way to monitor all potential shocks and tilting a shipped product may experience. They also pinpoint the damage and where it may have occurred.
Shock and Tilt Indicators:
Shock and tilt indicators may be defined as mechanical devices capable of showing evidence of mishandling of an item during transit. The function of these indicators is to ensure proper handling of any shipped equipment and helping businesses hold the handlers responsible for any type of damage.
The monitoring mechanism followed by these indicators is very simple. They can be installed on packages containing automotive, medical equipment, IT servers, semi-conductor equipment and much more. The true value of shock and tilt indicators rely on their visibility. Interestingly, the handlers tend to handle a package more carefully when they see indicators on the package. This is simply because of the fact that the indicators clearly show the shipment has been mishandled during the transport phase and if any damaged has occurred, they may be liable.
By using shock and tilt indicators, it is possible for businesses to avoid the exorbitant cost of replacing items damaged during transportation.
- Tilt indicators are capable of monitoring either the degree of tilt or when an item has been tilted on its side. This makes the shippers, consigners and handlers act accordingly. These devices are particularly useful for goods that are required to remain upright or not tilted over a certain angle throughout the packaging and shipping phase. They include a serial number for tampering prevention and arrows to remind handlers about keeping the shipment upright or within the specific degree of tilt. The indicator gets triggered as soon as the package gets tilted more than the permissible limit.
- Shock indicators, on the other hand, are used for the detection and recording of shocks in storage or during transportation. As soon as the shock exceeds the predetermined shock level, the device turns red to indicate mishandling.
Benefits of using Shock and Tilt Indicators:
Shock and tilt indicators offer numerous benefits that can improve any company’s operation. They allow businesses to ship their products and be rest assured that the impact of any mishandling of the shipped items will be detected and indicated. They can also significantly reduce the probability of damage and loss of products during shipping and storage.
Some other benefits of these indicators include:
- Protects sensitive, fragile, and calibrated items.
- Helps identify weaknesses throughout the supply chain.
- Provides evidence of product mishandling.
- Reduces customer inspection time.
- Enhances the image of a business.
- Do not require any changes to the products, packaging, or shipping methods.
If you have more questions about shock and tilt indicators, please contact us at ShockWatch. We are the market leaders in damage indicators and damage prevention products in Australia.
