Electronic Parts/Guidelines - infoHouse

Material light-Weightlng: Material light-weighting is a simple concept that involves using less mate-
rial in a design. The objective is to use only enough material to provide the required level of perform-
ance (e.@, shock protection, stacking strength, durability, etc.). Some examples of light-weighting are
included in the following list:
Reduced thickness or bursting test on COrrUgated fiberboards. For example, when Stacking
Strength. durability. for repeated uses, or puncture resistance is not needed in a container, lower
Strength boards may be selected. This may mean reducing triple-wall boards to high-performance
double-wall materials, or it may mean reducing the bUrSting Strength of a board (e& 350 Ib test to
275 Ib test).
Reduced wall thickness on plastic containers. When impact Strength. precise dimensions, or dura-
bility is not significant, wall thickness‘s of plastic containers can be reduced. In the case of
vacuum-formed containers, a thinner wall may be accomplished with no tooling Changes.
Changing wall thickness’s of injection-molded parts may be more difficult and costly.
Reduced wall thickness on molded cushions. Reduced wall thickness’s may also be used on
molded cushions (e& molded expanded polystyrene or EPS end caps and cushloned trays). If
material is not needed for structural integrity or for shock protection (foam will only provide shock
protection, if it can deflect during impact), material is probably not needed and can be removed.
Modified corner cushions. Protective foam cushions, designed to fit on the corners of a part or
product, often have unneeded or extra material that can be removed, without affecting the shock
protection ability. Protective cushioning material is usually needed only on the flat surfaces or
faces of the product. Material directly in the corner (Le.. the area formed by the intersection of
three adjacent product sides) is often not needed and may be removed.
Alternate Materlal Selection: Sometimes the use of an alternate material and design can result in the
reduction of material used. For example, shock protection requirements for a design can be met by
using several different types of foam cushioning material. Because of chemical composition and physical
structure differences, the volume and mass of foam needed will vary, depending on the material
selected. In general. the stiffer foam materials will require less volume in a design. Polystyrene materials
offer the highest stiffness, polyethylenes and polypropylenes offer medium stiffness, and
polyurethanes offer the lowest stiffness’s; however, certain polyurethane esters are available in moderately
high stiffness‘s.
Since the cost of the foam materials varies significantly. the package design using the lowest volume
of foam may not have the lowest package cost. When this is the case, savings from lower transporta-
tion costs (due to better density) or lower container costs may offset the higher foam costs. Lower
transportation costs are more likely to occur when smaller cushion thickness’s (rather than less
cushion bearing area) are used to reduce the volume of CUShiOning material needed in a package. For
example, if one inch of cushion thickness is removed from all sides of a 5.0 cubic feet packaged
product (Weighing 30 pounds), the package volume will be reduced to about 3.7 cubic feet. This
smaller package will cost about $8 less to ship by air within the US. and about $15 less to ship by air
from the U.S. to an international location.
Bulk versus Unit Packages: A material reduction technique often used with supplier and Interplant
packaging programs is bulk packaging. Quite often the use of bulk packaging requires less packaging
material, per part, than individually packaged parts. In addition to material advantages of more parts
per package, bulk packages Often require less material for shock protection. Bulk packages, especially
when palletized, are less likely to be dropped from high drop heights. Unit and manually handled
packages are more likely to dropped from higher heights and require more shock protection (e.g.,
more dunnage and CUShiOning).
Reduced Product Protection: Quite oflen packaging materials can be reduced and sometimes elimi-
nated when the product requires minimal protection. Minimal protection may be the result of;
increased product ruggedness,
46 Environmental Packaging Guidelines
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