Process
(1) Define best materials to have
a. Containers (boxes)
b. Bag sealing
c. Bags
d. Box fillers
e. Cold and heat packs
f. O2?
(2) Now that you have materials, See three options to ship
a. Confirm orders, payment, and shipping date
b. Option 1 I Like this one best
c. Option 2
d. Option 3
Shipping Best Practices
Purpose: Nail down a specific, repeatable shipping method that foremost gives the corals the best possible change of survival from my reef to the next. Cost is always a factor in both materials, and shipping so ideally want to keep costs down, which benefits everyone.
Containers
Purpose: Protect the life within its grasp. There are two parts, the box itself and the insulating capacity of that box.
Boxes:
Boxes can be premade with a single styrofoam cooler inside with a perfectly made lid, or a normal box with a sort of DIY insulation, or an already tailored bubble wrap insulating shell.
First, my plan is to target reusing medical shipping containers that are used to ship medications. This is a premade styrofoam cooler inside. Essentially safes both shipper and buyer money, since I should be able to get them for free as it recycles/reuses. Second in my opinion is this type of box is a more sturdy container to protect the corals inside against crushing. Let’s face it, a simple search on youtube confirms how badly boxes are treated, no matter what is written on them. Third, medial shipping tends to use smaller boxes, which in turn saves on the sipping.
If can’t get reuse, I’d explore both buying premade, or using bubble insulation - cool shield bubble packs (has a R value of 9 which is equal to a 1" of styro). Since box size is directly tied to shipping price, might still be worth exploring using bubble insulation. Personally, I’ll never get into buying sheets of styrofoam and cutting to fit that within a box. Too much time, and quality issues in my opinion to make it worth wile. Not knocking anyone who does this, but I don’t like the idea of cutting up styrofoam and making a mess. I have enough of a chore removing salt spray off everything in the house.
Found this helpful, although don’t know how true it is: An 8x8x7 box is a good size for small frag packs because its about as big as you can go before the price shoots way up. For example, an 8x8x7 box shipped priority overnight can cost $55 but if you ship a 12x12x12 box it can cost almost $90.
Size:
I didn’t realize that the size of the box makes a BIG difference. I learned this from earlier in this thread, that FedEx uses a formula called "dimensional weight" of (Length x Width x Height) / 194 rounded up to the next pound *OR* actual weight rounded up to the next pound, whichever is more. So, if you ship a box 12 x 9 x 10 you’ll pay for 6 pounds even if it only weighs 4 pounds. So even if you shipped an empty box, it's not just the weight but also how much space it takes up on the aircraft. Always use the smallest box you can get by with. This is tricky since right now while it's cold, the larger box with more water has more "mass" to keep the temp from fluctuating so much. I don’t know what the sweet spot is, but it was written in one of the reference links that if you're going to pay for 6 pounds anyway, you might as well put more water in the bags, the frags will arrive in better shape. Strategy is to use enough water to support 24-48hrs in transit, even though a goal is to shoot for 16 hrs door to door.
