There's never a bad time to brush up on your pallet rack safety, and even if you're reminding yourself of a number of rules you already follow, you're doing yourself a big favor. The pallet rack experts at Speedrack Midwest make safety their number one priority, and we make a mantra of every one of these tips to ensure that no one ever gets hurt.

There are plenty of other things to consider when installing or maintaining your pallet rack, but keep these in mind next time you walk the aisles.

• Protect uprights from collisions: column protectors may not stop everything, but they can take the brunt of most hits from fork trucks and keep smaller accidents from eating away at your pallet rack. Use these in all zones where fork trucks operate, and use end-of-aisle guards for added protection from turning or reversing fork trucks. Use floor markings, reflectors, and other highly visible indicators to let fork truck operators know their limits.
• Load rack properly: make sure your fork truck operators are loading pallets squarely on the rack, resting evenly across the load beams to ensure the weight is dispersed as it should be. Going along with the cardinal rule of obeying weight capacities, don't overstuff your load bays, either. Give your operators enough horizontal and vertical space in each load bay to safely store and retrieve product.
• Obey posted weight capacities: this assumes your weight capacities are posted, which they should be! All of your beams and uprights should be marked with their listed weight capacities, and these should never be exceeded. If you have pre-owned beams and don't know their capacity, take measurements and contact the manufacturer to find out.
• Prevent falls off the back of your rack: one especially important safety feature that you can't overlook is a barrier to prevent product from slipping off the back of your pallet rack. Heavy duty wire mesh panels or netting can prevent entire skids or loose product from falling to the floor below. Backstop beams ensure that skids are never shoved off the backside of your rack.
• Install uprights on level ground: as flat as your cement floor looks and feels, it likely isn't perfectly level. Ensure your uprights are square and plumb before adding load beams and more bays. Shim plates may be necessary to achieve this, so make sure you have plenty on hand that match your uprights' foot plates. Having your pallet rack square is critical toward weight distribution and overall strength.

Disobeying any of these tips, or many of the other rules you should follow when utilizing pallet rack, could result in a disastrous accident. You can consult the material handling experts at Speedrack Midwest in Sparta, Michigan to ensure that your pallet rack is installed, inspected, and maintained properly. Call 616-887-8886 to speak with a member of our team about new or pre-owned pallet rack and installation today.