On certain dates each year, in the part of the world where I live, thousands of wooden shipping pallettes are stacked up and burnt in the form of massive bonefires in celebration of bygone events. As these bonefires are controlled by powerful paramilitary gangs there is zero chance of any kind of deterring enforcement.
These pallettes are perfectly good and are capable of being repurposed to make various furniture items, but this is not going to happen unless something changes to make them become more valuable. The problem is therefore to make them more valuable, but not to cost any more to produce.
My solution to value/cost is to build in some extra features to the standard wooden pallette at the manufacturing stage, that are practically cost free and easily absorbed. These features involve machining the various pieces of wood to include dovetail joints and to print some lines and numbers on the various components that facilitate and encourage new sustainable usage with little effort.
With the new joints in place, the pallettes are capable of being broken apart and the resulting pieces reformed as the component parts of a variety of desireable, well made items. To make this even easier, there are complimentary instructions in the form of some simple diagrams.
A few cuts may need to made to create some of the items, but the dotted lines and numbers ensure there is no confusion. Pallettes will have colour types, with each colour offering a different configuration of lines, numbers and dovetail positioning to ensure a range of items can be generated.
With any luck, the new pallette range will result in reduced bonfire conflagrations and instead the proliferation of a large number of well made durable wooden items.-- xenzag, Sep 28 2020 You think the traditional drum-shaped stacking pattern is a strong enough "tradition" that no-one will dare use the dovetails to make higher and burnier conflagrations?-- pocmloc, Sep 28 2020 Can the dovetails be assembled with flammable adhesive ?
Can actual dove tails be burnt too ? Including the rest of the dove ... ?
<Evil chuckle/>-- 8th of 7, Sep 28 2020 //higher and burnier// [pocmloc]? Oh really? BURNIER???
How come no one says anything to him/her when they make- up words??? Huh???
The idea, I love. They leave stacks of these sitting on the side of the road for people to grab for free for fireplaces, I guess. It'd be good to see them repurposed, instead of burniering higherier.-- blissmiss, Sep 28 2020 A burny rabbit - a type of rabbit that spontaneously combusts.-- xenzag, Sep 28 2020 Where can we get some of those ? We will pay top dollar ...
<Pedantry>
We were waiting for someone to notice, but this is after all the slow class.
So, a "Palette" is "a rigid, flat surface on which a painter arranges and mixes paints". We have never seen piles of these discarded by the roadside.
However, a "Pallet" is "a flat transport structure, which supports goods in a stable fashion while being lifted by a forklift".
It's clear you're not a native English speaker ...
</Pedantry>-- 8th of 7, Sep 28 2020 Or "Peteroleum Rabbit", MUHWHAHAHAHAHA ...
Ahem.-- 8th of 7, Sep 28 2020 //when they make- up words??? Huh???//
Well [blissmiss] there is a knack to it. When *I* makeyuppy a word, one of my various fans, minions or assorted hangers-on will hurry to provide a fabricated dictionary definition to make it look more seriouser than it really is.-- pocmloc, Sep 28 2020 [pocmloc]; after all, if it's on the internet, it must be true... (Unfortunately, "makeuppy" is already a word, but is more related to the stuff women slather all over their faces, than inventiveness...)-- neutrinos_shadow, Sep 28 2020 (wonders if this reported shameless waste will spur the shift to metal pallets, aluminum or perhaps the British isotope aluminium, infinitely recyclable. doubtful.)-- whatrock, Sep 28 2020 Hey [what], have you seen how aluminium/magnesium alloy burns if you get it hot enough ?
<Sniggering/>
How come Americans can't spell "Aluminium" correctly, but can spell "Magnesium" ? If they were consistent, they'd call it "Magnesum", shirley ?
If Aluminium scrap from the rest of the world is recycled in the U.S.A., do they refine out the extra 'i's ? What do they do with them ?-- 8th of 7, Sep 28 2020 Recyclers in the US have a cozy deal with Apple. They buy all our unneeded "i's".-- whatrock, Sep 28 2020 Well, that explains a great deal. Not quite everything; there is, for example, no satisfactory explanation for the continued existence of root beer. But it explains a lot, nonetheless.
Hey [what], have you seen how aluminium/magnesium alloy reacts if you reduce it to fine filings and mix it with ammonium perchlorate in the right ratio, then supply a source of ignition ?-- 8th of 7, Sep 28 2020 Hmm, this opens up interesting methods of shipping your products when regular transport fails. Surplussing an aluminum pallet with a bit of ammonium perchlorate might launch your merchandise skyward, hopefully towards your customer.-- whatrock, Sep 28 2020 From the OED, “The Latin names of metals were in -um, e.g. aurum, argentum, ferrum; the names of sodium, potassium, and magnesium, derived from soda, potassa or potash, and magnesia, were given by Davy in 1807, with the derivative form -ium; and although some of the later metals have received names in -um, the general form is in - ium, as in cadmium, iridium, lithium, osmium, palladium, rhodium, titanium, uranium; in conformity with which aluminum has been altered to aluminium.”
Molybdenum, tantalum, stannum, plumbum, lanthanum...
It’s clear you’re just trying to make us into linguistic conformists to arbitrary rulings, like the French.
Either that or you’ve not done your Latin lessons properly.-- RayfordSteele, Sep 29 2020 //one of my various fans, minions or assorted hangers-on//
I think I'm jealous. I would like some mini-onions, and hangeroners. Send them out for coffees? Perhaps, [pocmloc].-- blissmiss, Sep 29 2020 Nice, but cost is either going to give a limited set of designs or a generic clever notching that allows open ended imagination.
The non for profit I work for is currently re-purposing pallet wood for various items, for funds generation. It works just, due to great volunteers and some workshop electricity and consumables. But then, skilled craftspeople do have the ability to tool the rough clay of wood into very beautiful things.-- wjt, Oct 02 2020 // tool the rough clay of wood into very beautiful things. // ... whch works fine until you bake them as 1200 C in a kiln...-- 8th of 7, Oct 02 2020 //burnier// obviously, it's from the French, and pronounced "burn-ee-ay".-- zen_tom, Oct 02 2020 Burney always gets my vote. [+]-- Voice, Oct 05 2020 random, halfbakery