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Wine shippers
Posted: 16:44 Wed 10 Sep 2008
by jdaw1
I’m off for a trip to the Douro at the end of the month, so will need a wine shipper that can hold at least a dozen bottles. For shippers that equally protect the bottles, next priority is a balance of cost, collapsibility for easy storage, and environmental soundness.
Recommendations?
Has anyone experience of
Spirited Shipper? They are cheap, collapsible, and cardboard. But are they strong? Also worthy of note is that they do magnum shippers. (But it’s not worth ordering ten boxes just to get
screen-printed onto them.)
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 17:46 Wed 10 Sep 2008
by Andy Velebil
Just go to your local wine store and buy a styro 12-bottle shipper, or get one from someone else that has one. Trust me when I say styro is best when traveling in the Douro and MOST IMPORTANTLY it protects better against the guerrillas (aka: airport baggage handlers) that love to try and destroy everything.
Those ones with cardboard dividers dont protect as well as the styro does. And the styro helps to insulate the bottles from heat fluctuations. Every box I've brought back from the Douro has had the airlines rip some kinda small hole in the side, exposing the stryo. With the type your looking at, your bottle will be exposed or broken by what ever ripped the hole in the side.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 22:05 Wed 10 Sep 2008
by SushiNorth
Andy V wrote:Just go to your local wine store and buy a styro 12-bottle shipper
I endorse these as well, along with:
1) Double bag the shipper in a garbage bags that you tie closed. Don't bag the bottles, bag the styro (which protects the bag from glass shards).
2) Consider a hard-case suitcase to protect against punctures. Fly out with it, then throw your clothes into a duffle for the return journey.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 04:46 Thu 11 Sep 2008
by Glenn E.
Another improvement for using styro shippers is to insert crumpled newspaper in the bottom and top of each bottle's bin to help absorb shocks and prevent the bottles from breaking out the top (or more usually, the bottom). If the bottles are loose in their bins, then wrap them in sufficient newspaper to prevent them from rattling around.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 17:47 Thu 11 Sep 2008
by mosesbotbol
Styro is the way to go unless you buy a purpose built wine suitcase. The purpose built hold usually 6 bottles, but there may be a larger one$ too.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 21:39 Thu 11 Sep 2008
by DRT
I would recommend a styro shipper in a cardboard box.
When you get to the airport have it shrink-wrapped for almost £zero$ and have them put FRAGILE tape around it. Then take it to the out-sized luggage desk to check it in. None of this will make any real difference but it will only really cost you time and will make you feel as though you tried as hard as you could to stop those tw***s playing footie with it in the baggage room.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 22:09 Thu 11 Sep 2008
by Glenn E.
The best way to insure that your baggage is handled properly is to insure it, but that can be expensive. Plus it also makes it more difficult to argue with customs about the value of the contents.
Marking it "fragile" makes it a target. Having them mark it "insured" means that the airline will have to cough up cash if they break it, so they seem to be much more careful about handling it.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 23:19 Thu 11 Sep 2008
by DRT
Glenn E. wrote:Marking it "fragile" makes it a target.
Perhaps we should have some special
tape made that says "Break this and I'll cut your nuts off with an Ah-so
" - that should work.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 02:30 Fri 12 Sep 2008
by jdaw1
For $200
Lexington Luggage will convert any suitcase into a bottle carrier. They will cut foam-rubber to fit, with holes as you require — whether for bottles, glasses, cameras or musical instruments. My old sturdy samsonite suitcase, hated by the boss, is likely to become a bottle carrier (if it can hold enough bottles, which I will check tomorrow).
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 03:44 Fri 12 Sep 2008
by g-man
jdaw1 wrote:For $200
Lexington Luggage will convert any suitcase into a bottle carrier. They will cut foam-rubber to fit, with holes as you require — whether for bottles, glasses, cameras or musical instruments. My old sturdy samsonite suitcase, hated by the boss, is likely to become a bottle carrier (if it can hold enough bottles, which I will check tomorrow).
fyi there's a 51 pound limit on all luggages.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 14:15 Fri 12 Sep 2008
by jdaw1
How much does a bottle of port weigh? Most of 4 pounds? (I don’t have a suitable weighing scale.)
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 14:38 Fri 12 Sep 2008
by Andy Velebil
On the weight thing....
A standard 12 bottle styro shipper filled with 12 bottles of Port is under the limit.
Those luggage type wine carriers are VERY heavy and for the popular one that Roy also has (forget the name) you can only get to about 7-8 bottles before you go over the weight limit. And if you do go over, stand by. Last year I asked and it was a 90 euros penalty for going over.
Trust me when I say, just get the 12 bottle stryo shipper here in the states and take it with you. It is the easiest way to safely transport your wine in. They are all but impossible to find once you get to Oporto.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 14:39 Fri 12 Sep 2008
by DRT
jdaw1 wrote:How much does a bottle of port weigh? Most of 4 pounds? (I don’t have a suitable weighing scale.)
An OWC of 12 bottles weight approx 21kg so allow <2kg per bottle.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 14:42 Fri 12 Sep 2008
by g-man
jdaw1 wrote:How much does a bottle of port weigh? Most of 4 pounds? (I don’t have a suitable weighing scale.)
Dont forget about the weight of your packaging stuff + suitcase =)
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 13:02 Sun 14 Sep 2008
by Alex Bridgeman
Allow 1.5kg per bottle (being 0.75kg for the liquid and 0.75kg for the bottle). At 2.24 pounds to the kg that is about 3.4lbs per bottle. My suitcases weigh about 3.5kg when empty.
But I do endorse Andy's suggestion with a slight variation. Get two 6 packs that are identically sized. You can then tape them together or not as you wish. How heavy was the parcel you carried over to the US last February? If I recall correctly, that was two 6 packs with 12 bottles.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 14:47 Sun 14 Sep 2008
by jdaw1
The weight argument has persuaded me that a semi-custom suitcase wouldn’t be clever.
And as Jay had an idle whole-case polystyrene shipper, he has donated it to me. Problem solved, as well as it can be.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 06:21 Mon 15 Sep 2008
by RonnieRoots
If you're only able to take along a small amount of bottles (like me), I can recommend Wineskin, a bottle-shaped bubblewrap. We had two bottles in each suitcase when we returned from holiday and it worked fine (bottles were of course packed in the middle of the suitcase, surrounded by soft clothes...)
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 20:29 Tue 13 Sep 2011
by jdaw1
Politico, in an article entitled [url=http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/62705.html]Janet Napolitano: Shoes-on flight in sight[/url], wrote:Air travelers will eventually be able to keep their shoes on to pass through security, but the restrictions on carrying liquids on board are likely to remain in place for some time, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told a POLITICO Playbook breakfast Tuesday.
‟We are moving towards an intelligence and risk-based approach to how we screen,” Napolitano told Mike Allen during a morning forum at the Newseum. ‟I think one of the first things you will see over time is the ability to keep your shoes on. One of the last things you will [see] is the reduction or limitation on liquids.”
!
She said research and development efforts on the shoe front are progressing, but technology to perform a quick scan that can distinguish harmless liquids from explosives isn’t there yet.
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 14:03 Wed 14 Sep 2011
by JacobH
jdaw1 wrote:Politico wrote:She said research and development efforts on the shoe front are progressing, but technology to perform a quick scan that can distinguish harmless liquids from explosives isn’t there yet.
Like tasting it?
Re: Wine shippers
Posted: 20:10 Mon 03 Oct 2011
by Alex Bridgeman
JacobH wrote:jdaw1 wrote:Politico wrote:She said research and development efforts on the shoe front are progressing, but technology to perform a quick scan that can distinguish harmless liquids from explosives isn’t there yet.
Like tasting it?
Heavens! Only if it's been properly decanted first!