Pelican Custom Case Solutions

June 4, 2017

pelican professional blog custom case design services foam

Pelican is uniquely specialized to create custom packaging solutions for almost anything. The Pelican Professional team took a few minutes to sit down with our Project Engineer and 20-year Pelican Veteran, Chris Hopkins, who works out of the East Coast branch in South Deerfield, Massachusetts.

Chris has been working with Pelican for many years, first as a customer for Hardigg before it was acquired by Pelican in 2009. Working as a military contractor for the ARMY, Hopkins advanced their tent systems and utilized custom cases for his transport solution. Today, he works as an engineer with a team that focuses on Pelican’s custom protective solution development and production services, offering case solutions in nearly any shape and size.

So how is a custom case created? How does Chris or someone on his team will work directly with customers to find exactly the solution that they need.

Let’s walk through the process:

Case type: Which case do you go with? We have plenty of options, and we’ll help you determine which is the best for your equipment.
Interior protection: Foam is the go-to, but depending on the equipment needs and specifications, you may want to consider shock mounts or a custom chassis.
Design: We can accept your own design, or we can work with you to create the design for you, all according to your schedule and budget.
The details: Lid stays, casters, purge valves, custom logos. The goal is to get your equipment from point A to B with zero impact, all while consider factors such as humidity, pressure, or aesthetics.

Here are some examples for both large and small solutions:

Small Solutions: A major Ride Share Service relies on data from their driver cars to match the data received via driver apps. So how do they verify this data? They install hard-wired monitors, including sensitive electronics, sensors and data loggers within cars. The Ride Share Service approached Pelican looking for a custom transportation solution for shipping the cases around the country. They provided the dimensional requirements and sensitivity needs and, with this basic information, Pelican was able to then draw up custom interior designs that would work for transporting their technology far and wide. This is a collaboration between Pelican, the Ride Share Service and their technology partners to create an interior foam custom solutions for an existing Pelican Case, that perfectly fit their needs.

But, what about solutions that don’t fit in existing Pelican sizes (of which there are hundreds!), Here’s our next example of a solution that’s extremely large:

Large Solutions: The US Military has a packaging group out of Philadelphia and approached Pelican to modernize their transport solutions for an F-18 Fighter Jet fuel tank. Their dimensions would require a case roughly the size of the car. These flexible fuel tanks previously shipped within wooden crates which normally last around two shipments before they have to be replaced, so they approached Pelican for a custom solution that could be used time after time.

The fuel cells had some interesting attributes. The cells couldn’t actually sit on their own weight, so Pelican created a custom aluminum framework that acted as an external service stand allowing service technicians to repair, inspect and maintain the cells without damaging them. Pelican partnered with the Military, and through multiple product generations, became the standard for this particular LRU (Line Replaceable Unit). Pelican designs and produces many packages for these replacement parts to ensure they make it to their final destination, ready for action.