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BBQ Charcoal

Packaging & Container Loading (20ft, Weight-Limited)

Charcoal is carried at sea as UN 1361 under IMDG class 4.2, and the self-heating behaviour behind that classification is assessed by the test set out in IMDG special provision SP 978. In practice the loading controls are dry cartons, a tight square stow and no crushed cases at the door face.

A 20-foot container of coconut BBQ charcoal is weight-limited, not volume-limited — you hit the payload ceiling long before you run out of space. How much loads depends on the briquette shape, and the figures below are industry benchmarks, not a fixed guarantee.

Net Load By Shape

Net load in a 20ft container, by briquette shape Industry benchmark — not our measured value. Method / source: Typical loaded weights — vary with briquette density, moisture, and packing
Shape Net load per 20ft (t)
Pillow 18–19.5
Hexagonal 15.5–16.5

The denser pillow shape carries more weight per container; hexagonal loads lighter for the same volume. Match the shape to whether your landed cost is driven by sea freight (favour pillow’s higher payload) or by your end-use.

The binder is natural, additive-free, food-grade tapioca (cassava) starch, which gelatinises with water during mixing and holds the milled coconut shell charcoal together, so no chemical accelerant is added to the briquette. Total sulfur in the finished briquette is determined by ASTM D4239.

Road Weight Limits Onward

The sea leg is rarely the binding constraint — the road leg at destination often is. Plan the inland move against the local truck payload cap.

Practical road payload caps by region Industry benchmark — not our measured value. Method / source: Regional road-weight norms — confirm against the local limit for your route
Leg Practical payload cap (t)
US road (20ft drayage) ~17
EU road ~40–44

Palletless Loading

We load palletless by default. Floor-loading the cartons:

  • avoids wooden pallets, so there is no ISPM-15 heat-treatment / fumigation stamp to manage, and
  • recovers roughly 15% of the usable space a pallet would consume.

Inside the container the goods are protected by a master carton → inner pack → wrap structure; private-label cartons follow your agreed OEM packaging specification.

Questions

It is weight-limited: roughly 18–19.5 t for pillow briquettes and 15.5–16.5 t for hexagonal (industry benchmarks). The exact figure depends on density, moisture, and packing.

No — we load palletless by default. That avoids the ISPM-15 wood-packaging treatment and recovers about 15% of the space pallets would take.

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