Can your warehouse receive a bronze crate?

Usually yes — but only if the foundry knows what your receiving end looks like before it builds the crates. Bronze is dense: a crate holding a handful of pieces can be the heaviest thing on your dock that week. Tell us your door height, whether you have a dock, a forklift or only a pallet jack, and how a crate travels the last ten metres. We size and split crates around that answer.

What does a bronze crate actually weigh?

One figure we confirm without seeing your order: a size-65 five-piece altar set runs about 36 kg in bronze alone — crane pair 5–7 cm taller than the burner, candlesticks 12–15 cm shorter. Add blocking and the case and one set is a crate two people should not lift by hand.

Beyond that we will not guess. Ask for the weighing sheet with your quotation: net weight piece by piece, then gross weight and outside dimensions per crate once the packing plan is fixed. A gross weight quoted before that plan exists is an estimate your forwarder will book on.

Do I need a dock, a forklift, or neither?

One of three: a dock a trailer can back into, a forklift that reaches the trailer bed, or a delivery service that brings the crate to ground level. With none of them the crate stays on the truck and you pay for a second attempt — the commonest way a first bronze lot goes wrong, and it is decided in the crate shop weeks earlier.

What can the foundry change if I have no forklift?

More than most buyers ask. Before the packing plan is signed we can split a large crate into several, cap the heaviest at a weight you name, raise or lower the skid, put the opening face on the long side so a piece slides out instead of lifting out, and mark the lifting points. What we cannot change is the bronze.

Send us this before we pack:

• Clear door and gate size — the narrowest point on the route, not the widest.
• What lifts — dock, forklift and its reach, pallet jack, or nothing.
• The route — steps, thresholds, a lift with a load limit, gravel, a ramp.
• A maximum crate weight — name the number and we build to it.
• Who signs and photographs — a name and a phone number, not "the warehouse".

How small can crates be split before they waste container space?

Splitting is not free. Every extra crate adds two walls of timber and a gap of blocking, so the same bronze measures larger — space you already paid for on a full container, and a higher measured volume on an LCL lot. Split for what your dock cannot handle, then stop: if you can take one heavy crate and three light ones, say so. Which mode suits a first lot: LCL or FCL for a bronze shipment from Vietnam. How much goes in a box at all is on how much bronze fits in a container.

What must I tell my forwarder?

The same facts you gave us, plus our crate list: crate count, gross weight, outside dimensions. Ask them — not us — about road weight limits, liftgate and inside-delivery availability, and limited-access charges; those vary by carrier and we put no numbers on them. Ask also for the loading photographs.

Who uncrates, and what do I check?

Inside, on a flat floor, with the crate standing the way it travelled — not on a tail lift, not on gravel, not on its side. Work top down: lid, face panel, blocking, then lift. Keep the timber until you have counted.

Photograph the closed crate, then the open crate before lifting. Count against the packing list, check the crate marks, measure two or three pieces. Hand casting moves: 1–3 cm off a nominal size is normal and we say so in writing; over 5 cm is a fault. A cracked base or fresh scrape is transit damage, and your photographs decide who pays — see bronze damaged on arrival. Measuring points are on our specifications page; crate construction is in packing bronze for sea freight.

Questions buyers ask

Can I receive a container with no forklift at all?

Yes, if the crates were built for it and you order the right delivery service — tell us before we pack. Full-size crates at a unit with only a pallet jack means a wasted delivery and a depot charge.

Can I open the crates at the truck?

We would rather you did not: a tail lift or kerb is where pieces get dropped and damage becomes impossible to attribute. If you must inspect before signing, open one crate inside with the driver present.

Does splitting into smaller crates cost me space?

Yes — more timber and blocking means the same bronze measures larger. Split only as far as your dock requires.

What should I cap the heaviest crate at?

Name a figure your team and equipment can handle and we build to it. For reference, a size-65 five-piece set is about 36 kg of bronze before timber.

A piece is broken when I open the crate — what now?

Stop unpacking. Photograph the piece where it lies, the blocking around it and the crate exterior, keep all of it, and send the photographs the same day.