Heavy Duty Saw Horse

Lancair kit crates are delivered in a covered cargo trailer ( I had been hoping for an open bed trailer ). Unloading the crates off the truck without a loading dock is some what tricky. The crates must be pulled out the back of the truck and one end rested on some sort of support that is approximately as high off the ground as the floor of the truck cargo area. After a crate has been pulled far enough out of the back of the truck, it can be lifted from the center by a forklift. Lancair suggests that the support can be something like a heavy duty saw horse. Unfortunately, any existing saw horse I am aware of is not high, strong, and stable enough to be used for this purpose. It was clear to me from the beginning that I would have to design and build a custom support for the job.

The heavy duty saw horse that I designed and built is pictured below.

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The vertical supports on both sides were made of an outer 2x6, and an inner 2x4. Those vertical supports were supported by 45 degree 2x4 boards. The base was made of a single 63.5” 2x4. The top cross beam was 48” high ( the approximate height of a typical loading dock ). The base was 30” on both sides of the vertical support. I chose to make the base length long to help insure that the support would not tip over easily.

Builder Note:

Saw Horse Contruction Changes

Now that I have actually gone through the receiving process, I would like to mention that I would make changes to this saw horse if I were preparing for another delivery. The 2 vertical 2x4s used in the two sides, and the 2x4s used in the top horizontal support were oriented such that the weight and stress was placed on the wide side of the boards. I should have oriented them such that the weight and stress was on the narrow side. If I had rotated the boards 90 degrees, I would have had to only use a little more wood, but the saw horse would have been substantially stronger. The saw horse I built was fine for the smaller crate, but I believe I was too close for comfort to the saw horse’s capacity with the larger crate.

The top cross beam was 5 feet long to insure that each crate would fit completely on top of the support so that the sides of the crate would not extend over the sides of the support. The top cross beam was made up of 3 2x4 boards screwed together and connected to the two sides. There were 2 separate 2x4 cross members along the bottom of the base. The top cross beam had 45 degree supports to make sure that the whole structure wouldn’t collapse to the right or left under a load.

Heavy Duty Dollies

I built large heavy duty furniture style dollies. Each dolly was 5’ by 3’. The boards that made up the frame of each dolly was made of 2x6 boards. One dolly is pictured below.

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Each corner of each dolly had a heavy duty caster. Each caster had a maximum weight capacity of 300 lbs. The total capacity of each dolly was 1200 lbs. With the aid of 20-20 hindsight, each caster should have been able to support at least 400 lbs.

The casters were purchased from Harbor Freight. The part number is 41514, and are $7.99 each. The casters are bolted to the frame with 5/16” carriage bolts.

Builder Note:

Dolly Casters Changes

If I were doing this all over again, I would use heavier duty casters. We were operating too close to the capacity of the casters. Although the weight of the crates were within the limits, the crates can be difficult to place on the dollies gently. The force for an instant could easily exceed the limits of the casters. When I designed the dollies, I figured that if they could hold 50% more weight than the known approximate weight of crates, they would have sufficient capacity. Now I would design them to accommodate double the target load. Each caster should have been rated for at least 400 lbs. Also, I think the actual tire should be solid hard plastic. I used 4” wheels. I would either stick with 4” wheels, or upgrade to 5” or 6” if possible.

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