Anyone in the international freighting business?

Try contacting this company. https://www.canaangroup.ca/ I had a possible shipment going to Australia. Even though it did not go s customer arranged own shipping, the sales rep here was extremely helpful. Kayak would need to be crated for insurance purposes and would likely need to be crated with certified treated lumber as raw lumber is a problem. This in turn increases cost of shipping due to volume and weight. Or you find a company that sends containers when they are full and ready to go which means you might wait a while. With the cost of containers and shipping, this kayak must be worth the expense. Are you moving there and taking belongings or importing the kayak as that will also mean brokerage and customs so speak to a customs broker in your country?
 
About crating: I imported a kayak from Australia and Expedition Kayaks wrapped the boat in multiple layers of plastic tube bags, bubble wrap and corrugated cardboard (and "Fragile" signage :) ). The bundle was strapped to a pallet (about 4 feet square?- I left that at the warehouse in Vancouver when I picked up the boat) so that it could be moved by forklift in warehouses. It arrived in perfect condition. So that might be an option.
Here's a pic of the wrapping materials:
mini-IMG_0436.JPG


There was some dicsussion - I can't recall all the details - that a hard crate would be more likely to have items stacked on top of it, and that an obvious 'soft package' would get more careful treatment and be put in the top of a container. Also, we (seller/shipper and me, the buyer) decided not to arrange extra insurance against damage. I recall that there was some standard coverage against loss.
 
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In my experience shipping canoes and kayaks nationally and internationally it's a bit of a crap shoot as to whether or not someone puts a forklift through it.

I have shipped a canoe to Hawaii in a crate and it made it there happily.

I have found fluorescent stickers reading "Top load only" "fragile" "do not stack" "do not forklift" are apparently invisible to many shippers.
 
Standard payout without insurance is $2 per pound. Insurance is usually 3% of total declared value, but you will not likely get insurance if not crated. A good crate should be able to withstand stacking. But I suppose if the product is not that valuable to the owner, then wrapping in cardboard and plastic might work. And a long boat is that much more difficult for a forklift to load as would need two (one on each end) to load into a container. Or they just push it in from the end. It is not the shipping that causes harm, it the multiple depots that handle the package on the way. A trip across a country could see a piece unloaded and loaded and transferred many times from truck to truck.
 
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OrcaBoats said:
And a long boat is that much more difficult for a forklift to load as would need two (one on each end) to load into a container. Or they just push it in from the end.
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Many depots have forklifts with extensions, but you can't rely on that either. I usually build crates with a pallet on each end so a single forklift can hold the entire load from just one end. But it takes some doing to make something rigid enough.
 
JKA said:
Thanks for the suggestions folks. I'll dig a little deeper based on them.
John, out of interest, what did you bring in?
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Expedition Kayaks Audax Aurora.
Very nice boat, and very well-built....which was good since the purchase was a complete 'shot in the dark'. :) The EK crew (Mark Sundin & company) were excellent to work with and they did a very good job on the packing and shipping. Good shipping agents / forwarders on both ends made a high-stress (for me, not them) transaction painless.
 
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