Standard footprints
Most stillages and pallet cages are built on standard pallet footprints so they work with the forklifts, reach trucks and pallet jacks you already own. The two most common in Australia are 1,165 × 1,165 mm, matching the standard Australian pallet, and 1,200 × 1,200 mm for heavier frames.
Longer frames exist for stock that does not fit a square footprint — tyre stillages, roll stillages for carpet and vinyl, and post-and-pipe stillages for long lengths. The rule is simple: the stock should sit supported inside the frame, not overhang it.
- 1,165 × 1,165 mm — standard cage, matches the Australian pallet
- 1,200 × 1,200 mm — heavy cage for dense loads
- 1,500–2,000 mm long frames — rolls, tyres, pipe and awkward lengths
What a load rating actually means
A safe working load is the weight the frame is designed to carry in normal use, with a safety margin built in. It is not the weight at which the frame fails — it is the weight you can load, stack and fork every day without deforming anything.
Two numbers matter. The first is the load inside a single frame. The second is the stacking load: what the bottom frame in a column has to carry from every frame above it. A cage rated to 1,000 kg internally will state a separate maximum stack height for that reason.
Choosing a rating you will not outgrow
Rate for the heaviest thing you will realistically put in the frame, not the average. A cage that spends most of its life half-loaded costs nothing extra to run, but a cage that is overloaded once a week will not last.
As a rough guide: 500 kg suits light, bulky stock like consumables and packaging; 1,000 kg covers most mixed warehouse stock, cased goods and fittings; 2,000 kg is for dense material — sorted scrap, cement, fencing wire, filled drums and bulk glass.
- 500 kg — light and bulky: packaging, consumables, trims
- 1,000 kg — general warehouse, cased goods, fittings, parts
- 2,000 kg — dense loads: scrap, bagged goods, drums, wire
Stack height and floor loading
Stacking is where stillages earn their keep — the same floor footprint carries four to six times the stock. How high you can go depends on the frame, the load inside it and the condition of your floor.
Check the floor loading of the slab before you plan a six-high column of 2,000 kg cages. Most warehouse slabs handle it comfortably, but older sheds, mezzanines and suspended floors need a look first.
Folding, and why it matters to the numbers
Foldable frames collapse when empty, so a return truck carries roughly four times the stillages it delivered and an empty frame takes a quarter of the storage space. On any returnable fleet, that is the difference between a freight cost that works and one that does not.
If your frames travel out to customers, sites or branches and come back empty, folding is not a nice-to-have. It is the whole business case.
Getting it right the first time
Send us the heaviest load you put in a frame, the footprint your handling gear expects, how high you want to stack and whether the frames travel. Those four answers pick the size and rating between them.
For bulk runs we build custom solutions for your unique requirement, sized around your stock rather than a catalogue page.