Hi all,  Years ago I ordered four wooden boxes from a joiner in
New Zealand.  I planned to complete them later with cylinder musical
movements from Reuge (3/50 or 3/72 model).  I instructed him to send
two boxes by airmail and two boxes by ship.  The two boxes sent by
airmail arrived in Germany in very good condition.  The two boxes
sent by ship arrived in a very bad condition: they were distorted and
twisted, with broken corners.

In February this year I was again in New Zealand.  In a small factory
for wooden boxes I bought a few boxes and told the owner about my
experience sending them overseas.  He told me about the former owner
of that company.  That man had an order from the USA for wooden boxes,
and he sent all the boxes in a container ship to the USA.  The order
arrived in bad condition, and ruined his business.

The reason was: You never know where the container with your
boxes will end up on a container ship.  If you have luck it will
placed inside the ship; if you haven't much luck it will placed
on top of a stack of other containers, covered with nothing.

When crossing the equator for days or weeks the sun will heat up
the inside of the uppermost containers to extremely high temperatures,
which can ruin temperature-sensitive things.  I think the same can
happen in the summer months between America and Europe.

Best Regards

Hauke Marxsen