5 ms·

These little air bags makes a lot of sense to me, I wonder why it took them so long to become popular. How did everyone live through the packing peanuts phase a

by vinhboy 10y ago

These little air bags makes a lot of sense to me, I wonder why it took them so long to become popular. How did everyone live through the packing peanuts phase and not realize this is a much simpler solution?

justinator 10y ago
the last package peanuts I seem to remember finding in a package were disposable by putting them in compost, which seems like an advantage over plastic bags.
- waterphone 10y ago
  I haven't seen anyone else using it yet, but iFixit uses a paper/cardboard lattice/expanded mesh as packing material.
  - spilk 10y ago
    If we're talking about the same thing, I see electronic component vendors like Digikey/Mouser/etc. using that paper mesh a lot.
  - hanniabu 10y ago
    These are awesomexpected and work great, but unfortunately I bet they're pricier which is a huge influencer in packaging decisions.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- mmanfrin 10y ago
  Recent ones you can, but those came about during the ascent of packaged air. Old ones were just plastic. New ones you can even eat. They're made of corn.
  - ianai 10y ago
    It seems silly to use something with finite supply for something so simple to substitute.
    - Dylan16807 10y ago
      It's not that simple. We can turn corn into petrochemicals if the relative prices change enough.
      - cossatot 10y ago
        We routinely turn petrochemicals into corn, so it's nice to occasionally return the favor. (https://store.extension.iastate.edu/Product/Energy-consumption-for-row-crop-production-Farm-Energy-PDF https://store.extension.iastate.edu/Product/Energy-consumpti...)
- r00fus 10y ago
  They're a nightmare if you have babies/pets and don't clear out your packing materials quickly - I keep my boxes and materials until I validate the item's functional. Disposable peanuts are made from corn/rice so humans/pets can eat them, but it's unknown if they're easily digestible in large quantities and anecdotes about pets hurling them up are out there. I prefer the air-packs, yes it's plastic (my recycler accepts them if they're collapsed and not loose), but a small amount given the size of the packages.
  - joezydeco 10y ago
    I ate one of the peanuts on a dare a long time ago, wouldn't do it again. Whatever is on there as a preservative or pet/child deterrent (or possibly both) made me nauseous for hours afterward.
    - CodeWriter23 10y ago
      What did you get in return for taking the dare?
  - kurthr 10y ago
    Even if you don't have babies/pets, but keep those recyclable peanuts around... you soon will in the form of roaches, moths, and mice. They grow up so quick!
- Spooky23 10y ago
  Except you need to have a compost pile and become adept at identifying variants of packing peanuts. We actually do compost, but our pile is inactive in the winter, and dumping some mysterious product into it isn't something that I'd want to do.
  - justinator 10y ago
    The city I live in has a composting program [0], so even if I don't want to compost myself, it's compulsory. The trash bin we get is about a quarter the size of both the recycle and compost bin. I've never had problems identifying which packing materials are compostable. Usually putting one under warm water will give it away - they're designed to be washed down the drain. https://bouldercolorado.gov/lead/compost https://bouldercolorado.gov/lead/compost
- walrus01 10y ago
  those are great until you send a large volume of shipments by ocean cargo somewhere, and it arrives with a nest of several hundred rats that have eaten the packing material.
jasode 10y ago
The air bags where each cell was independently inflated and sealed[1] were recently invented (2002) and there are a lot of patents for it.[2][3][4] It took several iterations of ingenuity to figure it out because the previous sheet of air bags had one inlet to inflate all the airtubes. All the tubes were connected to each other like the tubes of a waterbed. Since I've been seeing those inflatable air bags for more than 5 years in shipments from Amazon, Newegg, etc., it looks like industry adoption has taken less than 10 years. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflatable_air_cushion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflatable_air_cushion [2] https://www.google.com/patents/US7150136 https://www.google.com/patents/US7150136 [3] https://www.google.com/patents/US20050103676 https://www.google.com/patents/US20050103676 [4] https://www.google.com/patents/US6565946 https://www.google.com/patents/US6565946 used in this $1500 machine: http://minipakr.com/the-mini-pakr/ http://minipakr.com/the-mini-pakr/

by vinhboy 10y ago

justinator 10y ago

the last package peanuts I seem to remember finding in a package were disposable by putting them in compost, which seems like an advantage over plastic bags.

waterphone 10y ago
I haven't seen anyone else using it yet, but iFixit uses a paper/cardboard lattice/expanded mesh as packing material.
- spilk 10y ago
  If we're talking about the same thing, I see electronic component vendors like Digikey/Mouser/etc. using that paper mesh a lot.
- hanniabu 10y ago
  These are awesomexpected and work great, but unfortunately I bet they're pricier which is a huge influencer in packaging decisions.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
mmanfrin 10y ago
Recent ones you can, but those came about during the ascent of packaged air. Old ones were just plastic. New ones you can even eat. They're made of corn.
- ianai 10y ago
  It seems silly to use something with finite supply for something so simple to substitute.
  - Dylan16807 10y ago
    It's not that simple. We can turn corn into petrochemicals if the relative prices change enough.
    - cossatot 10y ago
      We routinely turn petrochemicals into corn, so it's nice to occasionally return the favor. (https://store.extension.iastate.edu/Product/Energy-consumption-for-row-crop-production-Farm-Energy-PDF https://store.extension.iastate.edu/Product/Energy-consumpti...)
r00fus 10y ago
They're a nightmare if you have babies/pets and don't clear out your packing materials quickly - I keep my boxes and materials until I validate the item's functional. Disposable peanuts are made from corn/rice so humans/pets can eat them, but it's unknown if they're easily digestible in large quantities and anecdotes about pets hurling them up are out there. I prefer the air-packs, yes it's plastic (my recycler accepts them if they're collapsed and not loose), but a small amount given the size of the packages.
- joezydeco 10y ago
  I ate one of the peanuts on a dare a long time ago, wouldn't do it again. Whatever is on there as a preservative or pet/child deterrent (or possibly both) made me nauseous for hours afterward.
  - CodeWriter23 10y ago
    What did you get in return for taking the dare?
- kurthr 10y ago
  Even if you don't have babies/pets, but keep those recyclable peanuts around... you soon will in the form of roaches, moths, and mice. They grow up so quick!
Spooky23 10y ago
Except you need to have a compost pile and become adept at identifying variants of packing peanuts. We actually do compost, but our pile is inactive in the winter, and dumping some mysterious product into it isn't something that I'd want to do.
- justinator 10y ago
  The city I live in has a composting program [0], so even if I don't want to compost myself, it's compulsory. The trash bin we get is about a quarter the size of both the recycle and compost bin. I've never had problems identifying which packing materials are compostable. Usually putting one under warm water will give it away - they're designed to be washed down the drain. https://bouldercolorado.gov/lead/compost https://bouldercolorado.gov/lead/compost
walrus01 10y ago
those are great until you send a large volume of shipments by ocean cargo somewhere, and it arrives with a nest of several hundred rats that have eaten the packing material.

jasode 10y ago

The air bags where each cell was independently inflated and sealed[1] were recently invented (2002) and there are a lot of patents for it.[2][3][4] It took several iterations of ingenuity to figure it out because the previous sheet of air bags had one inlet to inflate all the airtubes. All the tubes were connected to each other like the tubes of a waterbed. Since I've been seeing those inflatable air bags for more than 5 years in shipments from Amazon, Newegg, etc., it looks like industry adoption has taken less than 10 years. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflatable_air_cushion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflatable_air_cushion [2] https://www.google.com/patents/US7150136 https://www.google.com/patents/US7150136 [3] https://www.google.com/patents/US20050103676 https://www.google.com/patents/US20050103676 [4] https://www.google.com/patents/US6565946 https://www.google.com/patents/US6565946 used in this $1500 machine: http://minipakr.com/the-mini-pakr/ http://minipakr.com/the-mini-pakr/