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Because it would necessarily be heavier and more expensive than a regular container. Regular containers have been optimized to be about as cheap as possible while meeting the specs. If you also want to make it fold you are going to have to use stronger material in parts - plus things like the doors are going to be very difficult.

So you are likely to have a container that costs more, is heavier, isn't waterproof or as secure and is more expensive to handle. It's only benefit is lower volume for the return leg - volume isn't a big problem for ships.

It's like building a convertible - it always ends up heavier more expensive and less stiff than a regular car.

They are regular containers when up, but when folded they are just big flat heavy pieces of freight - so you can load them as any other 40' long piece of freight but that means extra handling gear, forklifts, cranes etc at the customer's site to collapse them.

You can put them on flat rack, but those are a pain to handle as well. Now if eg. 10 of these folded flat could lock together and be the same height as a regular container and and be handled as a regular container that would be great.

Frankly when you can pay < $1000 for a new steel container in China nobody is going to be buying expensive, unproven composite containers however clever.

They do have women now - I don't know what they remove as a precaution !

(Since 1996 they grudgingly allowed 2 women at the base - while releasing lots of PR about how go ahead they were for promoting women in this way!)

Wasn't this posted here in 61?

You're thinking logically - try thinking like a politician who has a lot of farmers in their constituency, or who belongs to a party where the first primary is in a farming state, or needs another politician from a farming state onside

They are made from a material that is easy to reuse - steel. In fact you can't make modern furnace steel without adding scrap steel to the blast furnace to control the temperature.

The problem is that the floors of the containers are wood and to protect the farmers they are impregnated with some of the nastiest pesticides you can imagine - so no foreign bug can hitch a lift.

Used containers are basically toxic waste, if you are reusing them for housing/storage/etc you are supposed to remove the floor, sandblast the inside and repaint everything in an EPA approved paint - which costs several times as much as the container.

There aren't any complex shipping chains. Goods go china -> Europe/US the only thing that goes back is waste.

I can't see this helping. It costs more in a very price sensitive industry. Rollup doors means it isn't going to be used for shipping anything valuable or anything which then needs further onward shipping at the destination - are you going to have a truck full of DVD players going down the highway with canvas doors!

None of the existing handling systems is going to be able to deal with them, so you will need special cranes to load the collapsed ones - unless you load them inside regular containers.

The point is that the insurance company can claim this but it wouldn't stand up in court. They would have to demonstrate that it an unbroken door proves negligence on your part - which would mean demonstrating that it is impossible for a thief to get past the lock otherwise.

We just secure them with security cable ties. Any baggage handler wanting to steal from a case is going to have a knife or a pair of cutters anyway, all a lock does is stop a casual pickpocket.

The main problem in the US is that baggage claim is on the street side of the airport and security is limited to a mall cop who might check your ticket tags if he can be bothered. A nice shiny camera case going around the conveyor 10ft from the open door is the main risk.

The only difference is that now you have to pay for a busted side window for somebody to find out that there is no meter change in the ashtray

And you use an unpickable Modeco door lock? You changed the lock yourself to make sure that no previous tenants or a janitor have a key?

nunchuks are Ok but don't try it wearing a T-shirt with a picture of a power ranger on it.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7431640.stm

You don't even need the gun - you just need the case. We carry long lenses and tripods in a Pelicase - the only one that fits is the gun case design.

If you buy the camoflage pattern one it is generally treated as a gun by the airport - even if you don't declare it.

It means a trip to the luggage office at the destination to recover it from the locked secure baggage area but thats a small price to pay for a free armed guard.