Party on the Punch-Deck

Company: FujiFilm

Problem: The printers they were storing had legs that required a smooth surface on the rack

Solution: Punch-Deck

Lesson Learned: Make sure UPS ships all of your material BEFORE installation day. UPS forgot to bring all 4 pallets of punch deck so installation was stalled.


A few weeks ago, I did a project for FujiFilm. This was one of the first projects I got to handle from start to finish. Luckily, the guys at FujiFilm are an absolute joy to work with.

I worked with George, who pretty much had the layout of the racking drawn out for me. He wanted short uprights, about 8 feet tall, and 3-4 beams on each of the bays.

Quick Racking 101
-The green things are called uprights
-The orange things are called beams
-Each beam is considered a "beam level" not to be confused with regular levels. The picture below has 3 beam levels and 4 regular levels.
-A bay is the whole structure. There are usually a ton of them lined up in a row.
-The shading in the middle of the orange beams is what gets exciting. This was the solution we got to come up with...

So George had this all mapped out for me, but he came to me with one concern. The printers he was storing on these racks had legs that needed a flat surface. Typically we use wire decking for most projects, but it was not going to work for this one. George had wooden 2x4 that we could have laid across the beams, but that proposed a fire issue.

You see, in our business, we get the pleasure of working with the fire inspectors to be sure the warehouses are safe and that in case of a fire, the racks would be in the best possible position to not let the fire spread. This includes sprinklers, flu space and proper decking. We were concerned with the wood because in case of a fire, not only is there a lot of wood, but the sprinkler system would not be able to distribute water from the top to the bottom of the rack, thus creating a bigger hazard.

I contacted a company called DACS out of the east coast and worked with David Swanson. He provided me the option for punch-deck and punch-deck covers. The punch deck and covers allow for water to freely flow through from the top to the bottom. I am sure the fire department will be so happy when they see this. This is a product that is not commonly used, but it worked perfectly for what FujiFilm was needing it for. Enjoy!


This is the racking prior to the decking being put on. No forklift of scissor lift needed for installation since the uprights were short.

This is punch deck. Also known as B-Deck. 

This is punch-deck with a punch-deck cover on top of it. The cover, with the small holes, is what makes the flat surface, but still allows water to flow freely through.

To show the contrast, this is a side angle of the project. The punch-deck and the punch-deck cover are on the middle beam and the punch-deck is on the bottom.

*Permission was granted to post names and pictures of FujiFilm.