COIL SECUREMENT

A steel coil is the least forgiving load on a flatbed. It is dense, it is round, and if it moves it does not stop. Securing one is a stack, and the order matters.

It starts on the deck with a rubber friction pad, which is what stops the coil creeping under braking. For a palletized coil FMCSA requires that pad between pallet and deck, and on a plastic pallet it is not optional in practice. Coil racks go on next, roughly one per 10,000 lbs, and the friction pad belongs underneath them, never between the timbers and the coil itself. Two beveled 4x4 timbers form the cradle the coil sits in.

Then the coil, then the chains: crossed through the eye, plus a trip chain against forward motion. Straps are not adequate on a bare coil. Steel coil protectors go under the chain where it crosses the edge, so the chain does not bite the steel and the steel does not saw the chain.

The tarp goes on last, and which one depends on how the coil is set. A skidded coil rides eye to the sky with cardboard already on the edges, so 11 oz is enough. A shotgun or suicide coil sits bare and mill-sharp in the cradle, and that takes 18 oz with a moving blanket underneath.