Drive-in Pallet Racking

How drive-in racking works

Drive-in racking removes the aisles. Pallets rest on continuous rails that run back into a lane, and the forklift drives inside the rack structure to place and retrieve them. One lane holds a single product line, several pallets deep and several levels high.

The trade is density against selectivity. You reach the front pallet first, so a lane operates last in, first out. Where a line is held in volume and rotation within the lane does not matter, drive-in stores far more pallets in the same footprint than a selective layout.

Design considerations

• Lane depth is set by product rotation, not by the building. Deeper lanes are cheaper per pallet but slower to clear.
• Entry guides and heavy column protection are essential. The forklift operates inside the frame.
• Rail height must suit the pallet condition. Damaged pallets are the usual cause of a drive-in incident.
• Drive-through variants allow load from one end and retrieve from the other, giving first in, first out.