
Ingenious Low-Cost Tilt Detection System (2018) - eigenvalue
https://imgur.com/a/9FMo38g
======
nneonneo
Some considerations: these packages have a very strong adhesive on the back
which is hard to remove without damaging the package or surface; they have
unique serial numbers (barcoded on newer versions under the bubble packaging)
so that they can’t be easily replaced; and the balls are glass, not metal, so
they can’t be pushed around by a magnet. It’s overall a pretty ingenious
system.

Another one is the Tip’n’tell system, which uses fine coloured sand and clear
tape to detect tipping in one direction. I once saw one of these affixed to
the side of a large autoclave which had been shipped to our university.
There’s a whole series of these shipping indicators, for detecting
acceleration (shock), temperature (too hot/too cold), and pressure.

~~~
ortusdux
I am always amazed at the lengths distribution warehouse workers will go to
tamper with these vs. just not tipping the shipment. I've actually seen boxes
of replacement stickers on the back of a forklift during a tour. I once had a
shipment come in with TiltWatches on it and someone had slid pins through the
plastic right above the balls to hold them in place. I now check for holes on
these.

IF you are shipping something that really needs to be rejected if tipped,
cover the stickers with a panel, shipping manifest, etc. Make sure the
receiver knows to remove the covering and check before signing for the
package.

Those Tip'n'tells double as great makeshift earthquake sensors.
[https://i.imgur.com/v83aNzV.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/v83aNzV.jpg)

~~~
ska
Absolutely. Receiver popping a panel to show the _other_ set of tip'n'tells
can get some great expressions.

But if the shippers are serious, and use to moving 6-7 figure equipment
around, they'll expect it.

~~~
amelius
But how do you prove these indicators weren't triggered _before_ shipping?

~~~
ortusdux
I usually do a walk around with a camera in the back of the truck before we
button everything up.

------
echelon
For those who didn't quite get this on the first glance:

This isn't a low-fi analog sensor used for taking novel measurements of
things. It's meant to be affixed to packages to determine if they were
mishandled during shipment. If a package was dropped or overturned, the ball
bearings will fall out of place and (presumably) be almost impossible to
return to their original positions.

Pretty cool.

~~~
mike_d
> and (presumably) be almost impossible to return to their original positions

Unless they have fixed them, the bearings are metallic and can be reset with a
magnet. (I had to do this a few times when I bumped the thing putting it on)

~~~
LeoPanthera
This is why you stick them on the inside of your package, as well as the
outside.

------
lisper
There's a pretty serious problem indicated in the first comment:

"These are a ripoff. I ordered an entire case of these and every single one of
them was already used when they arrived in the mail."

I think that comment was intend to be funny, but it does point out a serious
problem: how do you ship these things to the end-user without triggering them?

~~~
pensatoio
Addressed below
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22469900](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22469900)

~~~
lisper
Thanks.

------
larkost
My last employer used these when shipping robots. I don't know which was
better: being able to show mis-shipment, or the deterrent effect of these
highly-visible stickers.

~~~
gwright
There was an article here a while back about a bike company having lots of
trouble with damage during shipping. They changed their packaging so that it
appeared that there was a TV in the box and not a bike and the damage claims
dropped.

Found it: [https://www.theverge.com/2016/9/25/13048668/vanmoof-
shipping...](https://www.theverge.com/2016/9/25/13048668/vanmoof-shipping-
damages-dutch-bicycle-design)

~~~
pmiller2
That's funny! I had heard of this before, but I misremembered it as a TV
company printing a bicycle on the box to deter theft. I sort of wonder if that
would work now, come to think of it.

~~~
userbinator
If a TV company put a bicycle on the box, there would be plenty of shipping
damage. The only reason the opposite worked is because people naturally assume
a TV is far more fragile than a bicycle.

~~~
jolmg
By work, I think they were referring to avoiding thefts, not shipping damage.

~~~
userbinator
Yes, perhaps I wasn't clear but I meant that instead of thefts it will become
shipping damage.

------
ramraj07
We bought these and stuck them to some fairly expensive equipment crates when
moving our lab. The movers got very annoyed and made us sign so many extra
forms and take photographs. The entire move was insured as well,and I doubt
they'd have agreed to take these crates otherwise

~~~
myself248
> movers got very annoyed

That speaks volumes.

------
dekhn
Large expensive equipment (shipped in custom-built pallets) use this. About
$3/each to ship a $100+K box. [https://www.amazon.com/Tiltwatch-STWPLUS-Plus-
Label-Pack/dp/...](https://www.amazon.com/Tiltwatch-STWPLUS-Plus-Label-
Pack/dp/B00KG4BJN2)

~~~
exhilaration
How does one acquire these without triggering the tilt alert?

~~~
phren0logy
You don't, you just flip them all around and jiggle them to reset them. Then
you hope nobody does that to your box...

~~~
LeoPanthera
If you don't know, don't guess.

~~~
phren0logy
The ones I used (20 years ago?) worked this way. It's not a guess, it's just
outdated. Regardless, my apologies for the inaccuracy.

~~~
SamBam
I guess those ones didn't have the 180° sensors on them? With these one it
would be pretty much impossible to jiggle both balls into place.

------
deepspace
This is not exactly new technology. I was involved in shipping large,
expensive, delicate equipment overseas back in the 1990s and we used tilt
indicators extensively. Not exactly the same as these, but very similar. Along
with shock- and humidity indicators of course.

------
userbinator
I guess these are only used for very special applications, since I can't think
of any consumer product that wouldn't survive being shipped in any spatial
orientation; it's also easier to design packaging that ensures that, rather
than add these detectors and deal with the damages. Shock, on the other hand,
is far more damaging and harder to protect against.

~~~
leetcrew
large flatscreen TVs are quite vulnerable when laid sideways (even in the
original packaging). the internal components are not designed to support their
own weight in this orientation and can damage the screen.

------
Hackbraten
Unrelated, but this reminds me of John Birges’s self-made bomb, which would
explode if tilted.

[https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/stories/2009/august/a...](https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/stories/2009/august/a-byte-
out-of-history-harveys-casino-bomb/the-extortion-note)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvey%27s_Resort_Hotel_bombin...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvey%27s_Resort_Hotel_bombing)

------
Johnny555
Couldn't these be triggered by shock/vibrations that make the ball jump to the
next slot? At first I thought they were filled with mineral oil or some
viscous fluid to prevent this, but it looks like there are holes in the
backing material so it's not fluid-tight.

~~~
mike_d
Shock and vibration are bad too. You'll usually use tilt sensors with impact
sensors: [https://spotsee.io/impact](https://spotsee.io/impact)

------
daenz
Assuming Z axis is "up", you'll need one of these for the X and the Y axis to
catch all relevant tilts. It's probably not cost effective or practical to
make a 2-dimensional detector, but I imagine you could.

~~~
mike_d
I used these when we would ship servers off to edge sites. You end up putting
5 or 6 of them on the box... tilt sensors on two sides, impact sensors, and
temperature/moisture to make sure they haven't been left out on tarmac/loading
docks. $100 in stickers on a $xx,xxx shipment is an easy justification.

In practice they aren't hard for a motivated person to reset, but they do
result in handlers along the way being a bit more careful with your stuff.

~~~
nneonneo
It’s all about raising the bar for mishandling. Sure, if an unethical handling
company messes up your shipment they could go at it and try and reset the
indicator(s), but they could also just get the job done right and not risk
getting sued if the client does detect the tampering. On the other hand,
without indicators there’s nothing stopping them from pretending they didn’t
just throw your box around...

~~~
namibj
It also tends to make it rather obvious fraud.

While replacing a sticker is legal, doing so to trick someone into paying you
is usually criminal fraud.

Criminal liability is a _far_ bigger leap than normal deceptive business
practices.

~~~
SAI_Peregrinus
Especially since these stickers (and those like them) have serial numbers, and
the sender typically notes the serial numbers in an email or similar when the
item is shipped. The effort required to reset one without it being noticed is
pretty high.

------
sigmaprimus
Just curious if anyone knows the price of these? I wonder if an MPU6050 tied
to an attiny micro would be cheaper.

Of course part of the value in the posted indicator is the resulting better
(less rough) handling of a shipper that sees the monitoring device.

A good example of this phenomenon is the article posted on HN a few months
back about bicycle companies shipping their bikes in TV boxes resulting in
significantly less damage.

~~~
freepor
They’re about $5 each. An electronic solution would probably be similar cost
at scale, but ultimately easier to tamper with by hacking it, etc. These have
been used for decades and are pretty close to tamper proof.

~~~
dmurray
The electronic one could measure some other things, though. Like how long it
spent in a tipped-over state, or what time it was tipped over so you know
which shipper to blame.

------
janci
I remember having a toy like this where you had to put multiple balls to
different holes by tilting and shaking.

~~~
Psyladine
It's a similar idea, where the balls start in the 'finished' position, and
very little tolerance to being disturbed. Recreating that state would be more
trouble than it's worth.

------
ken
In my experience, the blue/red "Tip-N-Tell" indicator arrow is more common --
and also cheaper.

------
amelius
Or just put a glass of water in the box. If the box is wet upon arrival (or
looks as if it has been wet), don't accept it.

This is better because with the tilt detection system you will not measure
large vertical accelerations, which I suppose in most cases will also spoil
the shipped product.

~~~
Double_a_92
I would have to be ink, so you can't just dry the box. But even then they
could siphon the ink out and put it back in shortly before delivery.

~~~
amelius
Perhaps add a transparent window over the cardboard?

------
GistNoesis
Can't you just flip the box on its side, so that the label is horizontal, then
use static friction and tap it with little inclination like you would do with
those maze-ball children games.

To prevent this attack you could use two labels on two vertical orthogonal
faces.

------
lykr0n
I love simple and ingenious stuff like this.

Low cost, simple, and effective low tech way to monitor a shipment.

------
lixtra
Can’t you tamper it with acoustic tweezers [1]?

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_tweezers](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_tweezers)

~~~
mattkrause
Ignoring the fact that delicate lab equipment is rarely found in
warehouses....

Acoustic tweezers are usually meant to move much smaller particles (e.g., a
cell), rather than big macroscopic things, though I think someone had a system
that moved 1mm+ bits of foam.

------
walrus01
There are also things similar to this which show if the shipment has been
frozen, or un-frozen.

[https://www.scigiene.com/TI0300](https://www.scigiene.com/TI0300)

------
jagged-chisel
How are these shipped to folks who need to use them? Do they come with reset
instructions? Looks like that 180-degree detector would be the worst to reset
before applying the sticker.

~~~
Doxin
See those holes in the sticker? I imagine the piece of paper you peel off
holds pins into place in there, preventing triggering until after the sticker
is applied.

~~~
jagged-chisel
I hadn’t realized those were holes. Makes sense.

------
mooneater
See the video [https://spotsee.io/tilt/tiltwatch-
plus](https://spotsee.io/tilt/tiltwatch-plus)

------
fauria
Video of the device working:
[https://youtu.be/y0cohIWAbpA](https://youtu.be/y0cohIWAbpA)

tl;dr: it sticks to a package and has a tamper proof mechanisim to detect if
it was inclined.

------
paxys
It is clever, yes, but also something that has been used in the shipping and
logistics industry for decades. So more "standard" than "ingenious".

~~~
tachyonbeam
Ingenious means clever, and the fact that it's not a novelty doesn't make it
any less ingenious.

------
eeZah7Ux
Unfortunately it's quite difficult to prove _who_ tilted the devices in a
court of law.

~~~
SweetLlamaMyth
In the chain of custody that is shipment, though, it IS easy to check for
violated detectors before accepting custody of the package, and refusing to
accept responsibility for it.

------
bravoetch
Looks like to reset it you lay it flat and roll the balls to the small
indentations.

~~~
Arbalest
More than one sticker in different planes.

------
Sephr
I imagine that you could bypass this system by resetting glass ball positions
manually with the use of high-power acoustic grippers combined with additional
manual tilting of the package.

