MIL-STD-2073.pdf

This is an informational guide for packaging and marking products for the Department of Defense, published by the Defense Contract Management Agency in March 2014. The guide is not officially adopted by DoD and serves as an instructional reference only, not as a substitute for contractual requirements, specifications, or regulations.

The guide covers standard practices for packaging items destined for DoD, including military preservation and packing methods, hazardous materials requirements, commercial packaging standards (ASTM D-3951), and military packaging standards (MIL-STD-2073-1E). Key preservation methods detailed include Method 10 (physical protection), Method 20 (preservative coating), Method 30 (waterproof protection), Method 40 (watervaporproof protection), and Method 50 (watervaporproof with desiccant). The document specifies container types, marking requirements using MIL-STD-129, and quality assurance provisions including preservation inspections, leakage tests, and heat-sealed seam tests. Hazardous materials must be packaged according to applicable modal regulations (Title 49 CFR for land, IMO/IMDG for water, ICAO/IATA for commercial air, and AFMAN 24-204_IP for military air). The guide includes detailed illustrations of various packing methods, a sample worksheet for translating packaging requirement codes, explanations of Packaging Requirement Codes (PRC) used in military contracts, examples of unit and intermediate container labels with bar coding options, exterior container labels, Military Shipping Labels (MSL), and special markings for shelf-life, project codes, fragile items, Method 50 packages, expedited handling, and hazardous materials. Additional topics include heat-treated wood packaging material requirements, palletization standards per MIL-STD-147, and passive Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tag specifications.