A buddy of mine in Alabama is upgrading his car and is selling his turbos, ported exhaust manifold, intercoolers and down/test pipes to me for a really good price. In the past when I needed a transmission or front bumper cover they were either pallet shipped or on the Greyhound shipping service (which I don't think is in business anymore).


I'm trying to look into similar options and wanted to know if anyone here has had to send and receive heavy parts in an oversized box and could tell me what was used.

You're probably looking at LTL freight. I use a freight broker for shipping large electrical panels.

Box it, palletize it, and wrap it. Depending on the weight and freight class, probably a couple hundred dollars.
Edit:
Where they will try to get you is on lift-gate and residential delivery(those are +$75 adds at each end), so if you can go terminal to terminal without pickup and delivery, that'll be your cheapest option.

I use these guys:
https://www.freightquote.com/

They'll give you quotes from multiple carriers.

It's been over a decade, but I used to ship heavy palatalized parts via Forward Air. not sure why their name contains Air, but they are a trucking company.

https://www.forwardair.com/

I had to ship an old 3-sp Saginaw transmission for my old Impala from El Paso to Sacramento. Hoping it was under 65 pounds, I was just going to pay overweight fees and put it on the plane with me. However, it was way more than the 75 pounds that Southwest would allow.

I went to Lowes, had them cut some plywood and, in my hotel room, built a crate.

It was 135#, was about 36" by 12" by 16". Using FedEx Ground, it cost $165 and arrived in 3-4 days. I was overall happy with the results.

I don't follow why you need a palletized/liftgate shipment. Other than these "down/test pipes" which I assume are exhaust pipes and would be rather lengthy (but still not particularly heavy), none of the other parts, even combined, are all that large or heavy, nowhere near that of a transmission, or a bumper cover which is very long but lightweight. Why not just UPS?