US3349990A

US3349990A - Multi-wall mailing container

Info

Publication number: US3349990A
Application number: US619639A
Authority: US
Inventors: Reinold T Woodford
Original assignee: Arkell and Smiths
Current assignee: Arkell and Smiths
Priority date: 1967-03-01
Filing date: 1967-03-01
Publication date: 1967-10-31
Anticipated expiration: 1984-10-31

Description

Od- 31 1957 R. T. WOODFORD MULTI-WALL MAILING CONTAINER Filed March 1, 1967 l ....llm.

irl-...k I l INVENTOR REINOLD T. WOODFORD ATTORNEYS United States Patent O 3,349,990 MULTI-WALL MAILING CONTAINER Reinold T. Woodford, Hudson Falls, N.Y., assignor to Arkell and Smiths, a corporation of New York Filed Mar. 1, 1967, Ser. No. 619,639 6 Claims. (Cl. 229-55) ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A multi-wall mailing container is constructed with an outer wrapper made from a material which allows labels, stamps and inks to readily adhere to it and an inner liner which is attached to the outer wrapper and forms the inside wall of the container. The inner liner is formed with sealed air sacs and attached to the outer wrapper so that the air sacs are in contact with the outer wrapper.

The invention of the present application is directed to an improved multi-wall container which has particular application for use as a mailing container since it can be readilyassembled at low cost, is light weight and offers excellent protection for its contents against damage from moisture and shock. More specically, the multi-wall container comprises an outer wrapper made from a material such as specially treated Kraft paper which readily allows labels, stamps and inks to adhere to it and an inner liner formed which sealed air sacs. With this unique arrangement, it has been found that a very strong moisture proof and relatively light Weight package may be formed.

Containers used for shipping articles may be grouped into two classes: (1) those that require a separate packing material to protect the article being shipped and V(2) those in which the packing material is an inherent part of the shipping container. In the former class, many types of packing materials are used such as shredded paper, plastic inserts and packing boards. These materials have decided disadvantages in that in order to obtain sucient protection for the article being shipped, large quantities of materials must be used which increases the shipping weight of the container. Also, provisions must be made for storing the packaging material and additional time and personnel are required for packaging the articles which is expensive to the shipper. Further, none of the types of packing materials aid in preventing moisture from entering the container.

Packing boards as shown in U.S. Patent No. 1,945,024 are typical of packing materials now being used. The surface of the board is molded with protuberances so as to offer a raised surface to the articles being packaged. The effectiveness of the cushioning against shock will depend on the stiffness and Weight of the material being used. Therefore, in order to obtain a good shock absorbing board, the material must be inherently stiff which requires a relatively high weight material. As explained above, this gives the disadvantage of increasing the weight and thereby the cost of the material being shipped.

The second class of shipping containers is where the packing material is formed as part of the container. An example of this type of arrangement is shown in U.S. Patent No. 3,018,315. The disadvantage of this type of container is that the protuberances projecting from the sheet are not sealed and, therefore, as in the case of the first-mentioned patent hereinabove, the effectiveness of cushioning against shock Will depend on the stiffness of the material used which inherently increases the Weight of the final container. Further, the top portion of the protuberances are in contact with the packaged article and therefore the size of the protuberances must be varied to the shape of the article to obtain effective cushioning against shock. Clearly, to mold a package having protuberances shaped to the article being packaged is very expensive and would eliminate such a package from being used for ordinary mailing purposes.

The improved multi-wall container of the present invention solves the -above problems by providing a light weight, waterproof package which is inexpensive to manufacture and offers maximum protection for the packaged article against shock.

More specifically the multi-wall container of the invention incorporates lan outer wrapper made from a material which allows labels, stamps and inks to readily adhere to it such as, ybut not limited to, specially treated Kraft paper. 'Ihe container also utilizes an inner liner which makes up the inner wall of the container and comprises two plastic films which are flexible and light weight. In this connection, it has been found that polyethylene gives excellent results although other polyoleiin films such as polypropylene, and other lms such as polystyrene and polyvinyl chlorides may be used. The two plastic ilms are united by the use of heat, resins or other methods well known to those skilled in the art.

More speciiically, protuberances are formed in one tilm, hereinafter referred to las the first sheet, and the second lm, hereinafter referred to as the second sheet, is used to seal the protuberances so as to form sealed air sacs. The protuberances can be of any geometric shape such as round, square, rectangular or octangular. According to the present invention, the inner liner is arranged so that the second sheet is in contact with the article being packaged and the air sacs are adjacent the outer wrapper. This arrangement goes directly contrary to what the art teaches, which shows that the top portion of the air sacs are adjacent the article being packaged. Applicant has found that lwhen the second sheet is in contact with the article being packaged, as opposed to the air sacs, superior protection against shock is obtained and there is less `tendency for perforations of the air sacs. Further, by using Kraft paper as the outer Wrapper as opposed to a plastic material, there is less chance of the package being damaged from other pack-ages moving up against it during shipment. Because ofthe surprising protection obtained with 'applicants unique arrangement of the inner liner with respect to the outer wrapper, Ia lighter weight plastic liner can be used which reduces the overall Weight of the shipping container.

Further details of the present invention and its advantages will be readily understood by reference to the accompanying drawings which illustrate the preferred embodiment of the invention and in Which:

FIG. l is a top plan View of the inside liner mounted on the outer Wrapper.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken along the line 2-2 of FIG. l and FIG. 3 is the assembled container with a portion of it in section to show the inside of the container.

Referring to FIG. 3, a container 10 is shown comprising an outer wrapper 12 and an inner liner 14. The outer wrapper 12 is made from a material which allows inks, stamps and labels to readily adhere to it and reduces the chance of perforation of the package during shipment through the mail. It has been found that special Kraft paper such as low size is suitable for this purpose.

Referring to FIG. 2, the inner liner 14 comprises a iirst sheet 18 and a second sheet 16. These sheets can be made from a light exible material such as polyethylene.

The sheet 18 is formed with protuberances 20 of uniform height which are in spaced relationship with each other, and preferably uniformly spaced along the sheet as shown in FIG. 1. The sheet 16 is attached to the sheet 18 so that each of the protuberances 20 are sealed to form air sacs 22 as shown in FIG. 2. The

sheets

16 and 18 are united to each other by heat, resins or other devices known to those skilled in the art.

The inner liner 14 is assembled to the outer wrapper .12 by applying an adhesive to the outer wrapper and then pressing the inner liner against the prepared outer wrapper. It is important that the inner liner 14 be arranged so that the air sacs 22 are adjacent the outer wrapper 12 and the sheet 16 is spaced from the outer Wrapper. Only with this orientation does one obtain the desired results of a shipping container which offers maximum protection for the article being packaged against shock and minimizes the possibility of puncturing the package without the use of a stiff, heavy gauge plastic.

The outer wrapper 12 is made wider than the inner liner 14 and the inner liner is oriented with respect to the outer wrapper so that a narrow extension 26 of the outer wrapper is exposed at one of its sides and a portion 28 of the inner liner extends beyond the outer wrapper at the opposite side. A portion 30 of the extension 26 is coated with an adhesive.

In assembling the final package, the combined outer wrapper 12 and inner liner 14 is cut to a desired length suitable for packing a particular article. The width of the package will depend on the width of the outer wrapper 12 and inner liner 14 chosen. For purposes of illustration it will be assumed that the width of the nal package desired is that area or panel 32 bounded by

lines

34 and 36. The package is then assembled by first folding a panel 38, which is to the right of line 34, then folding panel 40, which is to the left of line 36 and wider than panel 36 by the width of the adhesive-bearing portion 30 of the eX- tension 26, over and down upon the panel 38 (see FIG. 1). It can be seen from FIG. 3 that when the

panels

38 and 40 are properly folded, the ends of the inner liner 14 are nearly butted and the portion 30 of the extension 26 overlaps a portion of the surface of the outer Wrapper 12. Since portion 30 of the extension 26 is treated with an adhesive, it will adhere to the outer wrapper 12 to form a sleeve containing inner liner 14 also substantially in the contiguration of a sleeve. In this manner, a uniform package is obtained with no unnecessary bulk and which assures maximum protection for the article packed since the inner liner 14 with its sealed air sacs 22 is distributed throughout the inside of the package.

The bottom 42 of the package is formed by uniting a transverse portion of the sleeve under heat and pressure. This will rupture the air sacs 22 and fuse the plastic material thereof into a mass which impregnates the interior pores of the wrapper material 12 and thereby forms a Water tight seal (see FIG. 3). The top of thepackage may be sealed after the article is placed in the package by the same method or by any other closing means such as staples, tapes, etc. l

It will be understood that it is intended to cover all changes and modifications of the preferred embodiments of the invention, herein chosen for purposes of illustration, which do not depart from the spirit and scope of the invention.

I claim:

1. A mailing container comprising an outer wrapper and an inner liner, said inner liner including a rst sheet having protuberances in spaced relationship to each other and a second sheet permanently fastened to said rst sheet and sealing said protuberances to form sealed air sacs, said inner liner being attached to said outer wrapper with said air sacs immediately adjacent said wrapper and with said second sheet spaced from said wrapper, said outer wrapper being folded and united to form a sleeve constituting the sides of said container, and a bottom portion of the sleeve being united transversely to said first mentioned fold to form the bottom of said container.

2. The mailing container of claim 1 wherein said air sacs are of uniform height and are uniformly spaced from each other.

3. The mailing container of claim 1 wherein said outer wrapper is wider than said inner liner to provide an extension of said outer wrapper, said extension being overlapped down 'upon and united to the outer surface of said outer wrapper without substantially overlapping said inner liner.

4. The mailing container of claim 3 wherein a portion of said extension is treated with an adhesive.

5. The mailing container of claim 1 wheren the bottom portion of said sleeve is united by means of heat and pressure sufficient to rupture and fuse the air sacs in said bottom portion of the sleeve to form a water tight seal.

6. The mailing container of claim 1 wherein said outer wrapper is made of Kraft paper.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,917,217 12/1959 Sisson 229-35 XR 3,018,015 1/1962 Agriss et al. 229--14 XR 3,207,420 9/ 1965 Kindelan 229-56 DAVID M. BROKENEK, Primary Examiner.

Claims

1. A MAILING CONTAINER COMPRISING AN OUTER WRAPPER AND AN INNER LINER, SAID INNER LINER INCLUDING A FIRST SHEET HAVING PROTUBERANCES IN SPACED RELATIONSHIP TO EACH OTHER AND A SECOND SHEET PERMANENTLY FASTEND TO SAID FIRST SHEET AND SEALING SAID PROTUBERANCES TO FORM SEALED AIR SACS, SAID INNER LINER BEING ATTACHED TO SAID OUTER WRAPPER WITH SAID AIR SACS IMMEDIATELY ADJACENT SAID WRAPPER AND WITH SAID SECOND SHEET SPACED FROM SAID WRAPPER, SAID OUTER WRAPPER BEING FOLDED AND UNITED TO FORM A SLEEVE CONSTITUTING THE SIDES OF SAID CONTAINER, AND A BOTTOM PORTION OF THE SLEEVE BEING UNITED TRANSVERSELY TO SAID FIRST MENTIONED FOLD TO FORM THE BOTTOM OF SAID CONTAINER.