AT9217U1 - PACKAGING FOR FOOD PRODUCTS - Google Patents

Abstract

A food product package comprising a solid food product contained in a rigid box which is parallelepiped-shaped made of a rigid, clear plastic material having a flexural strength of at least 90 Taber units; the carton being made using a method, the steps of which include (a) providing a pre-cutout (1) of a sheet of plastic material comprising four rectangular sections (2, 2 ', 3 and 3') corresponding side walls (102, 102 ', 103 and 103') of the finished box, and a plurality of flaps (7, 7 ', 8 and 8') intended to cover the top and the bottom of the box to form a finished box, the rectangular sections at each end (2 and 3 ') being joined together and folded together to form a flattened, semi-finished box (101); (b) opening the latter by pulling the opposing folded walls away from each other; (c) dosing the food product into the semi-finished box; and (d) folding and gluing the flaps (7, 7 ', 8 and 8') adjacent the ends of the semi-finished box (101) to close the ends and the ends To give packaging.

Description

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field of use

The present invention relates generally to a package made of plastic material for food products, in particular pasta, rice and similar foods.

State of the art

In the packaging of pasta, rice and similar solid foods, which can be stored at room temperature, two types of packaging have long been used: cardboard boxes and clear plastic bags, often printed and usually made of polypropylene or, less frequently, of polyethylene.

These two types of packaging offer both advantages and disadvantages. Transparent 15 plastic bags have the merit of allowing an immediate assessment of the shape and overall impression of the food contents (eg, the size of the pasta mold or the grain size of rice). On the other hand, the bag simply tears when opened and is not satisfactorily easy to close once a portion of the contents has been removed. In addition, because the plastic it is made of is flexible, the packaging is not well placed to be neatly stored in a cabinet or on a shelf.

Cardboard boxes, on the other hand, while mechanically strong and easy to close off, have the disadvantage of not being able to visually inspect the contents so that the buyer's choice can only be made on the basis of an image of the product displayed on the package is printed, can be performed.

The manufacturing processes of the two types of packaging described above are evidently very different. The plastic packaging used uses an established " flow wrap " ("Flow-Pack") technology, while the method of producing cardboard boxes is based on conventional paperboard manufacturing techniques starting with pre-cut cardboard cutouts.

Various attempts have been made in the past to produce packages that combine the advantages of the two types of packaging discussed above. One of the solutions proposed in the prior art is to provide a window of variable size on one side of a cardboard box, the opening being covered with a sheet of transparent plastic.

However, this solution, while on the one hand allowing for limited visibility of the box contents, on the other hand, impairs the mechanical strength of the box to an extent proportional to the size of the window. It also significantly increases manufacturing costs, which can not actually be maintained for low added value products such as pasta or rice. 45 Summary of the Invention

The problem underlying the present invention was therefore to make available a packaging for food products, such as pasta or rice, which combines the advantages of the two types of packaging described above, but without their disadvantages, and manufacturing costs comparable to conventional cardboard boxes.

Such a problem has been solved according to the invention by a packaging for food products, which is a solid food product contained in a rigid box, which is in the form of a parallelepiped or cuboid, characterized in that

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Box made of a hard transparent plastic material with a flexural strength of at least 90 Taber units ("Taber units", TU).

Flexural strength is measured with an instrument called a stiffness tester, 5, manufactured by Taber Industries of the USA, in accordance with Test Method T489 set forth by T.A.P.P.I. ("Technical Association of Pulp and Paper Industry", Technical Association of pulp and paper industry). A Taber unit is defined as the bending moment of 1/5 of a gram applied to a 1.5 inch wide workpiece at a test length of 5 cm, bending it to an angle of 15 °. A Taber unit is the equivalent of 1 gram · centimeter.

The hard transparent plastic material referred to herein is preferably formed from polypropylene, in sheets having a grammage of at least 0.40 kg / m 2 and preferably between 0.45 and 0.6 kg / m 2. 15

This can be either a single or a multi-layer polypropylene film.

The use of a sheet of rigid plastic material having a bending strength as defined above allows the boxes to be produced for the packaging according to the invention, using the apparatus conventionally used for the production of cardboard boxes.

The package may be made by a process comprising the steps of: a) providing a pre-cutout comprising four rectangular sections corresponding to the sidewalls of the finished carton defined by a three bendlines and a plurality of flaps thereto are provided to form the upper part and the lower part of the finished box; the rectangular sections being joined together at both ends and folded over one another to form a flattened semi-finished box; b) opening the flattened semi-finished box by drawing the folded opposite walls away from each other; c) dosing the food product in the semi-finished box; 35 d) bending and gluing the flaps adjacent the ends of the half-finished box so as to close the ends and obtain the package, the pre-cut section being formed from a sheet of hard transparent plastic material having a flexural strength of at least 90 Taber units is. 40

In some cases, step c), dosing the food product into the semi-finished box, is carried out as soon as the flaps adjacent to one end of the half-finished box have been bent and glued; this is done when dispensers are used that drop the product from a certain height into the semi-finished box, 45 to prevent the product from escaping through the end that is still open.

As a film of rigid transparent plastic material, it is preferable to use a polypropylene film having a bending strength as described above, which has a grammage of at least 0.4 kg / m 2 and preferably between 0.45 and 0.6 kg / m 2. 50

The above-described steps are carried out with the apparatus which, without the need for substantial changes, are conventionally used to make packages for pasta and similar solid foods, including cardboard boxes. 55 4 AT 009 217 U1

Refining the process for the industrial production of the packaging according to the invention was not without technical difficulties. The step of opening the flattened semi-finished box proved to be particularly critical, whereas such a step poses no particular problems when normal board is used. 5

Step b) of pressing the opposing folded walls away from each other has proved problematic because the plastic films currently lacking sufficient mechanical strength in the manufacture of non-food packaging (typically perfumes or garments such as socks or undergarments) to withstand the stresses applied by the device which opens the folded and flattened semi-finished box. Films such as these are actually designed to be completely hand-formed and therefore need not provide a particular degree of rigidity. In addition, as opposed to the cellulosic material from which the so-called " shallow " Paperboard is not a structure with fibers oriented substantially in the same direction as the mechanical actuation used to open or unfold the carton and therefore not immediately available for this process. 20

It has been observed in experiments that only films of plastic material having a flexural strength equal to or greater than 90 Taber units were able to withstand the mechanical stresses applied by the device responsible for opening the flattened half-finished cartons. 25

The solid food products package of the invention offers the advantages of both known packages, d. H. those made of paperboard and those made of flexible transparent plastic material but avoiding the disadvantages of both. All of this is achieved using the usual apparatus conventionally used in the manufacture of cardboard boxes, without the need for any structural changes, and therefore at no extra cost.

This invention will now be further described by reference to the figures below, and by describing an embodiment of the package according to the invention as will be explained below by way of non-limiting example.

Brief Description of the Drawings Fig. 1 is a perspective view of a package according to the invention;

Fig. 2 is a plan view of a pre-cutout used in the manufacture of the package of the invention;

Fig. 3 is a perspective view of a semi-finished box made in the course of manufacturing the package of the invention; Fig. 4 is a schematic illustration of the equipment used to make the package of the invention.

Detailed Description of the Preferred Embodiment Such Fig. 2 is a schematic representation of a prepunched section of 0.45 kg / m 2 transparent polypropylene having a flexural strength of 95 Taber units (determined with a 150-B Stiffness Tester manufactured by Taber Industries from the USA) used in the manufacture of a package according to the invention. 55 5 AT 009 217 U1

The prepunched cutout, which is generally designated by the numeral 1, comprises two equal rectangular sections, 2 and 2 ', which are intended to form walls 102 and 102' of the finished box, between which a narrower rectangular section 3 is arranged which is intended to form a wall 103 of the finished box, as defined by the bending lines 4 and 5. The bending line 6 defines the boundary between the rectangular section 2 'and the rectangular section 3', which is identical to the narrow section 3 and intended to form a wall 103 'of the finished box. Fastened to the short sides of each of the above-mentioned rectangular sections 2, 2 ', 3 and 3' are flaps 7, 7 ', 8 and 8, respectively. The end wall 2 has a flap 10 which extends longitudinally and from the wall 2 is separated by the bending line 9. This flap 10 is adapted to be adhered to a peripheral surface of the rectangular end portion 3 'adjacent to its free longitudinal side 11.

Once the above flap 10 has been glued 15 on the peripheral surface of the rectangular end portion 3 ', we obtain a semi-finished box 101, which is flattened by bending at the bending lines 6 and 4.

The thus obtained flattened semi-finished articles are stacked inside a loading device of an automatic packaging machine as shown (completely schematically) in FIG.

This machine 11 removes the flattened semi-finished boxes 101 from the loader 14 using a series of suction cups 12 disposed on movable arms 13 or similar devices and opens them away by pulling the opposing folded walls away from each other, until it assumes a rectangular section, as shown in FIG. A device suitable for removing the flattened semi-finished cartons from the loader and for opening them is described, for example, in patent application EP-A-0 590 568, but various similar devices are available on the market. 30

The open semi-finished box 101 is then fed to another section of the machine consisting essentially of a chain conveyor 15, one of the ends of the half-finished box being closed by bending and gluing the flaps 7, 7 ', 8 and 8' to form a bottom, thereby obtaining a box open at one end.

Generally, the narrower flaps (8 and 8 ') are bent first using a guide and pressing means 16 (these are essentially passive front flap guide devices and rear flap pressure devices), which is schematically shown in Fig. 4a is shown.

In the following, a similar guiding and pressing or pushing means 17, which is shown schematically in Fig. 4b and arranged downstream of the web of the chain conveyor, causes one of the larger flaps 7 or 7 'on the previously bent smaller flaps 8 45 or 8 'is bent.

At this point, suitable adhesive delivery devices (not shown) apply a layer of adhesive on one part of the curved larger flap and another similar guiding and pressing means 18, shown schematically in Fig. 4, bends the other major flap, thereby reducing the size of the flap Lower part of the open semi-finished box is closed, which is at this point a box that is open at the opposite end of the just described lower part.

In a following part of the packaging machine 11, known devices 19, 55, which are shown completely schematically, release the pasta or other by gravity

Claims (4)

6 AT009 217U1 solid food products in the box, which is finally closed by bending and gluing the flaps at the open end of the box by means of the known bending devices and adhesive feeders, analogous to those previously described for closing the bottom of the box and are shown under the same reference numerals in Figs. 4d and 4e. The finished packages are then passed by suitable conveyor belts to the next stage to be packed in cartons. In other packaging machines designed to package food products having an elongated shape (e.g., spaghetti or grissini), the product is placed horizontally by means of special push bars in the open semi-finished box. Once the food is introduced, both ends of the open semi-finished box are closed by bending and gluing the respective flaps at opposite ends of the semi-finished box. Claims 1. A package for pasta comprising the solid food product contained in a rigid box which is parallelepiped shaped, characterized in that the box is made of a hard transparent plastic material having a flexural strength of at least 90 Taber units. 2. A package according to claim 1, wherein the hard transparent plastic material is polypropylene in films having a grammage of at least 0.40 kg / cm 2. 3. Packaging according to claim 2, wherein the grammage of these polypropylene films is between 0.45 and 0.6 kg / m2. Hiezu 4 sheets drawings