AU2005100338A4

AU2005100338A4 - Recyclable pallet

Info

Publication number: AU2005100338A4
Application number: AU2005100338A
Authority: AU
Inventors: Tsung-Tsan Lin
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2004-12-16
Filing date: 2005-04-20
Publication date: 2005-05-19
Anticipated expiration: 2013-04-20
Also published as: US20060130711A1; JP3113098U

Description

S&F Ref: 716767

AUSTRALIA

PATENTS ACT 1990 INNOVATION PATENT SPECIFICATION Name and Address of Applicant: Actual Inventor(s): Address for Service: Invention Title: Tsung-Tsan Lin, of 10F., No. 1-52, Lane 81, Yuandong St., Longjing Township, Taichung County, Taiwan Tsung-Tsan Lin Spruson Ferguson St Martins Tower Level 31 Market Street Sydney NSW 2000 (CCN 3710000177) Recyclable pallet The following statement is a full description of this invention, including the best method of performing it known to me/us:- 5843c In RECYCLABLE PALLET SBackground of the Invention Field of the Invention The present invention relates generally to a pallet, and more particularly to an innovative one that is designed with a hollow section by means of plastic blowing, making it possible for gas injection within the hollow section to offer desirable support by air pressure.

SDescription of Related Art Generally, the so-called pallets are referred to sheet materials supporting the goods, whereby the goods are stacked on the supporting surface of the pallet, and a limited space is reserved at the bottom of pallet to accommodate the fork for lifting. In this way, the pallet can be controlled via mechanical or manual forklift to lift and handle the stacked goods to thereby save the manual work and promote the productivity. Among existing pallets about 95% are made of wood boards in combination with battens, with a structural strength about 700-3000kg.

Constructed of low-grade wooden materials, the pallet features cost-effectiveness, simple manufacturing and ease of mass production. Therefore, the wooden pallets have not been replaced by other materials or manufacturing modes currently. However, it can be found from the wide range of applications that, this wooden pallet has the following disadvantages: 1. Environmental protection: the wooden pallet, with a single source from the forest, belongs to consumptive products, thus leading to a rising consumption, namely indicating an increased speed of loss for the forest on the earth. However, the forest plays an important role of adjusting the weather and maintaining the living environment for the human beings.

Accordingly, it would be desirable for the industry to provide a structure that can replace the wooden pallets to lower wood consumption greatly.

2. Pathogen contamination: the wooden materials not subjecting to surface processing are vulnerable to insect pest and germ during the process decay. Currently, the wooden pallet are made of wooden raw materials without further surface processing. So, the insects and germs will likely be widely spread coupling with the domestic shipping or export of goods along with the wooden pallets. This will pose a serious threat to the quality of foodstuff or drugs, or even leading to catastrophic ecological or infectious epidemic problems. For this reason, many countries with strict sanitary standards demand for the certificates proving that 1 [R:\L1BTT]03967.doc:hxa In sterilization or fumigation treatment has been carried out on the imported wooden pallets. This means an increased cost of sterilization or fumigation treatment for the practitioners in this industry.

3. Structural strength: the wooden pallets are made of wooden materials, with N, 5 various units fixed securely by means of iron nails. In fact, the fixing state is rather rough and instable, possibly leading to loosening and damage during the handling.

00 S4. Weight: the finished wooden pallet is very cumbersome due to the nature of wooden materials (approx. 20-30kg). Also, considering the coarse structure of unpolished Isurface, they are easy to be wetted by some water or other liquids, resulting an increased weight io from 1/30one fold. In addition, the wooden pallet is generally available in a size of N, 120x 100x20cm (length, width and height), so the bigger volume is an important factor leading to a sharp rise of shipping cost.

Waste: once upon completion of unloading the goods, the wooden pallet made of lower-grade wooden materials has little remaining value due to impossibility of recycling for furniture and other wooden products. If the customers are intended to recycle these wooden pallets, a higher recycling cost and time-consuming effort shall be required. Therefore, the wooden pallets are burnt down as fuels according to the existing work practice. Generally, some environmental protection agencies are entrusted to handle this issue, with the expenses borne by the owners of the wooden pallets. To a global context, the number of wooden pallets burnt down totalizes hundreds of billions, showing a startling waste of resources. Furthermore, numerous of wasted wooden pallets to be processed around the world have led to environmental pollution to different extents.

Although a plastic pallet was marketed about two decades ago, the solid structure from plastic blowing demanded for a big number of plastics, with its price higher than 4 to 10 times of wooden pallet. Additionally, a higher degree of hardness for the plastics shall be required to ensure the load strength, but the hard and fragile structure of entire pallet is vulnerable to breakage due to external collusion. So, these plastic pallets are generally applied for warehousing, rather than one-time consumption during freight handling. At present, the plastic pallets register only a 3% market share of the wooden pallets, showing a poor economic efficiency, without mentioning possible replacement of wooden pallets.

2 [R:\LIBTT]03967.doc:hxa Accordingly, in order to solve the problems of the conventional wooden and plastic pallets when they are used, it would be desirable for the industry to provide a low-cost, lightweight, recyclable and environment-friendly utility model.

It is the object of the present invention to substantially overcome or at least ameliorate one or more of the disadvantages of the prior art or to meet one or more of the above desire.

00 Summary of the Invention Accordingly, the present invention provides a recyclable and environment-friendly pallet: Sa supporting surface; and 1 10 a landing section opposite to the supporting surface; and a concave space between the supporting surface and landing section for accommodating the fork for lifting, wherein said pallet is made of thermoplastic materials by means of plastic blowing of preset mold, thus offering a structure of hollow section.

The preferred embodiment of the invention provides the following advantages: 1. Based on this innovative structure of pallet preformed through plastic blowing, the waste can be recycled and fabricated into other plastic products, yielding a remaining value far more than the conventional wooden pallets. And, numerous of trees are thus protected against chopping to satisfy the demanding environmental protection.

2. The pallet is free from insect pest and germ via the help of plastic blowing, and antibacterial agents can be added for an enhanced effect depending on the requirement of the customers (this cannot be achieved by wooden pallets). Thus, it is optimally suited for foodstuff and medicines, etc. Moreover, no sterilization or fumigation treatment is required during import and export, leading to declined shipping cost.

3. As the pallets are integrally preformed through plastic blowing, it eliminates the need of assembly of any component for a reliable strength. In conjunction with the internal support of air pressure, the pallet features a stronger resistance to collision and vibration as well as a higher degree of tenacity not owned by the solid plastic pallet.

4. Thanks to the hollow structure of the pallet via the assistance of plastic blowing, the amount of required plastic can be reduced by about 75% of conventional solid plastic pallet. So, the cost and price of plastic pallet can be remarkably reduced similar to that of wooden pallet. Meanwhile, it offers a much lightweight than the latter one, thus yielding a bigger economic efficiency by reducing greatly the shipping cost.

3 [R:\LIBTT]03967.doc:hxa In 5. This pallet can be preformed by a special blow-molding machine, and easily put into mass production, presenting an easier quality control and higher degree of precision than wooden pallet.

6. Thanks to the combined structural design that the supporting surface and N 5 landing section of the panel can be dismantled for separate storage, shipping and packaging, this can help minimize the materials and cost.

00 M However, even though the preferred embodiments have been set forth in the foregoing description, the disclosure is illustrative only, but does not limit the present invention, and Ichanges may be made in detail within the principles of the invention to the full extent indicated C 10 by the broad general meaning of the terms in which the appended claims are expressed.

Brief Description of the Drawings A preferred form of the present invention will now be described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein: FIG. 1 shows a perspective view of the preferred embodiment present invention at a bird's eye view.

FIG. 2 shows a perspective view of the preferred embodiment of the present invention at an upward view.

FIG. 3 shows a local vertical cutaway view of the preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 shows another perspective view of the preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 shows another perspective view of the preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 shows a perspective view of the assembled invention.

FIG. 7 shows a local assembled cutaway view of FIG. 6.

FIG. 8 shows another perspective view of a preferred embodiment.

Detailed Description of the Invention The features and the advantages of the present invention will be more readily understood upon a thoughtful deliberation of the following detailed description of a preferred embodiment of the present invention with reference to the accompanying drawings.

As shown in FIGS. 1-3, a recyclable pallet 10 embodied in the present invention comprises: 4 [R:\LIBTT]03967.doc:hxa in a pallet 10, which includes a supporting surface 11, a landing section 12 opposite to the supporting surface 11 and a concave space 13 between the supporting surface 11 and landing section 12 for accommodating the fork for lifting. Wherein said pallet 10 is made of plastic materials by means of plastic blowing, and a hollow section 14 (as shown in FIG. 3) is formed s and then injected by air A of proper pressure. This can help the plastic wall in supporting the goods based on non-pressed air method.

00 M Wherein, the hollow section 14 of the pallet 10 can be designed with a local or global Sconfiguration.

Wherein, a through hole 15 is additionally placed at a preset location of the pallet and a tubular supporting wall 16 is arranged where the through hole 15 crosses the hollow Ssection 14. Based on the tubular supporting wall, a rib-like support force can be generated for an enhanced structure of pallet Wherein, the supporting surface 11 and landing section 12 of the pallet 10 can be preformed by means of plastic blowing (as shown in FIGS. 1 and Also, as shown in FIG. 4, the supporting surface 11B and landing section 12B of the pallet 10B can be performed by means of individual plastic blowing and subsequently combined by a plug bush of hole and column). Thanks to the structure that the panel (supporting surface) and column (landing section) of the pallet 10B can be dismantled for separate storage, shipping and packaging, this can help minimize the materials and cost.

Wherein, the pallet's supporting surface of the present invention can be designed with both a single-sided pattern plate (as shown in FIGS. 1-4) and double-sided supporting surface 11C IiD for the pallet O10C as shown in FIG. 5. When one supporting surface 11C faces upwards, the other one 11D acts as a landing section.

Wherein, FIGS. 6 and 7 show another example of structure for a composite design of the pallet of the present invention. In this example, the supporting surface 11 E of the pallet has a hollow section 14 by means of hollow plastic blowing, and the landing section 12B is designed with several cylinder-like components in radial arrangement. Also, it may be internally offered with a hollow section. The landing section 12B is constructed of metal materials or preformed by plastic blowing (namely, not limited to hollow plastic blowing). Besides, bolt holes 21 and through holes 22 are mounted oppositely between landing section 12B and supporting surface 11 E, thus offering a combined positioning via screw bolt 23. Additionally, this structure is suitable for double-sided supporting surface 11 E (as shown in FIGS. 6 and 7) or [R:\LIBTT]03967.doc:hxa single-sided supporting surface. Thanks to the structure that the supporting surface 1 E and landing section 12B of the panel can be dismantled and superposed for separate storage, shipping and packaging, this can help minimize the materials and cost.

0

O

6

(N

00,, [R:\LIBTT]03967.doc:hxa

Claims

1. A recyclable and environment-friendly pallet comprising: Sa supporting surface; and a landing section opposite to the supporting surface; and N 5 a concave space between the supporting surface and landing section for accommodating the fork for lifting, wherein said pallet is made of thermoplastic materials by means of plastic 00 M C blowing of preset mold, thus offering a structure of hollow section.

2. A recyclable pallet as defined in Claim 1, wherein said pallet's hollow section can be charged and pressurized by air, thereby forming a strong supporting force via air pressure.

3. A recyclable pallet as defined in Claim 1, wherein said pallet's supporting C, surface and landing section can be preformed by means of plastic blowing, or preformed by means of individual plastic blowing and subsequently combined.

4. A recyclable pallet substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to any one embodiment, as that embodiment is depicted in the accompanying drawings. Dated 15 April, 2005 Tsung-Tsan Lin Patent Attorneys for the Applicant/Nominated Person SPRUSON FERGUSON 7 [R:\LIBTT]03967.doc:hxa