Classifications

• • B—PERFORMING OPERATIONS; TRANSPORTING
  • B65—CONVEYING; PACKING; STORING; HANDLING THIN OR FILAMENTARY MATERIAL
  • B65D—CONTAINERS FOR STORAGE OR TRANSPORT OF ARTICLES OR MATERIALS, e.g. BAGS, BARRELS, BOTTLES, BOXES, CANS, CARTONS, CRATES, DRUMS, JARS, TANKS, HOPPERS, FORWARDING CONTAINERS; ACCESSORIES, CLOSURES, OR FITTINGS THEREFOR; PACKAGING ELEMENTS; PACKAGES
  • B65D75/00—Packages comprising articles or materials partially or wholly enclosed in strips, sheets, blanks, tubes, or webs of flexible sheet material, e.g. in folded wrappers
  • B65D75/52—Details
  • B65D75/58—Opening or contents-removing devices added or incorporated during package manufacture
  • B65D75/5827—Tear-lines provided in a wall portion
  • B65D75/5833—Tear-lines provided in a wall portion for tearing out a portion of the wall
  • B65D75/5838—Tear-lines provided in a wall portion for tearing out a portion of the wall combined with separate fixed tearing means, e.g. tabs
• • B—PERFORMING OPERATIONS; TRANSPORTING
  • B65—CONVEYING; PACKING; STORING; HANDLING THIN OR FILAMENTARY MATERIAL
  • B65D—CONTAINERS FOR STORAGE OR TRANSPORT OF ARTICLES OR MATERIALS, e.g. BAGS, BARRELS, BOTTLES, BOXES, CANS, CARTONS, CRATES, DRUMS, JARS, TANKS, HOPPERS, FORWARDING CONTAINERS; ACCESSORIES, CLOSURES, OR FITTINGS THEREFOR; PACKAGING ELEMENTS; PACKAGES
  • B65D75/00—Packages comprising articles or materials partially or wholly enclosed in strips, sheets, blanks, tubes, or webs of flexible sheet material, e.g. in folded wrappers
  • B65D75/04—Articles or materials wholly enclosed in single sheets or wrapper blanks
  • B65D75/06—Articles or materials wholly enclosed in single sheets or wrapper blanks in sheets or blanks initially folded to form tubes
  • B65D75/12—Articles or materials wholly enclosed in single sheets or wrapper blanks in sheets or blanks initially folded to form tubes with the ends of the tube closed by flattening and heat-sealing

Definitions

• This .invention relates to a resealable pack. It is particularly intended for use in the packaging of wet wipes, but it is to be understood that the invention is also applicable to the packaging of other articles.
• wet wipes are articles in the form of small sheets which are impregnated with a skin- cleansing liquid and which are intended to be disposed of after a single use. Wet wipes are sometimes packaged individually, in which case the packaging is thrown away after it has been opened and the wet wipe removed therefrom. However it is also known to produce a pack containing a plurality of wet wipes. In that case, the pack must be provided with a resealable opening, since the skin-cleansing liquid with which the wipes are impregnated evaporates readily, and the wipes will therefore dry out unless the pack can be properly resealed after each wipe is removed.
• the tape used for sealing and resealing the opening represents a substantial portion of the cost of the product. Furthermore, to prevent the cost of the tape becoming excessive it is usual to provide only a relatively small opening in the pack, so that the amount of tape required is reduced, and this makes it difficult for a user to remove wet wipes from the pack and may even result in their breaking during the course of removal. It is an object of the present invention to provide a pack in which the amount of material required to effect resealing is reduced in relation to the size of opening with which the pack is provided. By virtue of this it is feasible to increase the size of the opening, or reduce the cost of the material required for sealing, or both.
• a pack having a body portion defining an article- receiving cavity, the body portion being provided with a slit which is non-rectilinear and which has first and second ends; and a sealing member which covers the slit and is resealably adhered to the body portion on both sides of the slit, whereby to provide a seal, the sealing member having a pair of side edges, one on either side of the slit, both of which side edges follow generally the direction of the slit.
• slit does not necessarily imply that the material concerned begins in non-slitted form and then has a slit formed therein by a slitting process, though that would normally be the case. Further, it is to be understood that the term “slit” is intended to encompass not only openings which have a zero or very small width, and which would normally be described as slits, but also openings having a significant width, for example up to several mm, or even more, and which might more usually be described as slots.
• the said side edges are substantially parallel to one another and to the direction of the slit.
• the slit is generally V-shaped, and the sealing member is correspondingly generally V-shaped.
• the apex angle of the "V" is preferably from 40° and 100°, most preferably about 50°.
• other shapes of slit and tab may be used instead.
• the slit can be curved, for example arcuate, and may, for example, semicircular, and the sealing member may be correspondingly shaped.
• Figure 1 is a diagrammatic perspective view of a known pack for wet wipes, the pack being in its sealed condition;
• Figure 2 is a similar view of a pack according to the present invention
• Figure 3 shows the pack of Figure 2 in its opened condition
• Figure 4 shows part of a strip of material for use in the manufacture of the sealing members, showing how a plurality of the members can be cut therefrom.
• the known wet wipes pack shown in Figure 1 comprises a body 1 of generally parallelepiped form formed of a plastics material, for example a polyethylene film, a polypropylene film or a laminate consisting of, for example, polyethylene and polypropylene layers, optionally with a layer of paper between them.
• the body is formed of a single sheet of plastics material sealed at its opposite ends by end seams 2, and also having a longitudinal seam on the reverse side (not visible in Figure 1) .
• An elongate opening 3 is defined in the top face of the body portion.
• the opening is of generally rectangular form, but the ends 4 thereof are rounded so as to avoid forming sharp corners which might be unhelpful as regards the removal of articles from within the body.
• the opening 3 is covered by a sealing member 5 which is resealably secured to the adjacent face of the body 1 by means of an adhesive, for example an acrylic- based or rubber-based adhesive. Sealing is provided over the whole of the area where the sealing member 5 overlies the body 1, except for a tab 6 at one end of the sealing member 5. This provides a location where the user can grasp the sealing member. It will be seen that even for quite a small opening 3 it is necessary to provide a comparatively large sealing member 5, since the latter must extend beyond the former on all sides if it is to provide the requisite seal.
• the substrate to which the adhesive is applied may, for example, be a polypropylene film, or a laminate of paper/polypropylene, paper/polyethylene, or polyethylene/polypropylene. Where a two-layer laminate is used which includes paper, the adhesive is advantageously applied to the paper.
• this comprises a body, here denoted by reference numeral 11, which is sealed by end seals 12 and a longitudinal seal (not shown) .
• a body here denoted by reference numeral 11
• end seals 12 and a longitudinal seal (not shown) .
• longitudinal seal not shown
• first and second ends 14 which, as shown in Figure 2, are arcuate (for example semicircular) with the open sides of the arcs facing back towards the apex of the V.
• a generally V-shaped sealing member 15 covers the whole of the length of the slit 13 and is resealably connected by an adhesive to the body 11 on both sides of the slit.
• the sealing member 15 is adhered to the body 11 over substantially the whole of its surface, except that a tab 16 is provided at the apex of the V, where the sealing member 15 is not adhered to the body.
• the sealing member 15 has side edges 15a and 15b which at least follow generally the direction of the slit 13, and are preferably substantially parallel to one another and to the slit.
• the tab 16 When the user desires to remove a wet wipe from the pack he grasps the tab 16 and uses it to pull the sealing member 15 upwardly, starting at the apex of the V. The effect of this is that the portion of the sealing member 15 on the outside of the V is pulled away from that part of the body 11 to which it was previously adhered, but the portion of the sealing member on the inside of the V remains adhered to the body.
• the arcuate portions 14 are provided as a precaution to reduce the risk that continued pulling on the tab beyond the stage indicated in Figure 3 will cause the material of the body 11 to tear. In practice, however, the risk of this is slight and the arcuate portions 14 can generally be omitted.
• the opening process just described exposes a large V-shaped opening 17 through which a wet wipe can easily be withdrawn.
• the sealing member 15 is lowered to the position shown in Figure 2 and the pack is resealed.
• the sealing member 15 can be formed of relatively little material. This is illustrated in Figure 4, which shows a strip 20 of material suitable for forming sealing members 15. This can be used to provide a plurality of sealing members 15 by severing it along the V-shaped lines 21. This means that there is no wastage of material at all, except at the very ends of the strip 20, and that wastage can be made insignificant by using a sufficiently long strip. It is not necessary to trim the sealing members 15 in any way. This contrasts with sealing members of the type indicated by reference numeral 5 in Figure 1, where the sealing member is large in relation to the opening available for removal of a wet wipe, and where, furthermore, the shape of the sealing member is such that wastage of the sheet from which it is cut is inevitable.
• the tape is coated with adhesive before the tape is severed into individual sealing members, leaving adhesive-free zones to form the tabs 16.
• the sealing member used in the invention can have a shape other than V-shaped, and one possibility is to use a member which is arcuate, for example semicircular.

Landscapes

• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Mechanical Engineering (AREA)
• Containers And Packaging Bodies Having A Special Means To Remove Contents (AREA)
• Cleaning Implements For Floors, Carpets, Furniture, Walls, And The Like (AREA)
• Packages (AREA)
• Closures For Containers (AREA)

Applications Claiming Priority (3)

Publications (2)

Family

ID=11412814

Family Applications (1)

Country Status (6)

Families Citing this family (16)

Citations (5)

Family Cites Families (6)

• 1994
  • 1994-10-07 IT IT94TO000795A patent/ITTO940795A1/it not_active Application Discontinuation
• 1995
  • 1995-10-05 CA CA002159926A patent/CA2159926C/en not_active Expired - Fee Related
  • 1995-10-05 EP EP95938201A patent/EP0784573A4/de not_active Withdrawn
  • 1995-10-05 WO PCT/US1995/013027 patent/WO1996011147A1/en not_active Application Discontinuation
  • 1995-10-05 AU AU38921/95A patent/AU704785B2/en not_active Ceased
  • 1995-10-05 JP JP8512691A patent/JPH10509406A/ja not_active Ceased

Patent Citations (5)

Non-Patent Citations (1)

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