GB2137953A - Producing Packs of Overwrapped Goods in Trays - Google Patents

Abstract

A group of products (h) is packaged by positioning beneath the group a blank (d) which has no scoring or other form of weakening along its intended fold lines and which is selected from material thin enough to deform automatically about the group bottom edges when pressed against the group by a forming box or other blank-folding means; folding the blank up into a tray around the group; and over-wrapping the group and the tray. Preferably the material of the blank is selected from paper, resiliently flexible plastics film or card, and non-laminated flexible card whether resilient or not. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Cartoning a Pack of Products The invention relates to holding collated products by forming a tray around them and overwrapping them.

Our UK Patent Application No 82 23732 filed 1 8th August 1 982 and entitled Automatic Pack Forming and Pack-Cartoning describes and illustrates the collating and cartoning of a succession of products by using a preformed box to form the carton around the caged pack. A prescored or creased or otherwise line-weakened carton blank is positioned closely beneath the caged pack and then the forming box is brought up around the blank to fold the carton flaps up around their respective lines of weakening and so form the carton automatically around the pack holding cage.

A machine or method embodying the present invention also uses a forming box to fold the carton up around the collated products; but the carton blank consists of an essentially nonlaminated and relatively thin flexible material which can be folded automatically by the forming box without first having to be scored or otherwise weakened along its intended fold lines.

Examples of such a material are paper, plastics film, and so-called card which is thin enough to fold cleanly and automatically about the collated product when the forming box is brought up around the blank.

The present invention is particularly advantageous because it reduces the costs and problems of disposal associated with known cardboard or fibre-board orthermo-formed trays in which collated products have hitherto been cartoned. A paper or plastics film or other similarly easily removed and easily destroyed tray will greatly reduce the all too familiar piles of cartoning material with which modern supermarkets and hypermarkets are littered long before the end of the working day.

Finally the collated products, once trayed will be over-wrapped, for example with stretch plastics film, before being sent from the wrapping machine to the wholesaler or retailer. We use the term "over-wrapping" in the sense familiar to those in the art, i.e. surrounding the pack and the tray on all sides.

Figures 1 and 2 of the accompanying drawings show, in diagramatic perspective, the operation of one machine cartoning a pack of collated products by a method in accordance with the present invention. This is currently the best way known to the applicants of putting the invention into practice.

Paper is fed from a reel (a) by rollers-not illustrated-and is cut across the web at (b) whilst the web is stationary. At the same time the paper is cut at lines (c) to allow for forming when it is subsequently folded up around the collated product.

The resulting square paper sheet (d) is then transferred over the top of a forming box (e) by rollers or grippers which need not be described and are not illustrated. The forming box (e) is so sized and shaped that it fits closely over the bottom of the collated products (h) but with sufficient gap between the two respective sets of side-walls to allow the flaps created by notching the blanks at (c) to be folded up around the products and form the desired carton.

The folding up is accomplished automatically by rounding the top peripheral edges of the inside walls of box (e) to "lead in" the carton blank and automatically fold the blank (d) into the desired shape of an open-topped and relatively shallow four-sided tray.

When the blank (d) is initially in place beneath the collated pack of products (h) it is supported on a bottom plunger (f). Glue, for example hot melt or contact adhesive, is applied to the flap regions created by notching the blank at (c). A top plunger (g) then descends, taking the collated pack into the forming box (e) and causing the automatic folding previously referred to. As the carton sides are automatically folded up around the product, the flap regions will similarly automatically be pressure-glued against the carton sides to form the carton proper.

The bottom plunger (f) then descends, and the cartoned product can be discharged in any suitable direction for over-wrapping.

The carton flaps are all swung simultaneously up into place, and then glued into position, in this particular machine and method. The various movements can be controlled by pneumatic means, suitably electronically governed, which the skilled reader will readily supply. Although paper fed from a reel has been illustrated, a succession of paper sheets could instead be fed from a stacker.

The material for the carton blank is selected from paper, resilientiy flexible plastics film or card, and non-laminated flexible card whether resilient or not. Each of these materials lends itself to the formation of a thin-walled tray around the pack without first having to score or otherwise weaken any intended fold lines in the blank.

Preferably the tray material is less than 0.015 inches thick; advantageously less than 0.010 inches thick; and it can be as thin as from 0.002 to 0.005 inches.

Where the material of the carton blank comprises paper, the paper with advantage be less than 100 gsm weight and as low as approximately 50 gsm weight in some advantageous applications of the invention.

The over-wrapping film may conveniently be transparent plastics film and the methods of applying it, together with the most suitable choice of film for a given application, will present no problem to the intended skilled addressee.

Hitherto it has been conventionai to form the tray from material which will retain the collated products for stacking and display once the overwrapping has been removed. However it has not previously been realised that trade and overwrapped packs tend to be stacked and displayed so close together (for example in modern supermarket and cash-and-carry shelves) that the packs themselves will support one another if the products which form each pack are initially located, rather than positively and firmly held, by the pack tray. The over-wrapping provides the main resistance to individual pack disintegration during handling and transport and initial stacking before display, and once the over-wrapping is removed then, as just outlined, the packs are in any event usually so tightly bunched that a paper or thin plastics or card tray is sufficient and presents far less problems of disposal than the hitherto conventional tougher trays.

Claims (4)

1. A method of cartoning a pack of products by positioning beneath the pack a carton blank which has no scoring or other form of weakening along its intended fold lines and which is selected from material thin enough to deform automatically about the pack bottom edges when pressed against the pack by a forming box or other blank-folding means; folding the blank up into a tray around the pack; and over-wrapping the pack and the tray.

2. A method according to Claim 1 and in which the material is selected from paper, resiliently flexible plastics film or card, and non-laminated flexible card whether resilient or not.

3. A method substantially as described herein with reference to the accompanying drawing.

4. A cartoned pack produced by the method of Claim 1 or Claim 2 or Claim 3.