GB2268160A

GB2268160A - Reassemblable reusable packing

Info

Publication number: GB2268160A
Application number: GB9312979A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Piero Durazzani; Giuseppe Cargnel; Lucio Valent
Original assignee: Zanussi Elettrodomestici SpA
Current assignee: Electrolux Zanussi Elettrodomestici SpA
Priority date: 1992-06-30
Filing date: 1993-06-23
Publication date: 1994-01-05
Anticipated expiration: 2013-06-23
Also published as: IT229043Y1; ES1025146Y; ITPN920022V0; GB2268160B; ITPN920022U1; ES1025146U; DE9309584U1; FR2692865A1; GB9312979D0; FR2692865B1

Abstract

A reusable packing, in particular for domestic electrical appliances, comprising a lower base (1) and an upper base (2), and four angle members (5,6,7,8) which are capable of being respectively fitted to the base portion, the top surface and the four comers of a body of substantially parallelepipedic shape, said elements being made of substantially rigid material which however has a shock-resistant capacity. Each angle member is provided at both ends with projections of L-shape, which are fitted into corresponding grooves provided at the corners of said bases. Said angle members can be withdrawn and associated with each other in a single bundle disposed diagonally against the lower base (1) with the upper base (2) held against the lower base (1) to contain the bundle of angle members in the space provided between said bases. <IMAGE>

Description

REASSEMBLABLE REUSABLE PACKING The invention concerns a simple, robust and reusable packing for apparatuses of substantially parallelepipedic shape, in particular for domestic electrical appliances or the like.

As is known, a domestic electrical appliance such as a washing machine, a cooker or the like is normally packaged using packings which are formed by a cardboard box and are strengthened in the regions which are subjected to shocks. In particular angle or corner members are introduced into the box, the angle or corner members being of expanded plastics material and being positioned at the vertical corners, while respective protective plates or boards of cardboard and/or expanded plastics material are disposed at the bottom and at the top of the machine.

The packing which is made up in that way is completed by clamping straps or the like which hold the various components thereof together.

That type of packing suffers from some disadvantages which are well known to the man skilled in the art. In particular that type of packing does not permit reuse thereof but has to be abandoned, thus losing the economic value associated with the materials involved and giving rise to ecological problems in regard to the disposal of waste.

For the purpose of providing completely reusable packings, our Italian patent (application) No. PN91A000034 discloses a particular type of packing which is completely reusable, made up of a plurality of detachable portions so shaped that, after separation thereof, thoseportions can be put together again in interengaging relationship in such a way as to form an overall final volume which is much smaller than the original volume, and of parallelepipedic shape.

In that way the packing when put together again in that fashion can be easily and economically sent onto the producer so that it can be completely reused without wasting any piece of material.

That type of packing resolves the problem of its also being reused for numerous occasions; however it suffers from the disadvantage that the parts which make it up are numerous and are of fairly complicated configuration so that re-packaging of the packing is burdensome and damage to or loss of some of its parts is easier, which gives rise to the additional problem of management due to the need to sort and replace or substitute the parts which are no longer available, to the point of compromising the overall economy of the entire operation.

The aim of the present invention is to reduce or eliminate the above-described disadvantages by means of a type of packing formed by a limited number of parts which are easy and economical to reassemble, transport and check.

According to the present invention, there is provided a reusable packing for a generally parallelepiped body, comprising a lower base and an upper base, and four angle members which bases and members are capable of being respectively fitted to the base portion, the top surface and the four corners of said body, said elements being made of substantially rigid material having a shock-resistant capability, wherein each of said bases is provided with a rectangular external perimeter and a rectangular internal perimeter, said bases have at the four sides of their external edge two respective rim portions which are oriented vertically and of closed development, upwardly for the lower base and downwardly for the upper base, said rim portions constitute eight flat elements for containing and protecting the lower and upper edges of the body to be packed, each flat element of said rim portions is of a different thickness in dependence on the upper and lower dimensions of the body to be packed, each of said angle members is provided at both ends thereof with L-shaped projections, that said projections are inserted into corresponding grooves provided in the corners of said bases so that each projection is inserted into a corresponding groove, said angle members can be withdrawn and can be associated with each other as a single bundle, said bundle is disposed diagonally against the lower base and finally the upper base is held against the lower base containing the bundle of angle members in the space provided between said bases.

The invention will be better appreciated from the following description given solely by way of non-limiting example and with reference to the accompanying drawings in which: Figure 1 shows a perspective view of the components of the packing in operation in accordance with the invention, used for a front-loading clothes washing machine; Figure 2 is a perspective view of just the empty structure of the packing; Figure 3 is a diagrammatic view of one of the angle members according to the invention; Figure 4 is a perspective view of the four angle members when already made up as a bundle; Figures 5 and 6 show, respectively, the lower base with the bundle of angle members inserted diagonally and the reassembled packing on its own, ready for despatch of a variant of the embodiment of Figures 1 to 4.

With reference to figure 1, the packing according to the present invention is fitted for example to a clothes washing machine 3 of substantially parallelepipedic shape.

the packing comprises a pair of lower and upper bases respectively indicated at 1 and 2, between which the cloths washing machine 3 is positioned! and four angle or corner members 5, 6, 7 and 8.

The lower base 1 and the upper base 2 have a rectangular external perimeter and an internal perimeter which is also rectangular, which perimeters may be of different depths in dependence on the possible different depths as between the lower and upper bases of the laundry washing machine to be packed, as shown in figure 2 where the lower depth A is less than the upper depth B of the clothes washing machine. The two bases 1 and 2 which are substantially flat have at the four sides of their external edge two respective rim portions generally designated 10 and 11 which are oriented vertically and of closed development, upwardly for the base 1 and downwardly for the element 2, the rim portions 10 and 11 thus constituting eight flat elements for containing and protecting the lower and upper edges of the domestic electrical appliance.

Each flat element of said rim portions may be of different thickness in dependence on the dimensions of the domestic electrical appliance to be packaged; thus the dimensions of the internal perimeter described by said rim portions may be freely selected in such a way that one of said perimeters has the identical base perimeter and the other perimeter is identical to the upper perimeter of the article to be packaged, so that it can be easily inserted "edgewise" within the appropriate perimeters, with its lateral lower edge in contact with the rim portion 10.

It is thus in fact that the increased thickness of the lower rear element 14 of the rim portion 10 with respect to the thickness of the upper rear element 15 of the rim portion 11 determines the possibility of accommodating a domestic electrical appliance in which the depth of the base is less than the depth of the top surface, as shown in Figure 2.

The angle members are of smaller height that the height of the machine to be packed, and are shaped with an internal groove 9 along their entire height in such a way that they can be fitted with grooves to the vertical corners of the machine. Each of the angle members is provided at both ends thereof with an L-shaped projection 12 and 13 (as Figure 3 shows in respect of a single angle member) generally of different dimensions for the reason which will be more clearly seen hereinafter.

The projections are inserted into corresponding grooves provided on the corners of the two bases 1 and 2, so that each projection can be fitted into a single groove, being the correct one, thus avoiding the possibility of mistakes during packaging.

Finally the packing which is made up in that way is closed by one or more hooping strips of bands which pass in vertical planes around the packing compressing the two bases 1 and 2 against the domestic appliance, ensuring that the angle members are also stably locked to the assembly, or, preferably, a wrapping of heat-shrinkable plastics material.

To open the packing, free the machine contained therein and reassemble the parts constituting only the packing in a new volume, it is only necessary to lift the upper base 2 from the projections which are engaged with suitable recesses in the angle members, remove the angle members from the lower base 1 by withdrawing the lower projections of the angle members from the recesses provided at the corners of the lower base 1, remove the machine form its lower base 1, associate the angle members as a single bundle using the mode of operation described hereinafter, rest the bundle of angle members diagonally on the base 1 and finally fit the base 2 against the base 1, locking the solid item which is produced in that way by an easily removable band such as for example an elastic member.

For the purpose of ensuring that the angle members which are disposed in a single bundle are of sufficiently restrained dimensions for it to be possible to introduce them diagonally within the base 1, the arrangement will be adopted of providing two angle members whose vertical limbs 20, 21, 22 and 23 are not very broad, and the other two angle members 24, 25, 26 and 27 with broader limbs, as shown in Figure 4. When made in that configuration, the angle members can be associated with each other by first fitting together the angle members with the shorter limbs 20, 21, 22 and 23 in a position such that the two L-shapes are inverted relative to each other, thus occupying the minimum amount of space.The second operation involves associating with the first pair the other two angle members with the broader limbs 24, 25, 26 and 27, in such a way that said first pair is covered on at least three sides, the larger angle members being combined in such as way that they are positioned in mirror-image relationship with two homologous sides 24 and 25 of the respective L-shapes in oppositely positioned relationship, as shown in Figure 4. At that point the bundle of angle members 30 is ready to be fitted diagonally into the base 1 (see Figure 5) without any interference with the edges thereof since the heights of the angle members will be selected to be of suitable dimensions in relation to the heights of the limbs of the bases in such a way that precisely no interference occurs.

Finally the upper base is disposed upon the lower base in such a way as to produce a right regular parallelepiped, and the assembly is locked with a strong elastic member which prevents spontaneous disintegration of the construction of the packing described above (Figure 6).

Advantageously, to avoid the two bases 1 and 2 being able to slip relative to each other, a respective longitudinal groove 31 and 32 may be provided on one or more external edges (preferably two oppositely disposed edges) of the sides of the rim portion of the upper base 2, and similarly the corresponding external edges of the rim portion of the lower base 1 may be provided with respective longitudinal tongues 33 and 34 in such a way that the grooves, being coupled with the recesses, give the desired result of preventing the bases from slipping relative to each other.

It is apparent that the present invention can be -produced in numerous alternative forms and embodiments without however thereby departing from the scope of protection of the appended claims.

Claims

CLAINS

1. A reusable packing for a generally parallelepiped body, comprising a lower base and an upper base, and four angle members which bases and members are capable of being respectively fitted to the base portion, the top surface and the four corners of said body, said elements being made of substantially rigid material having a shock-resistant capability, wherein each of said bases is provided with a rectangular external perimeter and a rectangular internal perimeter, said bases have at the four sides of their external edge two respective rim portions which are oriented vertically and of closed development, upwardly for the lower base and downwardly for the upper base, said rim portions constitute eight flat elements for containing and protecting the lower and upper edges of the body to be packed, each flat element of said rim portions is of a different thickness in dependence on the upper and lower dimensions of the body to be packed, each of said angle members is provided at both ends thereof with L-shaped projections, that said projections are inserted into corresponding grooves provided in the corners of said bases so that each projection is inserted into a corresponding groove, said angle members can be withdrawn and can be associated with each other as a single bundle, said bundle is disposed diagonally against the lower base and finally the upper base is held against the lower base containing the bundle of angle members in the space provided between said bases.

2. Reusable packing according to claim 1 wherein the arms of said projections which are of L-shaped configuration are of dimensions which are different from each other so that no IL-shaped projection is identical to another projection and the grooves provided in the corners of said lower and upper bases are of corresponding dimensions in such a way that each angle member can be fitted only in a single position.

3. A packing according to claim 1 or claim 2 wherein two of the angle members are designed in such a way that the corresponding vertical limbs are not very broad and the other two angle members have broader limbs so that the angle members can be associated with each other by first combining the angle members with smaller limbs in a position such that the two limbs are mutually inverted, and the angle members with the broader limbs are associated in such a way as to enclose said first pair of angle members on at least three sides, said larger angle members being combined in such a way that they are position in mirror-image relationship with two homologous limbs in oppositely positioned relationship.

4. A packing according to one of the preceding claims wherein one or more longitudinal grooves are provided on one or more external edges of the sides of the rim portion of the upper base and that similarly the corresponding external edges of the rim portion of the lower base have respective longitudinal tongues in such a way that the said grooves are stably inserted into said recesses when the two said bases are joined together.

5. A packing according to claim 4 wherein said external edges are oppositely disposed edges.

6. A packing according to one of the preceding claims characterised by being made of expanded polypropylene.

7. A packing constructed and arranged to operate substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to and as illustrated in the accompanying drawings.

8. A domestic appliance packed in a packing according to any one of the preceding claims.