Classifications

• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A24—TOBACCO; CIGARS; CIGARETTES; SIMULATED SMOKING DEVICES; SMOKERS' REQUISITES
  • A24D—CIGARS; CIGARETTES; TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS; MOUTHPIECES FOR CIGARS OR CIGARETTES; MANUFACTURE OF TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS OR MOUTHPIECES
  • A24D1/00—Cigars; Cigarettes
  • A24D1/02—Cigars; Cigarettes with special covers
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A24—TOBACCO; CIGARS; CIGARETTES; SIMULATED SMOKING DEVICES; SMOKERS' REQUISITES
  • A24D—CIGARS; CIGARETTES; TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS; MOUTHPIECES FOR CIGARS OR CIGARETTES; MANUFACTURE OF TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS OR MOUTHPIECES
  • A24D3/00—Tobacco smoke filters, e.g. filter-tips, filtering inserts; Filters specially adapted for simulated smoking devices; Mouthpieces for cigars or cigarettes
  • A24D3/06—Use of materials for tobacco smoke filters
  • A24D3/061—Use of materials for tobacco smoke filters containing additives entrapped within capsules, sponge-like material or the like, for further release upon smoking
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A24—TOBACCO; CIGARS; CIGARETTES; SIMULATED SMOKING DEVICES; SMOKERS' REQUISITES
  • A24D—CIGARS; CIGARETTES; TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS; MOUTHPIECES FOR CIGARS OR CIGARETTES; MANUFACTURE OF TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS OR MOUTHPIECES
  • A24D1/00—Cigars; Cigarettes
  • A24D1/002—Cigars; Cigarettes with additives, e.g. for flavouring
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A24—TOBACCO; CIGARS; CIGARETTES; SIMULATED SMOKING DEVICES; SMOKERS' REQUISITES
  • A24D—CIGARS; CIGARETTES; TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS; MOUTHPIECES FOR CIGARS OR CIGARETTES; MANUFACTURE OF TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS OR MOUTHPIECES
  • A24D3/00—Tobacco smoke filters, e.g. filter-tips, filtering inserts; Filters specially adapted for simulated smoking devices; Mouthpieces for cigars or cigarettes
  • A24D3/02—Manufacture of tobacco smoke filters
  • A24D3/0204—Preliminary operations before the filter rod forming process, e.g. crimping, blooming
  • A24D3/0212—Applying additives to filter materials
  • A24D3/0216—Applying additives to filter materials the additive being in the form of capsules, beads or the like
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A24—TOBACCO; CIGARS; CIGARETTES; SIMULATED SMOKING DEVICES; SMOKERS' REQUISITES
  • A24D—CIGARS; CIGARETTES; TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS; MOUTHPIECES FOR CIGARS OR CIGARETTES; MANUFACTURE OF TOBACCO SMOKE FILTERS OR MOUTHPIECES
  • A24D3/00—Tobacco smoke filters, e.g. filter-tips, filtering inserts; Filters specially adapted for simulated smoking devices; Mouthpieces for cigars or cigarettes
  • A24D3/04—Tobacco smoke filters characterised by their shape or structure
  • A24D3/048—Tobacco smoke filters characterised by their shape or structure containing additives

Definitions

• the smoking article can be a conventional smoking article including a tobacco rod, for example coupled to the filter via a tipping paper, or a non-conventional smoking article, such as a smoking article to be used in conjunction with a system for electronic smoking.
• an additional element in the following called “filter inserted object”, can be comprised in the filter or in a segment of the filter.
• This object may be either including flavourant to modify the sensory attributes of the cigarette, or it may alter some other characteristics of the smoke, such as ventilation and resistance to draw.
• Objects present in the filter are for example one or more rupturable capsules containing flavourant, flavour pellets, flavoured or non-flavoured strands, exchange resin beads, absorbent/adsorbent particles, restrictors and combinations thereof.
• a single object is preferably comprised in a single segment of the filter of the invention, however in some specific cases, such as for example when beads are considered, hundreds of objects may be included .
• the wrapper may comprise porous plug wrap, impermeable plastics or any other suitable material known in the art.
• an inner surface and an outer surface are defined.
• the inner surface is the surface mainly facing the one or more plugs when the smoking article is assembled, while the outer surface is generally the surface mainly either in contact with the exterior of the filter or covered by additional one or more wrapping layers depending on the filter construction.
• a "seam area" can be identified, where the wrapper overlaps itself in order to be closed around the plug forming a longitudinal seam.
• the overlapping area which includes a portion of the inner surface and of the outer surface of the wrapper, is referred to as seam area where the outer surface and the inner surface of the wrapper are bonded one on the other.
• the remaining area that is, the area of the inner surface not part of the seam area, is referred to as "inner rod surface”.
• the inner rod surface is generally in direct contact to the plug rod circumferentially surrounding the plug .
• flavourant is herein used to indicate a substance, compound or a mixture of substances capable of triggering a sensation involving the taste of a person.
• the sensation involves gustatory and olfactory sensations.
• such a flavourant is recognizable by a person skilled in the art as being able to impart, enhance or modify in a desired manner the flavour or the taste of an article or composition to which it is added .
• a patch in the present context indicates a layer of material which covers an area of the inner surface of the wrapper. Preferably, it covers an area of the inner rod surface.
• the shape of the patch is arbitrary and may include a square, a stripe, a rectangle, a wavy line, a triangle or a combination of these or other geometries.
• the patch may cover most of the inner rod surface of the wrapper or just a small fraction of the inner rod surface of the wrapper.
• the patch may extend along the whole longitudinal length of the wrapper, or only for a portion of the longitudinal length of the wrapper.
• the patch has a thickness which is sufficient to allow for a secure connection between the plug and the wrapper.
• the layer's thickness may be homogeneous or non- homogeneous. A layer of between about 2 micrometres and about 50 micrometres is preferred .
• the filter of the invention requires a reduced number of processing steps for its fabrication compared to a flavoured filter according to the prior art.
• the steps of flavouring the filter with menthol and depositing the adhesive on the wrapper are therefore at least partially merged.
• the adhesive patch is located in the seam area of the inner surface of the wrapper, in other words it is located in proximity of the longitudinal edge of the inner surface of the wrapper, so that the longitudinal seam of the wrapper is bonded using adhesive.
• the adhesive patch located in the seam area comprises the first adhesive patch, which means that it comprises hot melt adhesive.
• the menthol patch is located in the inner rod surface only and the menthol patch does not extend into the seam area of the wrapper.
• a combination of a menthol patch or patches and second adhesive patch or patches is realized in the inner rod surface of the wrapper in the filter of the invention in order to anchor the plug onto the wrapper.
• the menthol patch may be disposed on the inner rod surface in many other different ways, for example diagonally with respect to the plug longitudinal direction.
• the menthol patches may form a predetermined selected pattern on the inner rod surface of the wrapper, for example the menthol patches can form an intermittent stripe, a wavy line, a dotted line, or any other chosen pattern.
• the apparatus also includes a cutter for cutting the resulting wrapped tow into segments of predetermined length.
• Applicants have noted that a substantially standard apparatus for the production of filters can be used also for the production of the filter of the invention at high speed . More precisely, the apparatus of the invention for the manufacture of flavoured filters does not need complex modifications with respect to an apparatus of the prior art. This allows a rather easy and cost effective conversion of the known apparatuses in order to produce the flavoured filter of the invention.
• the discharger may be configured to discharge a continuous menthol patch, so as to create a continuous longitudinal stripe of menthol along the web or intermittently. This allows for the production of a plurality of distinct menthol patches on the web of wrapper material.
• the spacing between the plurality of plugs may preferably be flavourant-free.
• a plurality of dischargers are present in the apparatus of the invention, so as to create a plurality of separated menthol patches on the web.
• a discharger including a plurality of nozzles for the formation of a plurality of parallel stripes of menthol may be included .
• This additional discharger of menthol can be located downstream or upstream the location of the discharger of adhesive.
• downstream and upstream refers to the direction of advancing of the continuous web of wrapping material .
• the discharger configured to discharge menthol so as to form a menthol patch comprises a drum having a plurality of grooves.
• the grooves are realized in a predetermined pattern on a circumferential surface of the drum.
• the drum is coupled to the apparatus of the invention in such a way that it rotates while contacting the web of wrapper material.
• the grooves are continuously filled with liquid menthol.
• the liquid menthol is in turn discharged onto the web due to the drum rotation.
• the movement of the web puts the drum into rotation.
• the menthol is therefore disposed onto the web according to the pattern of the grooves on the drum, creating a menthol design on the web and therefore on inner rod surface of the final filter.
• Each groove therefore may form one or more different menthol patches onto the wrapper web.
• Fig. 2 is a top view of a wrapper of a filter for the smoking article of Fig. 1 realized according to the invention
• Fig. 4 is a top view of a wrapper analogue to the top view of Fig. 2 according to a different embodiment of the invention
• a smoking article realized according to the teaching of the present invention is globally indicated with 1.
• the filter 400 includes a plurality of filter segments, such as white plug 5, restrictor 4b and carbon plug 4c coaxially positioned along the longitudinal direction X.
• the inner surface 21 is delimited by a first and second longitudinal edge 25, 26, substantially parallel one to the other, and includes a seam area 23 and an inner rod surface 24.
• the distance between the first and the second longitudinal edges 25,26 defines the width of the wrapper 20, for example between about 24 mm and about 30 mm, preferably, about 27 mm.
• the seam area 23 is the portion of the area of the inner surface which includes the seam 30 and the overlapping area between inner and outer wrapper surface 21,22.
• the inner rod surface 24 is the area of the inner surface which is in contact to the longitudinal surface 13 of the plug 5.
• the filter 4, 400 includes a menthol patch 50 on the inner surface 21 of wrapper 20 used to attach the wrapper 20 to the plug 5.
• the menthol patch 50 is applied to the wrapper 20.
• the shape and thickness of the menthol patch 50 are arbitrary and some examples are given with reference to the appended drawings of the preferred embodiments.
• the wrapper 20 includes two menthol patches, all indicated with 50 each of which has the shape of a menthol stripe which extends substantially for the complete longitudinal length of the inner surface 21 of wrapper 20.
• the two menthol patches 50 are substantially parallel to each other and are both realized in the inner rod surface 24.
• Objects are optionally inserted in the tow material for example by means of an apparatus for introducing objects in the continuous flow of filter material as described in the international application WO-A- 2012/076496 and not shown in the appended drawings.
• the continuous web and tow strand are then put into contact, in particular the tow strand 5a is laid down on the web 20a.

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• Chemical & Material Sciences (AREA)
• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Materials Engineering (AREA)
• Cigarettes, Filters, And Manufacturing Of Filters (AREA)

Priority Applications (6)

Applications Claiming Priority (2)

Publications (2)

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Family Applications (1)

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Cited By (5)

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Citations (5)

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• 2013
  • 2013-07-05 WO PCT/EP2013/064309 patent/WO2014019804A2/en active Application Filing
  • 2013-07-05 CN CN201380041080.9A patent/CN104540403B/zh active Active
  • 2013-07-05 RU RU2015106914A patent/RU2636564C2/ru active
  • 2013-07-05 KR KR1020157003043A patent/KR102183809B1/ko active IP Right Grant
  • 2013-07-05 JP JP2015524696A patent/JP6378677B2/ja active Active
  • 2013-07-05 BR BR112015002025-9A patent/BR112015002025B1/pt active IP Right Grant
  • 2013-07-05 EP EP13734117.8A patent/EP2879531B1/en active Active
  • 2013-08-01 AR ARP130102730A patent/AR091954A1/es active IP Right Grant
• 2018
  • 2018-04-12 JP JP2018076581A patent/JP6535782B2/ja active Active

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