US 4,380,134 AGranted

Molded squeeze toy including whistle

OwnerAnthony P. Taluba, Paul A. Talubainventors

Life of this patent

Estimating the term…

Loading patent…

Abstract

A squeeze toy of air-filled elastomer material including a whistle, and a method and apparatus for forming the same. A small cavity or depression is molded into the body of the toy to form the whistle site. A small cap, which may comprise a flat or slightly rounded disk, or a small hollow cylinder, closes the small cavity or depression forming the whistle site. A pair of small openings are formed in centered, aligned relation in the cap and in the bottom of the cavity, completing the whistle. The body of the toy is preferably formed by blow molding techniques, using the opening in the bottom of the cavity corresponding to the whistle hole to blow air in during the molding process, and to blow the finished part out of the mold. The whistle cap may either be made simultaneously with the body, by blow molding, or by separate injection molding techniques.

Claims11

Dependent claims

An air-filled squeeze toy of unvulcanized thermoplastic rubber material comprising in combination a whistle having a site comprising a whistle cavity integrally formed with the body of said toy in a blow molding process in which a parison extruded from a source for plasticizing said thermoplastic rubber is clamped in an unheated mold including precisely engineered apertured insert means in fixed relation to the interior of said mold,

said whistle cavity including a closure forming a substantially closed chamber resonant to a preselected sound frequency,
said whistle cavity and said closure each having a small central opening, said openings being substantially aligned in axial relation to said chamber, wherein at least the central opening in said whistle cavity as formed by said insert means is positioned to accommodate the excursions of a cylindrical blow pin of uniform cross-section, whereby it serves as a blow hole during said blow molding process, and wherein as a result thereof said opening in said whistle cavity is precisely controlled to have a uniform reproducible diameter precisely equalling the minimum diameter of the opening in said closure.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.