Multichamber container with expanded interior walls
AssigneeColgate-Palmolive Company
InventorPatrick Andre Connan
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Multichamber tubular containers are made by extrusion or injection stretch blow molding. The containers usually will have two or three chambers and one or more web walls. The web walls are relatively rigid as formed. The web walls must be stretched laterally to increase their flexibility which is needed for the uniform dispensing of product from the tubular chambers. The webs can be stretched mechanically by the rotation of rods, such as stretch rods, or pneumatically by a differential gas pressure in the chambers while the webs are at or near the glass transition temperature and can flow. The web walls for a circular tubular container can be stretched up to about one-half the diameter of the tubular container.
Claims15
A method for making containers having a plurality of longitudinally disposed separate chambers comprising:
- (a) forming a preform of said container by one of extrusion molding and injection molding, said preform having at least one interior web wall separating the preform into the same number of longitudinally disposed chambers as said container;
- (b) placing said preform into a mold and stretching said preform into contact with said mold by at least blowing a gas into said preform to form said container, said container having at least one interior web wall separating said container into said plurality of chambers, said container having a dispensing opening at one end and being closed at another end;
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- (c) after stretching said preform into contact with said mold in step (b) to form said container to set dimensions then further elongating said at least one interior web wall to a greater lateral dimension by creating a differential gas pressure between at least two of said plurality of chambers.
A method of making a container having a plurality of longitudinally disposed chambers comprising:
- (a) forming a preform of said container, said preform having at least one interior web wall separating a plurality of longitudinally disposed chambers, said at least one interior web wall extending from one end to the other end of said preform;
- (b) placing said preform into a mold and stretching said preform by at least blowing a gas into said preform to form a container having the shape of said mold, said container having at least one interior web wall separating said plurality of longitudinally disposed chambers, a dispensing opening at one end and having a closed other end, said at least one interior web wall extending from said one end to said other end of said container;
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- (c) providing a differential gas pressure in at least one of said plurality of chambers with respect to another of said plurality of chambers to increase the lateral dimension of said at least one interior wall to a dimension greater than that of said at least one interior web wall upon the formation of said container.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.