Bag-type package to be torn for easy access to the product

Details Bag-type package to be torn for easy access to the product Bag-type package to be torn for easy access to the product

1999-08-31

2001-10-30

Garbe, Stephen P. (Department: 3727)

Flexible bags

Bag having means to facilitate opening it by severing bag...

C206S484000, C383S009000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06309104

ABSTRACT:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The invention relates to a sachet-shaped tear-open package for rapid access to a packaged product.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
A multitude of packaging forms such as three- or four-side sealed bags, tubular bags, satchel bags and flat-bottom bags are known which are produced of various materials, e.g. mono-materials or composite materials, and made media impermeable by means of gluing, sealing or welding.
The packaging materials employed for these packages generally are made of composite materials, which have an object of hermetically shielding the product and especially of preventing the permeation of vapor and gases. However, these characteristics also result in a higher strength of the packaging material, so that these composite materials are very difficult to tear and can only be torn under exertion of a relatively high force.
Thus, cutting tools such as scissors, knives or cutters, which are often disadvantageously not present on the spot, are often necessary for opening these packages. On the other hand, auxiliary constructions such as notches, grooves or serrations can reduce the above mentioned difficulties, but cannot satisfactorily eliminate them.
In certain fields of application, e.g. medicine, the above described packages must be opened with gloves, which often have slippery product residue adhering to them, so that a holding strength of the fingers does not suffice even for tearing open notches, and the fingers slide off.
An improvement of this situation is described in French Pat. No. 741.988. A tear spot has a notch provided in a sealed edge of a known package which is flanked on each side by a grip hole. This does improve gripping capacity of the tear spot, but it still leaves much to be desired in the case of gloved fingers and a slippery coating on the gloves.
WO 94/28837 describes a different solution for this problem, in which the fingers are prevented from slipping off by creating a coarse surface in the opening area of the package. For this, however, it is necessary to incorporate additional foreign materials, which on the one hand leads to increased costs and on the other hand makes a recycling of the package more difficult or even impossible.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
On the basis of this state of the art, it is an object of the present invention to improve and further embody a package of a tear open type indicated to overcome the difficulties and technical limits indicated above and especially to enable a safe and quick tearing-open of the package for a rapid access to a packaged product without use of auxiliary means such as knives or scissors.
The object is achieved according to the invention in a package of the type described above in that contours of punch-outs, apertures, formed by punching, in the vicinity of a notch or groove in a sealed area are at least partially serrated.
The choice of a serrated contour of the punch-outs very advantageously and in a very uncomplicated and economically favorable way provides for secure contact by the fingers when gripping the sealed seam or seams with the fingertips and reliably prevents a gliding-off of the fingertips, so that the package can be torn open safely and quickly without auxiliary means such as knives or scissors.
At least one punch-out is provided according to the invention; however, two punch-outs can also preferably be provided on the right and left sides of the weakening.
Embodiments of the invention include at least one punch out assigned to a notch or groove in a sealed seam or in an area of overlap of sealed seams, according to the following examples.
If, e.g., a package has a longitudinal seam in addition to a cross-seam, the equipment can be provided in the area where the cross-seam and the longitudinal seam overlap.
If a punch-out with a closed punch line is chosen, this results in an open perforation of the sealed seam. If the punch line is not closed, the punch-out remains at the punched site and can be moved from the punching plane in a hinged manner, through which the function of a gripping and opening aid is also fulfilled. The punch-out is preferably circular, but it can also be polygonal or strip-shaped.
The punch-out preferably has a size which enables the introduction of a human finger. Its size should at least correspond to the tactile surface of a human fingertip.
In all cases, the contour of the punch-out is at least partially serrated, through which a significant improvement of the gripping and opening aid is achieved. The effect can be increased by bending the serration out of the punching plane and thus creating a considerably stronger slipping inhibitor.
Further details and advantages of the invention become evident in the following description of an embodiment example shown in the attached drawings.


REFERENCES:
patent: 3154238 (1964-10-01), Barnhill
patent: 3615711 (1971-10-01), Markus et al.
patent: 3663239 (1972-05-01), Rowe et al.
patent: 3741778 (1973-06-01), Rowe
patent: 4141452 (1979-02-01), Martin et al.
patent: 4332327 (1982-06-01), Frohwerk et al.
patent: 4537308 (1985-08-01), Hollander, Jr.
patent: 4696404 (1987-09-01), Corella
patent: 4832188 (1989-05-01), Christie
patent: 5062716 (1991-11-01), Conrad et al.
patent: 5164178 (1992-11-01), Muysson
patent: 5454601 (1995-10-01), Sekine et al.
patent: 5826985 (1998-10-01), Goodman et al.
patent: 5908245 (1999-06-01), Bost et al.
patent: 0 522 824 A1 (1902-07-01), None
patent: 387271 (1933-02-01), None
patent: WO 94/28837 (1994-12-01), None

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