Receptacles – Sectional – Knockdown
Patent
1994-05-17
1995-03-07
Moy, Joseph Man-Fu
Receptacles
Sectional
Knockdown
220 429, B65D 624
Patent
active
053950020
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The present invention relates to a box pallet having a base and four side walls. The box pallet is especially designed for transporting and storing plastic raw materials in pellet or powder form, but may also be used for transporting other goods that require a similar transport container.
Plastic raw materials are usually produced in large quantities in pellet or powder form and are transported to the user in bulk, in sacks on loading pallets, or in lid-equipped cylindrical containers of corrugated fibreboard or hardboard (masonite) on loading pallets.
The last-mentioned type of box pallets with cylindrical containers of board or masonite has a volume of about 2 m.sup.3 and holds about 1 ton of plastic pellets or plastic powder. Regrettably, the cylindrical container is sensitive to moisture and external damage, and since the box pallet often is exposed to wind and weather and fairly rough treatment when transported, the container will quite frequently break, causing the plastic raw material to leak out. These prior-art box pallets with cylindrical containers of board or masonite are, in addition, bulky and unwieldy when empty. As a result, only the loading pallet proper, and not the cylindrical container, is returned when the box pallet has been emptied. The fact that currently-used box pallets are only reused to a small extent involves considerable inconveniences, both from the economic and the environmental point of view, since the empty containers accumulate at the user's end. Another drawback is that today's box pallets with cylindrical containers of masonite do not make full use of the square loading area of the pallet.
It should here be mentioned that GB 2,166,116 discloses a box pallet which consists of a square base and four side walls which are interconnected by L-shaped vertical side edge portions which can be pushed into one another. The side walls are fixed to the base by means of a number of downwardly-directed legs equipped with projecting teeth which snap into corresponding holes in the base when the side walls are pressed down towards the base. Once the side walls have been fastened to the base, it is very difficult to release them again. Owing to their rather intricate design, the side walls are expensive to manufacture and can only be made in one size.
EP 0,285,953 discloses a container which consists of a pallet base with four vertical side walls which are interconnected by a hinge mechanism with a rod-shaped male member and arc-shaped female members which permit the side walls to be folded up. The side walls are fixed to the base with special steel clips. Although the pallet construction is collapsible, it is nevertheless disadvantageous in that the intricate design of the side walls does not permit the making of side walls of varying height, e.g. by extrusion. The fact that the side walls are fixed to the base by loose steel clips further complicates the construction and increases the number of component parts.
The object of the present invention is to reduce or eliminate the inconveniences of prior-art box pallets, especially those of the above box pallet with a cylindrical container of masonite, and to provide an improved box pallet which is simple and inexpensive to manufacture, easily assembled and disassembled, as well as handily and expediently returned for reuse.
According to the invention, this and other objects are achieved by a box pallet which has a base and four side walls and which is characterised in that the base has four vertical walls which, together with the upper surface of said base, form an upwardly open, rectangular space for accommodating the side walls, each side wall being releasably connected to the adjacent side wall in that the vertical edge portions of the adjacent side walls are in the shape of hook-shaped beads engaging one another and enabling the interconnection of the vertical edge portions of aligned and abutting side walls by turning one side wall through 90.degree.; and that the upper surface and the vertical walls of said base constitute supportin
REFERENCES:
patent: 2659515 (1953-11-01), Miller
patent: 3700134 (1972-10-01), Blanchard
patent: 4181236 (1980-01-01), Prodel
patent: 4711361 (1987-12-01), Mischenko
patent: 5056677 (1991-10-01), Toyosawa
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