Appliance shipping runner
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current blow molded runners used for bulky items like appliances lack sufficient localized stiffness, leading to buckling and deformation under load, which can cause shifting and damage during stacking.
Innovation Solution
A blow molded runner design featuring compressed double wall structures and varying width along its length, with channels and cross ribs to enhance stiffness and resistance to buckling, and protrusions for reduced friction.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If a double wall configuration is used for the runner, then manufacturing cost is reduced and material usage is decreased, but localized stiffness at mounting areas becomes insufficient causing buckling under load
Solution Approach 1:
The runner features varying wall thicknesses with thicker walls at mounting areas (attachment points) and thinner walls in non-critical areas. This local quality variation provides enhanced localized stiffness where loads are applied while maintaining the cost-effective double wall configuration in other regions, resolving the contradiction between manufacturing cost and localized strength.
Solution Approach 2:
The design incorporates three-dimensional structural elements including ribs, channels, and varied wall thicknesses that add structural complexity in specific dimensions. These features increase the moment of inertia and buckling resistance at critical mounting areas without requiring uniform thickness increases throughout the entire runner, maintaining cost efficiency while improving localized stiffness.
2Ease of manufacture
If the runner walls are made thinner to reduce material cost, then manufacturing expense decreases, but overall bending stiffness becomes insufficient leading to excessive deflection under load
Solution Approach 1:
The runner is segmented into multiple functional zones with different wall thicknesses and structural characteristics. Critical mounting areas have thicker walls and additional reinforcement elements, while non-critical areas use thinner walls to reduce material cost. This segmentation allows the runner to achieve sufficient overall bending stiffness where needed without uniformly increasing material usage throughout.
Solution Approach 2:
The runner employs a composite structural design combining regions of different wall thicknesses and structural configurations within a single molded part. This composite approach creates a heterogeneous structure that optimizes the balance between material cost and bending stiffness, using thicker sections strategically where structural support is required and thinner sections where material reduction is beneficial.
3Ease of manufacture
If the runner structure is simplified to reduce manufacturing complexity, then production ease increases, but localized buckling resistance decreases causing stack shifting and potential damage
Solution Approach 1:
The runner incorporates localized reinforcement features such as ribs, channels, and varied wall thicknesses specifically at mounting areas where buckling resistance is critical. These local quality enhancements provide the necessary structural integrity and buckling resistance without requiring complex features throughout the entire runner structure, maintaining manufacturing simplicity in non-critical regions.
Data Source
AI summary
A blow molded runner having a bottom wall and a top wall forming a double wall blow molded configuration, at least one compressed double wall structure defined by fusion an inner surface of the bottom wall to an inner surface of the top wall. At least two columns spaced apart at a distance wherein each of the at least two columns defines one of the at least one compressed double wall structure and has a top surface and the compressed double wall structure corresponding to each of the at least two columns extends from the top surface to a bottom surface of the runner at the at least two columns wherein the bottom surface is defined by an outer surface of the bottom wall. A width of the runner varies along a length thereof.