Tobacco Pack Collar with Support Element for Inner Wrap
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing rigid packs for tobacco articles with hinged lids and internal collars fail to adequately restrain small-sized cigarettes, leading to mechanical stress and potential loss of tobacco fibers during handling, distribution, and sale, and existing solutions are not always simple or inexpensive to produce.
Innovation Solution
A rigid pack design featuring a cup-shaped container with a hinged lid and a U-shaped collar that includes a rear wall and upper wall, which is internally glued to the container and protrudes to securely hold the inner wrap, preventing unwanted movement and ensuring the lid remains closed, using a conventional folding process that is cost-effective.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If containment elements protrude inwards to rest against the group of cigarettes, then the cigarettes are restrained from shaking, but the structure becomes more complex and expensive to produce
Solution Approach 1:
The collar is divided into functional segments: containment elements for restraining cigarettes, and a rear wall for structural support and stability. This segmentation allows each part to perform its specific function efficiently without requiring the entire structure to be complex.
Solution Approach 2:
The collar acts as an intermediary element between the container and the group of cigarettes. It provides the restraining function while maintaining a simple overall structure, mediating between the need for cigarette stability and the desire for manufacturing simplicity.
2Ease of manufacture
If the collar is folded to act as a filler, then production cost is reduced, but the collar becomes unstable without a rear wall
Solution Approach 1:
The collar is segmented into containment elements and a separate rear wall component. The rear wall is added as a distinct element that provides structural stability to the folded collar, preventing it from being unstable while maintaining the cost-effective folded construction.
Solution Approach 2:
The collar structure combines the folded filler material with a rear wall element to create a composite structure that achieves both cost-effectiveness (through folding) and stability (through the rear wall reinforcement).
3Ease of operation
If the upper surface of the collar is lower than the upper surface of the cigarettes, then ease of extraction is improved, but the lid may not remain properly closed
Solution Approach 1:
The collar is designed with different local qualities: the upper surface is lowered in the extraction area to facilitate cigarette removal, while the rear wall maintains sufficient height to provide structural support for keeping the lid closed. Each local region of the collar performs its specific function optimally.
Data Source
Figure 1~2
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AI summary
A rigid pack (1) for tobacco articles provided with: a parallelepiped shaped container (2); a parallelepiped shaped lid (3) hinged to the container (2); an inner wrap (4) which encloses a group of tobacco articles, is housed on the inside of the container (2) and has a cross section that is smaller than the cross section of the container (2); and a collar (13), which embraces the inner wrap (4), is internally glued to the container (2) and comes out of the open upper end of the container (2); the collar (13) has: a front wall (14), two side walls (15), an upper wall (16), a pull-out opening (18) for the tobacco articles which extends on a portion of the front wall (14) and on a portion of the upper wall (16), a rear wall (17), and at least one support element (25; 37), which projects from a corresponding wall (15; 17) of the collar (13) and rests against the inner wrap (4).