Implosion-Resistant Vacuum Skin Package Top Web
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Solution Overview
Problem
Vacuum skin packaging technologies face challenges with top web implosion, particularly when packaging bone-in meat products, due to excessive stretching and fracturing during the packaging process, which can lead to holes in the top web, reducing packaging effectiveness and product integrity.
Innovation Solution
The development of an implosion-resistant top web made from a thermoplastic material comprising a blend of ethylene/α-olefin copolymer and cyclic olefin copolymer, with specific weight percentages to enhance strength and resistance, and a multilayer film structure including a heat-seal layer, oxygen barrier layer, and tie layers to prevent stretching and maintain package integrity.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If the top web is made from conventional thermoplastic material, then the packaging process is simple, but the top web fractures and forms holes when packaging bone-in meat products
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies composite materials by blending ethylene/α-olefin copolymer with cyclic olefin copolymer in specific ratios (30-80 wt% ethylene/α-olefin copolymer and 1-50 wt% cyclic olefin copolymer). This composite material structure provides both the necessary flexibility for packaging and the strength to prevent fracture when packaging bone-in meat products, thereby resolving the contradiction between top web integrity and material complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the material parameters by specifying precise weight percentages of different polymer components and controlling the molecular weight distribution. By adjusting these parameters, the top web achieves optimal mechanical properties that prevent fracture during the packaging process while maintaining simplicity in the packaging method itself.
2Shape
If the top web is stretched to cover exposed surfaces, then the vacuum skin package conforms to the product shape, but the top web implodes and fractures
Solution Approach 1:
The composite material structure combines ethylene/α-olefin copolymer (providing flexibility and conformability) with cyclic olefin copolymer (providing tensile strength and fracture resistance). This allows the top web to be stretched sufficiently to conform to product shapes while maintaining the strength needed to prevent implosion and fracture during the stretching process.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies local quality by creating a top web with non-uniform material properties through the blend of different polymers. The material composition is optimized to provide different characteristics in different regions - flexibility where conformability is needed and strength where fracture prevention is critical - allowing the top web to successfully conform to product shapes without imploding.
3Area of stationary object
If the top web is drawn into unfilled volumes, then the package covers the product completely, but the top web fractures during forming
Solution Approach 1:
The cyclic olefin copolymer component in the blend provides exceptional tensile strength and resistance to fracture, enabling the top web to be drawn into unfilled volumes and conform to complex product shapes without breaking. This composite material approach allows complete coverage of the product surface while maintaining top web integrity throughout the forming process.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution effectively prevents top web implosion, ensuring a secure and intact vacuum skin package, particularly for bone-in meat products, by providing enhanced strength and resistance to stretching, thus maintaining product freshness and packaging integrity.
Implementation Method 1
a top web is drawn upward against a heated dome and thereafter draped down over the article and support member. When the vacuum is released from the chamber and atmospheric pressure comes to bear on the top web, the top web is thermoformed to take the shape of the exposed extending portion of the support member, as well as the shape of the exposed surface of the product.
Implementation Method 2
the atmosphere can cause portions of the heated top web to be stretched to a high degree. After the top web is draped over the released, with the resulting atmospheric pressure forcing the top web to conform to the shape of the product and to that portion of the upper surface of the support member which extends around the product.
Implementation Method 3
Vacuum skin packaging (VSP) is carried out by placing a product on a support member, placing the support member with product thereon into a vacuum chamber in which the atmosphere is evacuated
Data Source
AI summary
A packaged product has a product surrounded by a vacuum skin package. The vacuum skin package has a support member and an implosion-resistant thermoplastic top web. The top web conforms with both the upper surface of the product, and an uncovered portion of the upper surface of the support member. The thermoplastic top web comprises an ethylene/α-olefin copolymer in an amount of from 55 wt % to 85 wt %, based on total weight of top web, and/or a blend of ethylene/α-olefin copolymer and cyclic olefin copolymer. Also disclosed is a vacuum skin package containing the implosion-resistant top web.