The present invention relates to a plastic closure having an integrated capsule for dispensing solid, granulated or liquid active ingredients, comprising a cylindrical or conical capsule wall with a chamber at its lower end, the chamber being sealable by means of a film, wherein in the area of the upper end of the capsule wall a convex, flexible membrane is formed onto the same in one piece therewith, by means of which a piercing member can be operated, wherein the plastic closure part comprises a shell wall with fastening means which are connected with the capsule wall via a ring-shaped covering surface and wherein the shell wall concentrically encircles the capsule wall and in that the piercing member prior to the operation of the convex membrane rests completely inside the chamber.
Increasingly, capsules are offered on the market which contain active ingredients for the preparation of beverages. These active ingredients may be present in a solid, liquid or granulated form. Capsules of this kind comprise capsules which are suitable for the preparation of coffee. Typical examples of such capsules are shown in EP-A-0 512 468 and EP-A-1 190 959.
Substantially more complex are closures in various shapes or forms which comprise a storage space serving as a capsule and from which a solid, liquid or granulated active ingredient is to be dispensed into a container, on which the closure is fastened. One of the oldest closures of this kind is disclosed, for example, in document GB-A-1193989. Here a plug-on collar is placed on top of a container neck, which comprises an upwardly extending, cylindrical wall, wherein this wall is formed as a closed cylinder, in which a hollow press piston is mounted, which is filled with the respective active ingredient. A separate protective cap is placed on top of the piston cylinder part. A closure of this kind comprises many individual components, and it is not possible to fit and use it on conventional filling machines.
A very similar system is known from WO-A-03093128. Both in the case of this closure with integrated chamber and in case of the previously described closure, once the active ingredient has been dispensed, the capsule consisting of piston and cylinder unit must be removed.
A somewhat different system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,886,686. Again a separate chamber exists in which a ram is mounted which must be pressed downwards. The cylinder of the capsule is provided with a piercable bottom, to which the ram is attached. Here too, the capsule comprises a moving part configured as a flying piston which acts upon the ram, and this in turn pivots the bottom partly to one side.
More and more foodstuffs, medicines, cosmetics, adhesives and cleaning agents, as well as other substances described altogether as active ingredients, are offered in highly concentrated form. This has the advantage of reducing package sizes, lowering of transport costs and thereby reducing packaging expenditure. The disadvantage is that all these active ingredients in a highly concentrated form must be subsequently dosed to obtain the required usage quantities and then be added in a dosed manner to a liquid, i.e. a solvent in the widest sense. Frequently consumers do not take sufficient notice of the advice regarding the dosed quantity and tend to dispense a much higher concentration than required. This is detrimental to the end product to be produced and consumers will notice that the goods bought in concentrated form, in the end, cost more than if they had bought them in their ready-to-use diluted form. This has lead to the fact that the concentrated form of such active ingredients has not come to be accepted to the extent that would be desirable.
Therefore there has been a move towards offering these concentrated active ingredients in pre-dosed quantities. In the case of active ingredients in powder form these are offered in the form of tablets, capsules or lozenges. However, not all powdery active ingredients are suitable for being dispensed as tablets. And even if these active ingredients are dispensed in predefined portions, the corresponding liquid portions are missing which, usually after having been dosed, must then again be mixed with the solid or granulated active ingredients.
A capsule according to the preamble of patent claim 1 has been disclosed in document WO 2010/084176. In this instance the capsule is combined with the screw closure, and has a cylindrical capsule wall which is closed at its lower end by means of a destructible film, and the upper end of which has a convex flexible membrane to which a piercing member is attached, which prior to operating the convex membrane is completely contained in the chamber, and following operation of the membrane partially protrudes from the chamber, piercing the film. As already mentioned these combined capsule closures are used to dispense both solid and granulated or liquid active ingredients. Often these different types of active ingredient also mean that they cannot simply be stored in the capsule but must be stored specially, in particular in blister packs, in order to achieve an improved gas seal or liquid seal. As such it would be perfectly feasible to store a blister pack inside the capsule, or the blister pack itself could form a destructible film. This means that depending on the type of active ingredient a completely different type of destructible film could exist, i.e. not merely an aluminium film, but instead also a plastic film, a blister pack etc. These different possibilities of devising capsule closures also mean that different piercing members are required, i.e. piercing members which merely cause a perforation, or which cause a cut or which merely pierce. In practice this means that, depending on the ingredient stored in the capsule, a completely new injection mould must be employed. If a company then intends to offer an assortment of such closures, this would mean extremely high investments.
Therefore it is the requirement of the present invention to modify a plastic closure with capsule of the kind mentioned in the beginning in such a way that for small modifications and a small investment volume a whole series of such capsule closure can be manufactured which are suitable for a wide variety of films sealing the capsule. This requirement is met by a plastic closure with integrated capsule of the kind mentioned in the beginning, which capsule is characterised in that the lower face of the convex membrane can be brought into operative contact with a replaceable piercing member.
With a preferred solution the lower face of the flexible membrane has a coupling attachment formed onto it, to which a replaceable piercing member with coupling attachment receptacle can be fitted.
Further advantageous designs of the capsule are revealed in the claims.
Various embodiments of the subject according to the invention are depicted in the drawing and explained in the description below. In the drawings
The plastic closure with capsule is marked overall with reference symbol 1. This consists of a capsule part 10 and a screw closure part 20. The capsule part 10 and the screw closure part 20 are formed integrally in one piece. The capsule part 10 comprises a capsule wall 2. This capsule wall 2 is preferably, but not necessarily, formed cylindrically. Preferably at least the outside of the capsule wall would be provided with a slightly conical taper in order to achieve improved demoulding. As such the outside of the capsule wall 2 will have a slightly larger diameter in the open area than in the closed area.
This capsule wall 2 is closed in the upper area 5 by a flexible convex membrane 6 which is formed integrally on the inside of the capsule wall 2. This causes a chamber 3 to be formed below the flexible, convex membrane 6. When viewing the capsule part 10 from the open lower face a kind of cup is formed, the bottom of which, in this case, is the flexible, convex capsule membrane 6. This kind of cup can be filled in conventional filling plants without problems with any given active ingredient W. This active ingredient may be filled into the chamber 3 in a liquid, solid (for example as several tablets), flowing or granulated form. Subsequently, in conventional filling plants, the chamber 3 may be sealed by means of a destructible film 4.
The destructible film 4 may be configured as a plastic film or an aluminium film or even as a dense paper film or a blister. Again in conventional filling plants, the film can be welded on or glued on. In case of a blister the plastic film would be welded to the rim of the capsule wall, and the piercing member presses against the convex part of the blister.
The integrally formed capsule wall 2 with the flexible convex membrane 8 may be produced in one piece by the injection-moulding technique. For particular active ingredients, the entire part or at least the capsule wall 2 with the flexible convex membrane 6 may be produced directly with a barrier layer, by injection-moulding.
The embodiment depicted in the figures shows a capsule 1 which is formed integrally to form a screw cap closure 1. The shell wall 25 of the closure comprises an internal thread 21. It concentrically encircles a horizontal ring-shaped covering surface 24 and then merges directly with the capsule wall 2, which forms the chamber 2. Inside the capsule wall 2 exists the convex membrane 6, on the lower face of which a coupling attachment 40 is formed. The capsule wall 25 has a guarantee band 27 formed onto it here via predetermined breaking point bridges 26.
Joined onto the ring-shaped covering surface 24 is an inner relatively thin annular wall 22, which merges with the capsule wall 2 via a shoulder 23. The convex membrane 6 directly engages with the capsule wall 2 in the area of the shoulder 23. The convex side of the convex membrane 6 is directed upwards. The lower convex surface of the convex membrane has a coupling attachment 8 formed onto it. In
In the drawing the plastic closure according to the invention is depicted merely as a screw closure. This is, albeit, a preferred embodiment because always realisable, but it is by no means the only possible solution. Thus, for example, the shell wall 25, instead of being provided with an internal thread, may be equipped with a circumferential continuous bead or a bead split up in the partial area, which may be pressed on a container neck with a counteracting bead.
A further possibility would be to design the plastic closure as a hinge closure. In this case the ring-shaped covering surface 24 and the shell wall 25 would be arranged to join at the level of a shoulder 23. A lid is then formed onto the shell wall 25 via a hinge, and the capsule wall 2 with the convex membrane 6 and the coupling attachment 8 with the fitted piercing member 7 are then arranged in the lid. In other words, in the version according to
The coupling attachment 8 as shown may be formed as a simple tube portion, and the piercing member placed on top or inserted into it is held thereon in a form-locked or positively locking manner. Should it be desirable for the coupling attachment 8 to be closed at the bottom, the convex membrane may be open without problems above the point where the piercing member is attached, enabling a plug of the injection mould to protrude into it. This plastic closure, here as a screw closure without piercing member, now forms a standard. This standard also, allows plastic closures with capsules to be produced in a very simple way and at low cost by means of corresponding inserts in the injection mould, where the capsule walls 2 may be of varying length. Whilst in
In both variants, i.e. variants with high or low capsule wall 2, the chamber 3 may be filled with liquid, granulated or solid active ingredients. Since in most cases there is no problem in increasing the concentration of the active ingredient, it becomes ever more probable for screw closures with very small chambers 3 to be used. Such small chambers have the big advantage that they enable such closures to be fitted on conventional automatic screw closure machines. With screw closures where the capsule wall protrudes at the bottom, special devices must be provided in order to place these closures onto the respective containers.
It should be briefly pointed out that for simplicity's sake the containers mentioned here may be both plastic bottles and glass bottles, but of course, also soft packs provided with an opening for pouring and comprising a flange with a spout provided with an external thread for fitting the plastic closure.
After a piercing member 7 has been placed onto the coupling attachment 8, as shown in
Thanks to this design according to the invention, in which a coupling attachment is formed onto the convex membrane 6 and a piercing member 7 can be placed onto this coupling attachment, standard closures can be produced, which may be equipped according to customer requirements with an application-specific piercing member. The type of piercing member depends, for example, on what kind of sealing or destructible film 4 is chosen. In
In the explosive view of
The possibilities of configuring the piercing member 7 are practically limitless. In
Although in the embodiment shown here the piercing member 7 is connected with the convex membrane 6 via the coupling attachment 8 or the coupling attachment receptacle 74 when assembled, it is also certainly possible to arrange the piercing member 7 in the chamber 3 so as to be only axially movable. In this case it would make sense if the piercing member 7 is equipped with a cylindrical guiding wall 71 and held inside it with a certain degree of friction. Prior to being operated for the first time, the piercing member 7 is retained right up to the top within the capsule wall 2, and by operating the membrane the membrane presses upon the piercing member not bodily connected with it, pushing the same in a downward direction. Such a solution is of some importance insofar as a variant is thereby produced which after its first operation cannot be manipulated. With this variant therefore, the lower face of the flexible membrane 6 can be brought into contact with the replaceable piercing member 7, not necessarily physically, but merely through the way in which it operates. In principle the lower face of the flexible membrane 6 forms so-to-speak a pressure surface which has a coupling attachment function, and the piercing member thus has an interactive pressure surface which acts as a coupling attachment receptacle. Instead of being connected in a positively-locking and/or a force-locked manner, as already mentioned, the two parts are operatively connected only during operation. The concept of offering a solution for different versions sealing film or destructible film is maintained. The term “destructible” is not be understood as only a solution where the film itself is torn or cut, but also where the connection of the film with the capsule wall is achieved and thus the opening of the chamber 3. This can be effected, for example, in that the destructible film is held on the capsule wall 2 by means of a peeling lacquer, thereby, due to the pressure of the piercing member, interrupting the connection between this destructible film and the capsule wall 2. The content of the chamber 3 can thus get into the container, onto which the plastic closure has been placed.
A further variant consists in that also with variants, where a tablet is stored in a blister pack, the pressure plate, for example, can be additionally provided with perforating teeth or cutting teeth. It is, of course, possible to provide only one perforating tooth or one cutting tooth.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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01670/10 | Oct 2010 | CH | national |
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind | 371c Date |
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PCT/EP2011/062826 | 7/11/2011 | WO | 00 | 4/11/2013 |