Note: Descriptions are shown in the official language in which they were submitted.
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SELF STICRING CARPET TILES
~IELD O~ THE INVENTION
The preser.t invention is directed to a
method and system for packaging tiles. More
specifically, the invention relates to a method and
system for packaging carpet tiles of the self-
sticking type, which have a pressure release
adhesive applied to one surface.
~ACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
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There are two types of carpet tiles
currently available. A first type requires that a
self-release adhesive be applied to the floor on
which the carpet tile is to be placed. ~here are
several disadvantages in using this type of carpet
tiles, including the need to apply expensive
adhesive over the entire floor and difficulty in
installing tiles on such a surface. A second
disadvantage is that when thle tiles are removed the
glue which remains on the floor is both diffîcult
and costly to remove in order to return the floor to
its original ~urace.
Accordingly, the second type of carpet
tiIe, which is commonly known as a self-sticking
tile, uses a pressure self-release adhesive cured
25~ onto the back of the carpet tile. Such carpet tiles
having the self-release adhesive are advantageous
over the first type of carpet tiles in that less
adhesive is required, installation is facilitated
and when the carpet tiles are removed there is no
; 30 messy and costly clean up necessary in order to
return the floor to its original surface.
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Ayotte, U.S. Patent 4,380,563 proposes to
package felt substrates having an adhesive applied
to one surface of the substrate. Each felt
substrate, with an applied adhesive, is separated
from another such felt substrate, with an applied
adhesive, by a release paper. The release paper is
necessary to prevent the adhesive surface of one
felt substrate from contacting the finished or
exposed felt surface of another felt substrate. The
proposed Ayotte packaging i9 disadvantageous, in
that it is costly to provide the release paper
during the manufacturing process and the release
paper also presents problems of paper disposal
during the time of installation of the carpet tiles.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
This invention provides a carpet tile
packaging system and method for self-sticking carpet
tiles which is an improvement over the prior art
packaging methods and systems in that it obviates
the above-described disadvanltages of the prior
art. The pressure self-release adhesive, in the
present invention, is applied to the bottom surface
of the carpet tiles in one of two predetermined
geometrical patterns. The two predetermined
geometrical patterns are complementary so that when
two tiles with pressure aelf-release adhesives are
placed back to back, the adhesive from one tile will
not contact the adhesive from the other tile.
As is well known to those skilled in the
art, pressure self-release adhesive can be applied
to carpet tiles in several ways. In one way, an
aqueous or solvent adhesive is used and upon
application to the carpet tile the adhesive is cured
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to the back of the tile by driving out the water or
solvent by a conventionally known process. A second
way of applying pressure self-release adhesive to
carpet tiles results in a hot melt process, in which
the adhesive is applied hot so that it forms a
permanent bond with the carpet tile substrate and
upon cooling becomes a release adhesive to anything
that it contacts.
Furthermore, the invention can also use a
double faced tape in place of the pressure self-
release adhesive.
One example of the present invention would
be the application of pressure self-release
adhesives at the outer most corners of one group of
carpet tiles. A second group of carpet tiles would
have adhesive placed at locations away from the four
outer most corners of the carpet tile, for example,
on the outer edges of the tile intermediately
located between adjacent corners. Thus, when the
carpet tiles are placed back to back the adhesive
from one tile would not contact the adhesive from
the other tile. Furthermorel, because the adhesive
has been applied in such a manner that it is cured
when applied to its receptor carpet tile, the
adhesive is firmly bonded to the carpet tile with a
significantly higher bonding strength than the bond
which the exposed surface of the adhesive will form
with another surface such as the back of another
carpet tile or a floor.
Another example of the present invention
would be the application of a special adhesive
pattern to all carpet tiles such that when one
carpet tile is rotated relative to a second carpet
tile, the adhesive portions of the two respective
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tiles will not contact each other when the tiles areplaced back-to-back.
When double faced tape is used in place of
a pressure self-release adhesive, one side of the
double faced tape has superior bonding
characteristics as compared to the other side of the
double faced tape which is to contact the floor.
Thus, by placing the carpet tiles of the
present invention back to back so that their
respective adhesive portions do not make contact,
the carpet tiles can be packaged without the use of
release paper.
In another embodiment, those areas of
carpet tile back which do not receive adhesive are
treated with non-stick material. More particularly,
a non-adhesive wetting material is used which, for
example, can be silicone crossed linked materials,
fluorocarbons, waxes, metallic stearates or
resins. The non-adhesive wetting material can be
sprayed or printed on to the carpet tiles and will
need to be dried or cured. The latter is needed
with materials which must crbss link to be
effective. This alternative increases flexibility
in pressure self-release adhesive selection so that
highly appressed types can be used which might
otherwise have too much adhesion to an untréated
tile backing surface.
Accordingly, the present invention provides
the following advantages over the prior art carpet
tiles. First, the use of a self-stick tile without
the need for release paper saves consideration cost
during manufacturing and also obviates any problems
of paper disposal for the carpet tile installer.
Secondly, because it is not necessary to apply a
coat of adhesive to the floor, substantial savings
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in time of application, time of curing, the labor of
application and more difficult tile installation and
the cost of the adhesive, result. And finally, when
the carpet tiles of the present invention are
removed from the floor, since the glue is on the
tiles and not on the floor, messy and costly clean
ups in order to return the floor to its original
surface are avoided.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIGURE 1 shows a carpet tile having a first
predetermined pattern of adhesive portions mounted
on its bottom surfaces;
FIGURE 2 shows a carpet tile having a
second predetermined pattern, which differs from the
first predetermined pattern of the carpet tile of
FIGURE l;
FIGURE 3 shows the adhesive patterns when
the first carpet tile backing is laid against the
second carpet tile backing;
FIGURE 4 is a crossl section of the carpet
tile of FIGURE 1 along line 4-4:
FIGURE 5 is a cross section of the carpet
tile of FIGURE 2 along line 5-5;
FIGURE 6 shows one example of a packaging
container for the carpet tiles as assembled in
FIGURE 3;
FIGURE 7A and 7B show carpet tiles having
identical adhesive patterns which do not contact
each other when one of the tiles is rotated relative
to the other; and
FIGURE 8A and 8B show carpet tiles in which
the portions not receiving adhesive are treated with
non-stick material.
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DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PRESENT INVENTION
In FIGURE 1 there i5 shown a first carpet
tile A having a bottom surface S0 on which adhesive
portions 10 and 20 are formed in a predetermined
geometrical pattern. Although the adhesive portions
are shown as square in shape in FIGURE 1, it will be
readily understood to those skilled in the art that
any shape of adhesive portions would be suitable,
for example, circular, elliptical, striped, etc.
FIGURE 4 is a cross section of carpet tile A taken
along line 4-4. As can be seen in FIGURE 4, the
adhesive portions 10 and 20 arelocated on the bottom
surface 50 of the carpet tile A opposite to its top
surface 70.
FIGURE 2 shows a carpet tile B having a
bottom surface 60 on which are arranged adhesive
portions 30 and 40 in a second predetermined
geometrical pattern which is complementary to the
first pattern of the carpet tile A, as will be
described below. A cross section of carpet tile B
along 5-S is shown in FIGURE 5. In FIGURE 5, the
carpet tile B is shown to have a bottom surface 60
on which adhesive portions 30 and 40 are located
opposite to the top surface 80.
The geometrical arrangement of the first
carpet tile A and second carpet tile B are said to
be complementary to each other in that the carpet
tiles A and B can be placed over top one another
with none of the adhesive portions 10, 20, 30 and 40
contacting each other, as shown by the dotted lines
in FIGURE 3.
FIGURE 3 shows the carpet tile A placed
against the bottom of the carpet tile B such that
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the upper surface 70 of the carpet tile A is in
view. Thus, the geometrical patterns of the carpet
tiles A and B are said to be complementary in that
they do not intersect or overlap but result in
adhesive portions contacting the respective bottom
surface of the adjacent carpet tile. For example,
the adhesive portions lO and 20 of carpet tile A
contact the bottom surface 60 of carpet tile B and
the adhesive portions 30 and 40 of carpet tile B
contact the bottom surface 50 of carpet tile A.
Therefore, none of the adhesive portions contact
each other.
Since the adhesive portions 10, 20, 30 and
40 have been cured to their respective carpet tiles,
they are firmly bonded to the bottom surface of
their respective carpet tile. However, the exposed
surfaces of the adhesive portions are characteristic
of a pressure self-release adhesive surface so that
the carpet tiles can be easily pulled apart from one
another, placed into position on a floor surface and
pulled up and rearranged as necessary to finalize
their position on the floor surface. Furthermore,
if and when the carpet tiles are to be removed from
the floor surface, they are easily pulled up out of
place with the adhesive portions remaining firmly
bonded to the carpet tiles.
As noted above, the described construction
of carpet tiles therefore allows an inexpensive and
efficient packaging method whereby carpet tiles A
and B are placed back to back and then stored in a
carton or container 100 as shown in FIGU~E 6.
Virtually any type of container can be used for
holding the carpet tiles, including strapa for
strapping a plurality of paired tiles together.
Upon removal from the container at the installation
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site, the carpet tiles are easily pulled apart for
placement on the floor surface.
In FIGURES 7A and 7B there are shown,
examples of carpet tiles having respective identical
predetermined patterns which nonetheless allow
carpet tiles having the same pattern to be placed
back-to-back without the adhesive portions of the
tiles contacting each other. For example, carpet
tiles 110 and 120, shown in FIGURE 7A, have an
identical adhesive pattern on their back sides, but
by rotating tile 120 counterclockwise through 90 to
the position shown, the tiles 110 and 120 can be
folded over onto each other along line a-a so that
the adhesive portions on the tiles (darkened areas
in PIGURE 7A) do not contact each other. Similarly,
carpet tiles 130 and 140 shown in FIGURE 7B have
identical adhesive patterns and can be folded over
onto each other along line b-b, so that the adhesive
portions on the tiles do not contact each other.
In another embodiment of the present
invention, the portions of the carpet tiles which do
not receive adhesive are treated with a non-adhesive
wetting material (non-stick material). As shown in
FIGURES 8A and 8B, adhesive is applied to portions
150 and non-stick material is applied to portions
160 of the carpet tiles. The non-stick material is
positioned on the carpet tile of FIGURE 8A so that
it will be directly opposite to the adhesive
portions on the carpet tile of FIGURE 8B, when the
tiles are placed back-to-back. Similarly, the non-
stick materia} is positioned on the carpet tile of
FIGURE 8B so that it will be directly opposite to
~;~ the adhesive portions on the carpet tile of FIGURE
8A, when the tiles are placed back-to-back.
~ 35 Provisions of the non-stick material eases
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separation of the packed tiles even when the paired
tiles have been subjected to abnormal temperatures
and pressures.
The present invention can be practiced with
carpet tiles of virtually any construction. For
example, carpet tiles having polyvinyl chloride,
ethylene vinyl acetate, polyurethane, ethylene
propylene diene mononer compound, asphalt, ~vinyl
acetate ethylene, SBR latex, atactic polypropylene
and other crystalline or amorphous synthetic resin
backings are suitable for the disclosed packaging
method and system. Furthermore, carpet tiles with
secondary backings such as woven or non-woven
polypropylene and polyester are also suitably used
with this invention.
The invention may also be applicable to
other types of tiles made of cork, ceramic,
linoleum, or other materials.
It should be appreciated that the above
described description of the preferred embodiment do
not limit the scope of the present invention in any
way, and that various change's and modifications may
be made without departing from the spirit and scope
of the present invention.
