Sealing member

Claim 1

A sealing member comprising: an elastic body of resiliently yieldable material having a generally V-shaped top wall, a Vshaped bottom wall and a pair of opposite sidewalls formed integral with said top and bottom walls forming a tubular structure; an internal truss structure formed integral with said body and disposed within said tubular structure; said internal truss structure being effective to exert laterally outwardly directed forces against portions of said bottom wall to urge said bottom wall portions laterally outwardly for increasing the interfacial surface contact area of said sealing member at opposite sides thereof during compression; said top wall comprising at least a pair of sloping portions extending from said sidewalls downwardly in a converging relation and meeting at an apex juncture; said bottom wall comprising a pair of sloping portions extending from said sidewalls downwardly in a converging relation and meeting at a common juncture to form an apex; said internal truss structure including a pair of intersecting crossbars, each extending from the region of the juncture between a sidewall and said bottom wall upwardly at an angle to the opposite top wall sloping portion; said crossbars intersecting intermediate the opposite ends thereof; and an intermediate wall extending vertically from the intersection of said intersecting crossbars to said bottom wall apex whereby said bottom wall apex is restrained against excessive downward movement during compression to facilitate lateral outward movement of said bottom wall portions.