Process for making single ornament stones coated with heat-activated adhesive

Claim 1

In a process for making single ornament stones with a coating of heat-activated adhesive, including placing a plurality of ornament stones having opposed ornament and mounting faces in spaced apart hollows located on one side of a plate provided with means for applying a vacuum to the bottom area of the hollows with the ornament faces in the hollows, the mounting faces and ornament faces of each stone being divided by a periphery of maximum diameter that is greater than that diameter of the stones that lies in the plane including the apertured side of the plate when the stones are disposed in the hollows, the maximum diameter of each hollow on the side of the plate being smaller than the maximum diameter of the respective ornamental stone in the hollow, placing a sheet of heat-activated and softenable adhesive foil over the mounting faces of the ornament stones with the foil being disposed generally parallel to the plate; drawing the adhesive foil over the mounting faces of the stones towards the plate by applying a vacuum between the foil and the plate through the hollows while heating the foil to soften same to cause the foil to adhere to the stones, the improvement comprising: drawing the foil over and around the periphery of maximum diameter of the stones by vacuum until the foil extends over and adheres to the mounting face and a portion of the ornamental face of each stone, the applied vacuum and heat being sufficient to cause stretching and thinning of the foil in the areas between the stones and the plate; cooling the stones and foil to room temperature; and separating individual stones with adhered foil from the unitary assembly of multiple stones and sheet of foil by severing the foil at the thinned areas.