Apparatus for making cushioning packaging material

Claim 1

In apparatus for making cushioning packaging material, such material being in the form of discrete capsules formed from a pair of webs of heat sealable flexible sheet material joined in facing relationship with the webs distended and transversely sealed and severed transversely thereof to provide discrete cushioning capsules: (a) a frame including drive means for moving web material having web elements in face-to-face relationship; (b) means for sealing the movable strip along at least one edge thereof to provide an elongated tubular strip; (c) means for directing a stream of gaseous material within the so formed tubular strip to distend the sides thereof; (d) means for sealing and severing the distended strip transversely thereof while the distended strip is moving, said means comprising: (e) a pair of conjugately arranged cusped roll structures arranged to engage said distended strip therebetween; (f) one of said roll structures being an anvil roller and the other being a heating and severing roller; (g) said heating and severing roller having sealing devices mounted along the periphery thereof in spaced relationship; (h) each of said sealing devices having a pair of closely spaced resiliently supported transversely extending sealing shoes mounted thereon with a transversely extending heated severing element therebetween; (i) said sealing shoes engaging said distended tube transversely and nipping the same between said sealing shoes to encapsulate the gaseous material in said distended web and seal the same transversely thereof, and said heated severing element separating said tube between said nipped and sealed portions of said tube to provide a discrete cushioning capsule.