Coextruded multilayer sheet and tough sleeve label made therefrom

The present invention relates to a coextruded multilayer sheet adapted to form a tough sleeve label for wrapping around a container.

Laminated (coextrusion coated) sheets for sleeve labels for containers have been disclosed in the prior art, for example. US-A-3,979,000, US-A-4,069,934 and US-A-3,760,968, all of which have been assigned to the present Applicant. US-A-4,463,861 also discloses a laminated (coextruded two-layer) sheet and a heat shrinkable sleeve label for wrapping containers. The laminated sheet sleeve label comprises a solid film comprising polystyrene containing more than 50% by weight of styrene residues and foamed film comprising polystyrene containing more than 50% by weight of styrene and optionally not more than 30% by weight of rubber.

The prior art coextruded multilayer sleeve labels having polystyrene-type layer do not have as much toughness as desired.

It has now been found possible to provide a tough, attractive coextruded multilayer sheet sleeve label for a container such as an oriented plastic carbonated beverage container.

It has also been found possible to provide a coextruded multilayer sheet adapted to form a sleeve label for wrapping a container, the sheet comprising a polystyrene foam layer adapted to be wrapped next to the container and a solid skin layer which may be adapted for decoration.

It has not been recognized in the art that a structure of a coextruded tough skin/brittle foam must not be too well bonded or the benefits of the toughness of the skin layer will be lost. However, as a practical matter, there must be some degree of adhesion. The present invention provides a means of balancing the adhesion between the tough skin layer and the brittle foam layer to enhance and preferably maximize the toughness of the total label structure. The toughness is maximized when the shear bond strength between the skin layer and the foam layer is as close to unity as possible but less than the yield strength of the skin layer.

The present invention provides a tough, attractive, sealable coextruded multilayer sheet adapted for forming a snug, wrinkle-free heat shrunk sleeve label around a container including an oriented plastics beverage bottle that tends to expand after filling. The tough sleeve label is easily sealable, a strong side seam being formed, for instance, by high speed sealing means such as hot melt adhesive, ultrasonic, hot air and heat sealing.

According to the present invention there is provided a coextruded multilayer sheet, adapted to form a sleeve label for a container, which comprises a polystryene foam layer adapted to be wrapped next to the container and a solid skin layer, characterised in that the solid skin layer is extruded from a blend comprising 50 to 70 parts by weight of linear low density polyethylene, and 20 to 60 parts by weight of a block copolymer of styrene and butadiene. The presence of the block copolymer balances the adhesion between the foam layer and the skin layer at the interface thereof, the adhesion being enough to prevent premature delamination and tearing and the adhesion being low enough to enhance, and preferably maximize, the toughness of the label.

The blend preferably comprises about 50 to 70 parts by weight linear low density polyethylene and about 30 to 50 parts by weight of the block copolymer, more preferably about 50 to 55 parts by weight of the polyethylene and about 45 to 50 parts of the copolymer. The blend may comprise up to 10 parts by weight of polystyrene.

The solid skin layer is desirably adapted for decoration. The present invention also provides a container and a coextruded multilayer sheet which is in the form of a sleeve label for the container, the multilayer sheet being of the present invention with the polystyrene foam layer being adapted to be wrapped next to the container.

The container may be an oriented plastics container, particularly an oriented polyethylene terephthalate carbonated beverage container. It may however be a glass container.

The block copolymer is one of styrene and butadiene, prepared, for example by anionic polymerization. The copolymers are thermoplastic rubbers, showing the behaviour of vulcanized elastomers at room temperature, with hard chain lengths or blocks of styrene acting similarly to crosslinks to prevent creep in the polybutadiene block matrix. At higher temperatures, they undergo normal plastic flow.

The butadiene component of the copolymer can be replaced by isoprene or ethylene butylene as, for instance, is available as KratonTM rubber materials including 1102 and 1107 from Shell Chemical. (The words having the suffix "TM", throughout this description, are Trade Marks).

Stereon 840A and other Stereon ^TM elastomers, available from Firestone, Akron, Ohio, are preferred butadiene-styrene block copolymer elastomers, the preferred block copolymer containing about 35 to 55% by weight bound styrene and having a number average molecular weight of about 50,000 to 100,000. Stereon 840A brochures list two of the block copolymers having 53 and 43% by weight bound styrene and number average molecular weight about 60,000 to 80,000.

The present invention will now be further described with reference to, and as illustrated in the accompanying drawings in whiεh:­ <ul id="ul0001" list-style="none"><li>Figure 1 is an elevational view of a container, the container being an oriented plastic container with a base cup;</li><li>Figure 2 is a perspective view of the container of Figure 1 with a plastic oriented sleeve label made according to the present invention being partially wrapped around the container;</li><li>Figure 3 is an enlarged fragmentary sectional view of the label showing a solid skin layer and a foamed layer; and</li><li>Figure 4 is a greatly enlarged sectional view of the label showing a slight tear in the foamed layer when stretching forces are applied thereto, the tough skin layer remaining intact.</li></ul>

Referring to the drawings, a container 8 having a body portion 9 and a base cup 9a is shown partially wrapped with a label 10 in Figure 2. As seen in Figures 2 and 3, in the embodiment shown, the label has an outer solid polymer layer 15 and a foam layer 20. The foam layer 20 has an underside 22, a leading edge 25 and a trailing edge 27. Finite areas 65 are provided on the underside near the leading edge and a finite area 66 is provided on the trailing edge. These finite areas are tacky areas of hot melt adhesive to enable the sleeve to be wrapped around the container and a side seal seam formed. In the alternative, a sleeve can be formed on a mandrel and telescopically moved from the mandrel and around the container encircling the latter to be heat shrunken in firm, conforming contact on the container outer surface. In such case, the side seam of the sleeve may be either hot air or heat sealed.

Coextrusion of multilayer sheets is known in the art, for instance, as generally disclosed in US-A-4,244,900. As is known, heat shrinkable multilayer sheets for heat shrunk sleeve labels can be made by coextrusion that comprises concurrently extruding a foamed film (for instance, a polystyrene foamed film) and a nonfoamed solid skin film (for instance, a polystyrene film). The foamed film side of the laminate is generally cooled more quickly than the skin film, the foamed side having more shrinkage than the skin side when later used as a heat shrunk sleeve label for containers.

The skin and foam layers are oriented and will shrink down on the container when heated, say above the softening point (tg) of the foam material around, for instance, 82°C or 93°C (180°F or 200°F) up to 110°C or 121°C (230°F or 250°F) or more. The heat for shrinking the sleeve labels in high speed production operations is often infrared sources as is known in the art. Method and apparatus for applying heat shrunk plastic sleeve labels to containers are shown in US-A-3,959,065 and US-A-3,767,496, both of which have been assigned to the present Applicant.

In accordance with the present invention, it is now recognized that the tough skin 15 and brittle foam 20 must not be too well bonded or the benefits of the toughness of the skin will be lost. As seen in the greatly enlarged cross section shown in Figure 4, the shear bond strength of the skin and foam layers is less than the yield strength of the tough skin to maximize the toughness of the total label structure. When forces are applied to the laminate in the direction of the arrows shown in Figure 4, the foam layer 20 tears slightly at 70 to pull away from the adjacent surface 75 of the skin. The skin resists tearing and stretches and necks down slightly at 80 but does not break until stretched beyond the elastic limit of the skin. Although not wishing to be bound by theory, the suggested label structure can be illustrated by a number of styrenic sites near and at the interface of the skin and foam layers. The sites are very small styrenic groups that are located randomly in the skin layer and generally predominantly in the foam layer to form compatible bonding areas in sites along the interface, especially when solvent sealing is employed to make and seal the side seam. Apparently there is an intermingling of molecules of styrene in the skin and the foam. The more sites that are in the structure, the stronger the bond between the foam and skin layers. Hence, to obtain the more desirable limited adhesion, the fewer the sites, the lower the bond strength.

Polystyrene is a highly preferred polymer for foam layer. The polystyrene can be crystal (general purpose) polystyrene or impact (rubber- modified) polystyrene. A suitable polystyrene foam, is generally a low density foam, say about 0.048 or 0.064 g/cm³ (3 or 4 lbs. per cubic foot) up to 0.224 or 0.0240 g/cm³ (14 or 15 Ibs. per cubic foot) or a medium to high density foam of about 0.240 g/cm³ (15 Ibs. per cubic foot) to 0.72 or 0.80 g/cm³ (45 or 50 lbs. per cubic foot).

Other preferred polymers that can be used for part or all of the polystryene, for most applications, are styrenic polymers such as copolymers of styrene and a vinyl copolymerizable monomer including vinyl acetate, vinyl chloride, vinylidene chloride and acrylic and acrylate monomers such as methyl methacrylate and ethyl methacrylate. It is preferred that the amount of styrene in styrenic polymer be at least about 40 or 50% by weight and, for best results, about 60 to 75%.

The thickness of the foam layer can vary from about 0.025 to 0.050 mm (1 or 2 mils) up to about 0.375 or 0.5 mm (15 or 20 mils), but the preferred thickness is about 0.2 to 0.25 mm (8 to 10 mils).

An outstanding label is one that has two layers, it being a coextruded structure of a solid polymer skin layer and a foamed layer. The solid skin layer of the multilayered label can be about 6.25x10-3 or 0.0125 mm (1/4 or 1/2 mil).to 0.125 mm (5 mils) in thickness and the foam layer about 0.075 to 0.5 mm (3 to 20 mils) and preferably 0.10 to 0.30 mm (4 to 12 mils).

Good results have been obtained with a total label structure of a 0.05 mm (2 mil) skin layer of 50% by weight linear low density polyethylene and 50% by weight of a block copolymer of styrene and butadiene having 43% by weight bound styrene and a number average molecular weight of about 80,000, the skin layer being bonded to a coextruded polystyrene foam layer of about 0.125 mm (5 mils). Good results also have been obtained with a label as above described with 70% by weight low density polyethylene and 30% by weight of the copolymer.

The tough skin/brittle foam laminate is protected from degradation from heat, light and oxygen by antioxidants or other stabilizers including UV absorbers, hindered amine light stabilizers, antioxidants and nickel quenchers. Suitable stabilizers include UV stabilizers based on hydroxy phenyl benzotriazole including Tinu- vinTM 328 (Ciba-Geigy); hindered amine light stabilizers including Tinuvin ^Tm 292 (Ciba-Geigy); antioxidants including Iganox hindered phenolic compounds such as IganoxTM 1010, 1076 and B225 (Ciba-Geigy) a synergistic combination of an organophosphite and a hindered phenol; and a nickel phosphonate such as IrgastabTM 2002 (Ciba-Geigy).

Another advantage obtained by using the linear low density polyethylene/block copolymer blend is being able to incorporate scrap or cullet back into the foam layer and still obtain substantially all the results and advantages of the invention.