making soap bars patent

8/7/2019 making soap bars patent

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United States Patent [19JGrelon

[ 11] 3,884,605[45] May 20, 1975

[54] MANUFACTURE OF SOAP BARS

[75] Inventor: Pierre Grelon, Marq-en-Baroeul,

France[73] Assignee: Lever Brothers Company, New

York, N.Y.

[22] Filed: Feb. 15,1974

[21] Appl. No.: 442,692

Related U.S. Application Data[62] Division of Ser. No. 303,176, Nov. 2, 1972,

abandoned.

(30) Foreign Application Priority DataNov. 5,1971 United Kingdom 51476/71

[52] U.S. CI. 425/131.1; 264/75; 264/245;425/199; 425/376

[51) Int. CI. B29f 3/12[58] Field of Search 425/131.1,130,199,197,

425/198,204, 132,133,376,380,202,205;264/148,211,349,75,245

[56] References Cited

UNITED STATES PATENTS2,456,1413,398,2193,608,0133,823,215

12/19488/19689/19717/1974

Myerson 425/133Kelley 264/148 XIngham 264/245 XD'Arcangeli 425/131 X

FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS981,373 1951 France 425/131

Primary Examiner-R. Spencer AnnearAssistant Examiner-Mark Rosenbaum

[57] ABSTRACT

Continuous preparation of striped soap bars by com-pressing simultaneously two soap masses of differentcolours in parallel directions employing a modifieddouble-twin-barrel plodder, provided with partitionwalls, tubular arrangement and apertured plates, andmeans for injecting coloured liquid.

5 Claims, 7 Drawing Figures


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1MANUF ACTURE OF SOAP BARS

This is a division of application Ser. No. 303,176,fi led Nov. 2, 1972, now abandoned.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the InventionManufacture of striped soal bar.2. Description of the Prior ArtMulticoloured, striped or marbled soal bars are

known in the art. The preparation of such bars is ofcourse more complicated than the preparation of aone-coloured bar.Various methods have been applied and suggested

for the production of multicoloured soap bars.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to an improved soapplodder, and to a process employing the improved soapplodder for making multicoloured soap bars, especially 20striped soap bars. The invention also includes soap barshaving stripes and multicolouration made by the pro-cess.

DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The invention relates to a process and apparatus forthe continuous preparation of multicoloured soap bars.The term soap used herein is intended to cover normalsoap based on salts of fatty acids, synthetic detergentraw material and mixtures thereof.According to one aspect of the invention a process

for the continuous preparation of striped and marbledsoap bars comprises the steps of compressing simulta-

neously two soap masses of different colours in paralleldirections and extruding one soap mass through a sys-tem of parallel tubes to form rods, pressing simulta-neously the other soap mass into a room surroundingthe tubular arrangement and extruding it through anapertured plate at the end of the tubular arrangement,where the two systems of soap rods combine and arefurther subjected to inward compression and extrudedas a striped soap bar.According to another aspect of the invention an ap-

paratus for carrying out the 'above process comprises atwin-barrelled soap plodder comprising at least one set 45of two parallel barrels having a partition wall in be-tween for the provision of two separated streams ofsoap mass, a cone attached to the barrel-twin outletsand two parallel plates positioned in the cone after the 50worm compressors, each plate having two groups of ap-ertures, one group being connected by a system oftubes through which the soap mass emerging from onebarrel passes, the second group of apertures function-ing as outlets for the soap mass emerging from the sec- 55ond barrel. In practice the two parallel plates should bepositioned at reasonable distance from each other, soas to obtain a satisfactory and homogeneous structureof the extruded striped soap. It has been found that adistance of 200-300 mrn, and preferably of between 60250-300 mm, is generally quite acceptable.

Preferably at least one means for colour injectioninto the barrel is provided for in situ production of co-loured soap mass, which enables feeding the two sepa-rate barrels of the plodder via the hopper with one and 65the same soap base. The apparatus can also work with-out a means for colour injection. In that case the plod-der is fed with two differently coloured soap bases

3,884,6052

made elsewhere, the soap bar obtained being a stripedsoap bar.A sharply striped soap bar is also obtained with the

process of the invention employing the improved soap5 plodder if the colour is injected at a position as far as

possible from the barrel outlets, preferably immedi-

ately after the hopper, feeding the plodder apparatus.Said arrangement would of course give a better ho-mogeneous distribution of the colour within the soap

10 rather than an arrangement in which the colour is in-jected nearer the barrel outlets.The striping appearance of the soap bar may, how-

ever, be modified as desired by varying the position ofcolour injection along the barrel length.

15

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The process and apparatus of the invention will nowbe further described with reference to the accompany-ing diagrammatic drawings, in which:FIG. 1 shows a longitudinal view through the essen-

tial part of the soap extrusion apparatus according tothe invention andFIG. 2 shows a perspective view of one embodiment

of the device comprising the apertured plates with tu-25 bular arrangement.

FIG. 3 shows a cross-sectional view of the soap massproduced by the process of the invention just beforepassing the eye plate at the end of the plodder, using anend plate with the above aperture arrangement.FIG. 4 shows three orifice positions of eye plate pro-

ducing different striations in the fianl soap tablet. Dand E can be obtained simultaneously by using an eyeplate with two apertures.

FIG. 5 shows a cross-sectional view of a striped soap35 bar made according to the process of the invention ex-truded through a rather conventionally shaped orificedeye plate.FIG. 6 shows a plain upper view of the striped soap

tablet stamped from this bar.40 FIG. 7 shows another striped soap tablet stamped

from a bar extruded through orificed eye plate E ofFIG. 4.

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DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Referring now to FIG. 1: Cone 1 is attached to thebarrel twins 2 and 3 enclosing two worm compressors7 and 8, and separated by a partition wall 16. The aper-

tured front plate 4 is positioned in cone 1 near the out-lets of barrels 2 and 3. The apertured end plate 5 is po-sitioned further down-stream in cone 1; the system oftubes 6 connecting one group of apertures in bothplates is positioned horizontally and parallel to thecone axis. Soap mass A transported by worm compres-sor 7 emerging from barrel 2 passes through openings9 (see also FIG. 2) into room 10 and is pressed throughapertures 11 (see also FIG. 2) into room 12. Soap massB (having a colour distinct from A) transported byworm compressor 8 and emerging from barrel 3, passesthrough tubes 6 and is pressed into room 12, meetingsoap mass A. The combined soap mass is extrudedthrough the orificed eye plate 13 to form a soap barhaving a striped appearance.Separate streams of soap masses A and B passing

through plate 4 are effected by partition wall 14.Pressure gauge 15 posit ioned on the cone in between

the two apertured plates provides an efficient controlof the pressure in the cone.


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3In FIG. 2 a model arrangement of apertures is shown

on end plate 5.The tubes 6 are preferably longitudinally positioned

substantially around the central axis of the cone, to givethe least capacity reduction of the plodder. Dependingon the capacity and size of the plodder the number of

tubes may vary from 5 to about 40.The total surface area of the tube outlets for soap Bwith respect to the total surface area of apertures forsoap A on end plate 5 should be arranged so as to rea-sonably correspond with the pressures exerted on thesoap masses by the two worm compressors.

It has been established that a surface area of the tubeoutlets for soap B of 55-60% against a surface area ofapertues for soap A of 40-45% on the end plate givesve,..rygood processing into soap bars of quite satisfac-tory appearance.A satisfactory aperture arrangement on the end plate

such as shown in FIG. 2 may consist e.g. of:

3,884,6054

comprising sodium soap derived from mixtures of co-conut and tallow fatty acids, it is equally applicable tothe processing of bars composed of other synthetic de-tergent mixtures having a comparable consistency of

5 true soaps.Examples of suitable soap compositions are sodium

soaps derived from mixtures of 30-90% by weight oftallow fatty acids and 70-10% by weight of nut oil fattyacids, which mixtures can be super-fatted with for ex-

10 ample free fatty acids up to 20% by weight of the totalcomposition.Examples of synthetic detergents which can be pro-

cessed according to the invention include the alkalimetal salts of higher (C IO -C 20 ) fatty alcohol sulphuric

15 acids, higher (C IO-C I8) alkyl benzene sulphonates, thesodium or potassium salts of higher fatty acid mono-glyceride sulphuric acids having 14-18 carbon atoms inthe fatty acid groups, ethylene oxide condensationproducts of (CS-C IO) alkyl phenol or of (C I2-C 20) fatty

20 alcohols, and the alkali metal sulphates of ethoxylated

fatty alcohols.An embodiment of the invention will now be de-

scribed by way of example.Milled white soap is fed via a hopper into the worms

25 of a modified double twin-barrel vacuum plodder. Dueto the partition wall between the worms two streams ofsoap now travel separately through the barrels in paral-lel direction. Colour is injected into one barrel at apoint approximately half-way down the first set of bar-

which arrangement has a surface area ratio of 57% Bto 43% A. 30 rel-twins, The soap masses A and B pass again sepa-

rately a vacuum chamber and travel further throughthe second set of barrel-twins as shown in FIG. 1.

In fact this aperture arrangement determines in anessential way the colour pattern in the soap bar and itsstriped appearance.

Quite attractive variations in the striped appearancemeeting different consumer preferences can also be ob- 35tained by simply mounting different orificed eye plateson the plodder outlet through which the soap mass isextruded.FIGS. 3, 4 and 5 illustrate some cross-sectional views

40of the many variations of colour patterns within thesoap obtained from one aperture arrangement on theend plate, by using different orificed eye plates.It is to be understood that when preparing the striped

soap bar according to the process of the invention, the 45two differently coloured soap masses should be com-pressed and transported by the worm compressors inthe plodder at about the same speed, so as to avoid theshearing of stripes, causing irregularities in the pattern.In order to obtain a good regularity of stripes it is also 50 Component

desirable to operate the plodder at a temperature of ----------------98-.-40-----superfatted chips

about 30-50C, preferably in the range of 35-45C, titanium dioxide (white pigment) 0.30depending on the fat charge or composition of the preservative 0.06soap. Too high a temperature during plodding would ~~~~~Ieach 6 : 6 ~cause the soap mass to be too soft for plodding and 55would consequently result in bleeding of the stripes. Itis also important that the temperature during ploddingshould be maintained at a constant level, otherwise ir-regularities in stripes occur.

It has further been established that a feed ratio of 6025-75% by weight of soap A and 75-25% by weight of

soap B generally produces bars of satisfactory stripingappearance.Normally the compositions of the soap base, which

can be processed in the apparatus of the invention donot differ from those used for manufacturing white orone-coloured soap bars. Although the improved plod-der is preferably used for processing true soap bars

12 holes of 26 mm diameter } for soap B2 holes of 14mm diameterand

4 holes of 20 mm diameter

}I hole of I8 mm diameter for soap A12holes of 8 mm diameter10rectangular slots of 9 to 32 mrn

The process according to the invention does not pro-duce only stamped soap tablets having a striped ap-pearance, but can also be employed to produce tabletshaving a pattern of stripes emanating from the centreif the cut bars leaving the extrusion apparatus arestamped in axial direction, the term axis meaning thesymmetry axis of the bar leaving the extrusion appara-tus.

EXAMPLE

Chips ofsuperfatted toilet soap base comprising 67%by weight of tallow fatty acid soap, 29% by weight ofcoconut fatty acid soap and 4% free stearic acid weremixed with titanium dioxide, preservative, opticalbleach and perfume in the following proportions:

% by weight

The mixture of soap chips, white pigment, opticalbleach, preservative and perfume was milled in a con-ventional soap mill and the milled chips were fed intoa 1.5 tons/hour capacity double-twin-barrel ploddermodified according to the invention by the provision of

partition walls, means for colour injection and a tubulararrangement with apertured plates as described aboveand illustrated in the accompanying darawings.

65 Into soap A a 3% aqueous soluton of a mixture ofblue. and green dyes, "Monastral fast blue" and"Monastral fast green" (Trade Marks) was injected ata rate of 10 litres per ton of soap throughput.


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3,884,6055 6

The means for colour injection was positioned at apoint half-way down the first set of barrel-twins. Thetubular arrangement and apertured plates used werethose as shown in FIG. 2.The blue striped white bar, extruded from the appa- 5

ratus through a conventional eye plate as shown in FIG.

5, was stamped into tablets.I claim:

outlets for the soap mass emerging from the secondbarrel.2. Apparatus according to claim 1, in which there is

provided at least one means for colour injection into atleast one barrel positioned at a point along the barrellength.

3. Apparatus according to claim 1, in which the twoparalJel plates are positioned at a distance of 200-300mm from each other.4. Apparatus according to claim 1, in which the tubes

connecting the two apertured plates are positioned lon-gitudinally and substantially around the central axis ofthe cone.5. Apparatus according to claim 1, in which the sur-

15 face area of apertures forming the tube outlets on thedown-stream positioned plate is 55-60%, and the sur-face area of the free apertures if 40-45% of the totalsurface area of apertures.

* * * * *

1. An apparatus for the continuous preparation ofmulti-colored detergent bar which comprises a twin- 10barrel soap plodder comprising at least one set of twoparallel barrels, having a partition wall in between forthe provision of two separated streams of soap mass, acone attached to the barrel-twin outlets and two paral-lel plates positioned in the cone after the worm com-pressors, each plate having two groups of apertures,one group being connected by a system of tubesthrough which the soap mass emerging from one barrelpasses, the second group of apertures functioning as

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