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  Method of wrapping elongate material, especially cable harnesses, with a sheathUSPTO Application #: 20060231192Title: Method of wrapping elongate material, especially cable harnesses, with a sheath Abstract: A method of wrapping elongate material with a sheath having first and second single-sideded adhesive tapes the tapes laminated to one another with an offset, a free edge of the first adhesive tape aligned parallel to the center axis such that, relative to the center axis of the material, the adhesive of the first adhesive tape lies outwards, the first adhesive tape of the sheath guided by the free edge onto the material, and wound around the material so that the first adhesive tape essentially completely envelopes the material, the second adhesive tape also wound around the material, the exposed adhesive of the second adhesive tape bonding to the exposed adhesive of the first adhesive tape, so that the material is surrounded by at least two plies of adhesive tape. (end of abstract) Agent: Kurt G. Briscoe Norris, Mclaughlin & Marcus P.A. - New York, NY, US Inventors: Andreas Wahlers-Schmidlin, Thomas Friedrich, Frank Lange USPTO Applicaton #: 20060231192 - Class: 156184000 (USPTO) Related Patent Categories: Adhesive Bonding And Miscellaneous Chemical Manufacture, Methods, Surface Bonding And/or Assembly Therefor, With Winding Of Web Or Sheet The Patent Description & Claims data below is from USPTO Patent Application 20060231192. Brief Patent Description - Full Patent Description - Patent Application Claims
[0001] The invention relates to a method of wrapping elongate material, especially cable harnesses, with a sheath, the bandaged cable looms being useful in automobiles. [0002] In many segments of industry, bundles composed of a multiplicity of electrical lines are wrapped either before installation or when already mounted, in order to reduce the space taken up by the bundle of lines, by means of bandaging, and additionally to obtain protective functions. With sheet adhesive tapes a certain protection against ingress of liquid is achieved; with airy and bulky adhesive tapes based on thick nonwovens or foam backings, insulating properties are obtained; and, when stable, abrasion-resistant backing materials are used, a protective function is achieved against scuffing and rubbing. [0003] Particularly the protective function with respect to scuffing, rubbing, grinding on sharp edges and burrs, summarized here under the rubric of abrasion resistance, is increasing in significance. The sharp edges, burrs and weld points that come about as a result of production operations are increasingly not having their sharpness removed by complicated post-production work, since such work entails an additional operation and increased costs. This is so in particular in the case of the untreated bodies in the automobile industry, but also in other segments too, such as in the case of washing machines, vibrating machines such as compressors and the like, for example. Cable strands which run in such segments and which are scuffed by vibration, relative movements and the like on such sharp points are therefore at potential risk of destruction of the protective sheath. This protective sheath may be the additional wound bandaging, or else may be the insulation around the copper cable itself. In that case the result would be a short circuit with complete functional failure and destruction of electrical/electronic components, possibly going as far as a fire, with the attendant risks of damage to equipment and people. [0004] In order to minimize potential hazards of this kind it is the case not only that normal wrapping tapes are used to bandage the cable strands at critical points but also that additional precautions are taken. Either specialty adhesive tapes are used or particular protective components are employed. These components may be, for example, cable ducts made of wear-resistant polymers such as nylon or fluted tubes or braided hoses of polyester or nylon, all components which are unfavorable from the standpoints of cost, separate logistics, and complexity of handling during assembly. In the case of the assembly of fluted tubes and cable ducts, for example, considerable effort is required for attaching the lengthy tube systems and fixing them reliably to the cable bundle and/or to the body, in order to prevent slipping. Additionally, separate measures may be necessary for preventing rattling, since the lines in the tube systems rarely lie flush against them and in the event of vibrations they therefore produce rattling noises with the hard materials of the tubes. Specialty adhesive tapes as well are used in segments involving increased abrasion protection and scuff protection. Adhesive tapes for the wrapping of cable harnesses or similar elongate systems with additional functionalities are known prior art and in some cases are also utilized commercially: [0005] Sound insulation is the purpose of the adhesive tape described in DE 199 10 730 A1, which is composed of a laminate, a sound insulation layer (velour or foam) and a web, produced using hotmelt adhesive, melting powder or a transfer fixative. The use of the very expensive velour backing comprising the polymer material polyester or polyamide is also employed in other patent applications which describe adhesive tapes having a pronounced antirattle function (DE 299 00 294 U1, DE 299 16 616 U1, and DE 101 02 927 A1). In all cases the resulting adhesive tapes are highly priced and in terms of abrasion protection do not meet very exacting requirements. [0006] WO 00/13894 A1 describes a scuff protection device as edge protection for sharp-edged components such as sheet steel bodywork burrs, the scuff protection being adhered in such a manner as to engage around such areas. The scuff protection is composed of a textile backing layer (made of velour or a needlefelt, for example) and of a protective film, preferably made of thermoplastic polyurethane polymer, which is applied on the side of the scuffing sites, and also of an adhesive layer which is applied on the side of the component and has a release paper lining. Textile backing layer and protective film are joined to one another via a thin adhesive bond, the adhesive being applied only in selected areas in the form of a heat-activatable adhesive web, powder or film. This complicated assembly is lined with released paper, used in appropriate cut-to-size shapes, and is therefore unsuitable for the general protective wrapping of cable looms. The protective device of this invention does not actively protect the cable loom; instead, where needed, sharp-edged parts are locally masked from their surroundings as a kind of passive cable-harness protection. [0007] DE 100 42 732 A1 describes an adhesive tape for the spiral wrapping of elongate materials such as cable harnesses, for example, where a stripe coating which does not extend over the full area of the backing, preferably a textile backing, produces reduced adhesion of the wrapping tape to the lines and hence improved mobility and bendability of the cable harness as a whole. Inventive adhesive tapes of that kind, however, do not offer any particular abrasion protection, but serve solely for the flexibilization of the cable harness. [0008] An adhesive tape with a combination of noise reduction and frictional-stress protection properties is described in DE 101 13 425 A1. Even at the required basis mass of the web backing, with vertical pile folds, of more than 200 g/m.sup.2, the protective effects obtained are only in the middle range for attenuation, and in particular against abrasion, as was already known from EP 0 995 782 A1 and also EP 0 995 783 A1. Similar considerations also apply to DE 100 39 983 A1, which in one specific embodiment describes a textile assembly composed of a scuff-resistant web and a textile sheetlike structure, which is produced without the use of a laminating adhesive or the like, solely by hydroentanglement. While the textile sheetlike structure imparts additional attenuation or reinforcing properties to the assembly, the abrasion resistances for the scuff-resistant hydroentangled base web, composed of stable fibers, is seen as being fairly low for a basis mass of not more than 200 g/m.sup.2. [0009] Besides the stitchbonded web mentioned in the cited publication, there are further backings which are used in adhesive tapes for cable loom bandaging. [0010] DE 44 42 092 C1 describes one such stitchbond-based adhesive tape, which is coated on the reverse of the backing. DE 44 42 093 C1 is based on the use of a web as backing for an adhesive tape, the web being formed by the formation of loops from the fibers of the web to produce a reinforced cross-layed fiber web, in other words a web which is known to the skilled worker under the name Malifleece. DE 44 42 507 C1 discloses an adhesive tape for cable bandaging, but bases it on so-called Kunit or Multiknit webs. [0011] Likewise a multilayer backing assembly is described in EP 1 063 747 A1, with the aim of using it to form a protective wrapping for elongate articles with good abrasion resistance and soundproofing. In accordance with that invention it is necessary, for the assembly backing, to take at least two webs, which are bonded to one another loosely, mostly only in selected areas, and which are able to move relative to one another. Wovens, formed-loop knits and similar textile backings are explicitly ruled out as being unsuitable. The extent of the abrasion resistance and the soundproofing of inventive multilayer systems also remains unclear, since no specific, measured data are communicated. An extremely complicated and high-cost multilayer assembly is disclosed by EP 0 886 357 A1 and EP 0 886 358 A1. In this case a spunbonded PET web, a formed-loop PET knit and also, where appropriate, a felt ply or foam ply are each bonded to a laminating layer. This assembly of up to five plies, which is already complicated, is additionally provided partially with the two necessary components of a touch-close fastening system and with one or more self-adhesive strips lined with protective paper. From an economic standpoint, systems of this kind with a high abrasion protection function are practicable only at a few, selected sites, but not as general wrapping tapes for cable harnesses or other elongate articles. [0012] DE 100 36 805 A1 describes a wrap for wrapping elongate material, especially cable harnesses, with a preferably textile enclosure, wherein on at least one edge region of the enclosure, said region being narrow in comparison to the width of the enclosure, there is a self-adhesive tape which is bonded to the enclosure in such a way that the adhesive tape extends over one of the longitudinal edges of the enclosure. [0013] It is an object of the invention to achieve a marked improvement over the state of the art and to provide a method of wrapping that combines the facility to bandage individual lines to form cable harnesses with a high level of protection against mechanical damage by scuffing and rubbing on sharp edges, burrs, and weld points. [0014] This object is achieved by means of a method as recorded in the main claim. The subclaims provide advantageous developments of the method and also provide a cable loom wrapped by the method of the invention. [0015] The invention accordingly provides a method of wrapping elongate material, especially cable harnesses, with a sheath comprising a first and a second single-sidedly adhesive tape the tapes in the running direction each being laminated to one another on the adhesive side with an offset, the free edge of the first adhesive tape of the sheath being aligned parallel to the center axis such that, relative to the center axis of the material, the adhesive of the first adhesive tape lies outwards. The first adhesive tape of the sheath is guided by the free edge onto the material. The first adhesive tape of the sheath is wound around the material so that the first adhesive tape of the sheath essentially completely envelops the material. The second adhesive tape of the sheath is guided in a further winding around the material, the exposed adhesive of the second adhesive tape bonding to the exposed adhesive of the first adhesive tape, so that the material is always surrounded by at least two plies of adhesive tape. [0016] In one advantageous embodiment of the invention the winding of the second adhesive tape of the sheath is such that the exposed adhesive of the first adhesive tape is completely covered by the second adhesive tape. [0017] In a further advantageous embodiment of the invention, at the free edge of the first adhesive tape of the sheath, a third single-sidedly adhesive tape is laminated onto the first adhesive tape in the running direction, in each case on the adhesive side, with an offset, the third adhesive tape having a narrower width than the first. The third adhesive tape serves as an application aid for the sheath on the material and so facilitates handling. [0018] In a further advantageous embodiment of the invention the sheath and also the sheath with the third adhesive tape are present in fixed lengths, for example as meter product, or as continuous product on rolls (Archimedean spiral). [0019] The sheath preferably has a width of 50 to 400 mm, in particular of 80 to 280 mm. [0020] With further preference the first adhesive tape has a width of 40 to 140 mm, the second adhesive tape a width of 40 to 140 mm and/or the third adhesive tape a width of 20 to 40 mm. [0021] With further preference the first adhesive tape is laminated onto the second adhesive tape with an offset of 5% to 20% relative to the width of the adhesive tape. [0022] With further preference the third adhesive tape is laminated onto the first adhesive tape with an offset of 40% to 60%, in particular 50%, relative to the width of the adhesive tape. [0023] In a further advantageous embodiment of the invention the sheath has one or more lines of weakness essentially at right angles to the running direction. [0024] In order further to improve hand tearability, in one preferred embodiment of the invention the lines of weakness extend over the entire width of the sheath: that is, of the first adhesive tape, of the second adhesive tape and/or of the third adhesive tape. Continue reading... Full patent description for Method of wrapping elongate material, especially cable harnesses, with a sheath Brief Patent Description - Full Patent Description - Patent Application Claims Click on the above for other options relating to this Method of wrapping elongate material, especially cable harnesses, with a sheath patent application. ###  How KEYWORD MONITOR works... a FREE service from FreshPatents1. Sign up (takes 30 seconds). 2. Fill in the keywords to be monitored. 3. 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