Absorbent article having acquisition layer

Abstract

An absorbent article includes a liquid permeable top sheet, a liquid impermeable back sheet, an absorbent core being arranged between the top sheet and the back sheet, and an acquisition and distribution layer (ADL) of a nonwoven material being arranged between the top sheet and the absorbent core. The nonwoven material has a basis weight of 20-40 g/m.sup.2, 3-20 through holes per cm.sup.2, the holes having a diameter in CD and MD of 1-3 mm, and at least 70% by weight of the nonwoven ADL includes fibers having a fiber diameter of 12-22 m.

Claims

1. An absorbent article comprising a liquid permeable top sheet, a liquid impermeable back sheet, an absorbent core being arranged between the top sheet and the back sheet, and an acquisition and distribution layer of a nonwoven material being arranged between the top sheet and the absorbent core, wherein the acquisition and distribution layer includes a longitudinal center-line extending in a direction from a front portion of the absorbent article to a rear portion of the absorbent article, and the liquid permeable top sheet covers the longitudinal center-line of the acquisition and distribution layer, and wherein said nonwoven material has a basis weight of 20-40 g/m.sup.2, 3-20 through holes per cm.sup.2, the holes having a diameter in CD and MD of 1-3 mm, and at least 70% by weight of the nonwoven material comprises fibres having a fibre diameter of 12-22 m.

2. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein at least 70% by weight the nonwoven material comprises fibres having a fibre diameter of at least 15 and less than 19 m.

3. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein 30% by weight or less of the nonwoven material comprises fibres having a fibre diameter of less than 12 m.

4. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the nonwoven material has a basis weight of at least 20 g/m.sup.2 and less than 30 g/m.sup.2.

5. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the nonwoven material has a thickness of 0.8-1.2 mm at 0.5 kPa.

6. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the open area of the nonwoven material is 35-65%.

7. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the nonwoven material has 3-15 through holes per cm.sup.2.

8. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the holes have a diameter in CD and MD of 1.5-2.5 mm.

9. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the through holes are funnel shaped.

10. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the nonwoven material is a spunbonded nonwoven material.

11. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the nonwoven material is a spunbond-meltblown-spunbond (SMS) material.

12. The absorbent article according to claim 11, wherein the spunbond-meltblown-spunbond (SMS) material comprises fibres having a diameter of 0.1 to 12 m.

13. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the top sheet is of a nonwoven material.

14. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the top sheet is of a non-apertured nonwoven material.

15. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the top sheet has a basis weight of 10-20 g/m.sup.2.

16. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the top sheet is of a spunbonded nonwoven material.

17. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein the liquid permeable top sheet covers a portion of the acquisition and distribution layer having 3-20 through holes per cm.sup.2.

18. The absorbent article according to claim 1, wherein a surface of the top sheet covers an entirety of a surface of the acquisition and distribution layer which faces away from the absorbent core.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

(1) FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of an absorbent article according to the invention, seen from the side which will be facing the user when it is being worn.

(2) FIG. 2 shows a cross-sectional view of the absorbent article of FIG. 1, along the line II-II (holes in ADL not shown).

(3) FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view of an embodiment of an ADL according to the invention and a core layer.

(4) FIG. 4 is a drawing of the funnel used in the test herein for measuring surface dryness.

(5) FIG. 5 is a graph showing amount of fluid (in g/m.sup.2) remaining in different types of ADL and ADL combined with a topsheet, as measured according to the surface dryness test disclosed herein.

(6) The invention will now be described by means of example referring to the figures. In this example of the invention the absorbent article is a urine incontinence protector in the form of a diaper 1. In FIG. 1, the absorbent article is seen from the side of the absorbent article that is intended to be facing towards a wearer's body when being worn, and in FIG. 2, it is seen in cross-section along the line II-II in FIG. 1. The drawing shows an embodiment of a diaper 1 for an infant or an incontinent adult, said diaper typically comprises a chassis comprising a liquid permeable topsheet 2, a liquid impermeable backsheet 3 and an absorbent body 4 enclosed there between. The liquid permeable topsheet 2 may consist of a nonwoven material. The liquid impermeable backsheet 3 may consist of a thin plastic film. The topsheet 2 and the backsheet material 3 may have a somewhat greater extension in the plane than the absorbent core 4 and extend outside the edges thereof. The layers 2 and 3 are connected to each other within the projecting portions thereof, e.g. by gluing or welding by heat or ultrasonic. The topsheet and/or the backsheet may further be attached to the absorbent core by any method known in the art, such as adhesive, heat bonding etc. The absorbent core may also be unattached to the topsheet and/or the backsheet.

(7) The absorbent core 4 can be of any conventional kind. It may be a combination of cellulosic fluff pulp and superabsorbents in an absorbent body.

(8) The diaper 1 disclosed in FIG. 1 is intended to enclose the lower part of the wearer's trunk like a pair of absorbent pants. It comprises a front portion 5 intended during use to be worn on the front part of the user's body, a rear portion 6 intended during use to be worn on the rear part of the user's body, and a more narrow crotch portion 7 located between the front and rear portions and which is intended to be worn in the crotch part of the user between the legs. The back portion 6 is provided with a pair of adhesive tape tabs 8 or other type of attachment means such as hook-and-loop type fasteners.

(9) The diaper 1 comprises elasticized side flaps 10 forming leg openings. Elastification is provided by elastic members 11 secured between the topsheet and backsheet in the side flap region 10. The diaper disclosed in FIGS. 1 and 2 further comprises elastic barrier flaps 12 having a proximal edge 13 and a distal edge 14 and elastic member 15 spacing the distal edge 14 away from the topsheet. These barrier flaps 12 form leakage barriers and are at their proximal edges 13 secured to the topsheet 2 close to the lateral edges of the absorbent core 4 either in the area of the side flaps 10 or above the absorbent core 4.

(10) The diaper may further comprise an elasticized waist in the form of elastic members extending in the transverse direction of the article in the waist portion thereof.

(11) It is however understood that the diaper described above and shown in the drawing only represents one non-limiting example and that the present invention is not limited thereto, but can be used in any type of absorbent articles as defined above.

(12) A fluid receiving layer 16 in the form of a nonwoven ADL is located between the absorbent core 4 and the topsheet 2. During use of the article the ADL is intended to be located in the crotch area of the diaper 1. The ADL is a nonwoven material having a basis weight of 20-40 g/m.sup.2 and having 3-20 through holes per cm.sup.2, the holes having a diameter in CD and MD of 1-3 mm. The through holes are not shown in FIG. 2. The ADL may be of an SMS material having a surface weight of 25 g/m.sup.2 divided up as 10/5/10 g/m.sup.2. The ADL 16 is a three-dimensional layer having through holes 20 that originate in a first surface 21 and extend towards a second surface 22 as shown in FIG. 3. The distance between the first surface 21 and the second surface 22 is the apparent thickness of the layer 16. When fluid 23 reaches the first surface 21 of the ADL 16, it spread on the surface 21 before passing through the apertures 20 as shown in FIG. 3. The through holes 20 form protrusions 19 in the ADL 16. The protrusions 19 may extend from the surface towards the topsheet 2 or, as shown in FIG. 3, towards the absorbent core 4.

(13) The absorbent core 4 may have one or more 4, 18 absorbent layers extending over the front, crotch and rear regions of the diaper, see FIG. 2. The material used in the storage layers should have the ability to absorb and store large quantities of fluid and may comprise 40-80% superabsorbents and 60-20% pulp fibres.

(14) Test Methods

(15) Surface Dryness

(16) The following test was used to determine the amount of liquid left in a material after subjection to a certain amount of fluid. It gives a good indication of surface dryness and the result is reported as not drained fluid (g/m.sup.2). The test liquid used was 0.9% NaCl.

(17) Circular entities having a diameter of 6 cm are punched out of the materials to be tested. The weights of the test samples are noted prior to testing.

(18) A funnel connected to a cylinder, see FIG. 4, is placed on top of the material to be tested which material in turn is placed on seven filter papers (140140 mm). When placing the materials below the cylinder it is crucial that there is no gap between the material and the cylinder wall. 15 ml of test fluid is added to the funnel with a finger placed at the outlet of a measuring cylinder in order to have a constant and controlled flow of the liquid into the cylinder. A timer is started to time 1 minute when all liquid has been added to the test material. After 1 minute the tested material is removed from the filter papers as an entity with a tweezers and weighed separately if more than one material was tested. The weight of the test sample is thus noted prior to the start of the test and after the 1 minute draining. The difference between the weight before and after the test is the not drained fluid (in g/m.sup.2) left in the material. The different ADL materials were tested alone as first layers (No 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11) and then as second layers together with a 17 gsm, PP nonwoven spunbonded, 1.8 den, topsheet (No 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12), see Table 1 below.

(19) TABLE-US-00001 TABLE 1 Tested ADL materials Second layer No First Layer (1.sup.st layer) (2.sup.nd layer) 1 Highloft A (50 gsm): 9 den PET Hollow Spiral Crimp + bico PP/PET + bico CoPET/PET fibres 2 Topsheet Highloft A 3 Highloft B (50 gsm): 12 den PET Hollow fibers + 6 den PET/PET binder fibers + 3 den PET/PP welding fibers 4 Topsheet Highloft B 5 Highloft C (50 gsm): 70% PET and 30% PP fibres 6 Topsheet Highloft C 7 Highloft D (40 gsm): 100% bico PP/PE fibres 8 Topsheet Highloft D 9 Nonwoven apertured (70 gsm): Philic SMS 100% PP fibres, open area 17% 10 Topsheet NW apertured 11 Embodiment of the invention (25 gsm): 100% spunbonded PP fibres, average fibre diameter 18.5 m, material thickness 1 mm, 5 holes/cm.sup.2 having CD/MD 2 mm 12 Topsheet Embodiment of the invention (25 gsm)

(20) The highlofts A-D are carded air through bonded materials (ATB). The topsheet used in the test is in all cases a 17 gsm, PP nonwoven spunbonded, 1.8 den.

(21) The results of the surface dryness test for the above materials are shown in FIG. 5 showing the not drained fluid in g/m.sup.2 for the tested materials. The sample material according to an embodiment of the invention (No 11 and 12) was superior to the other tested materials both compared with different types of highlofts and apertured material. The inventive material drained effectively both itself and the nearby topsheet of liquid. This is seen in FIG. 5 as only small amounts not drained fluid stayed in the topsheet and ADL for No 11 and 12. This is an extremely important property of an ADL material as liquid left in topsheet and ADL will lead to malodours and discomfort. Excellent results have also been achieved with an ADL according to an embodiment of the invention wherein the ADL is of an SMS material (10/5/10 g/m.sup.2).

(22) Thickness Measurement

(23) The thicknesses of the materials were measured according to a standard test method for nonwoven materials: WSP120.6.R4(12). Specifically, 4.1 for normal nonwovens were used and 7.2 Option A for normal nonwovens using a uniform pressure of 0.5 kPa.

(24) Open Area and Hole Diameter Measurement

(25) The following method may be used to determine the open area and the hole diameter for an apertured material.

(26) Apparatus: a Nikon microscope a personal computer software NIS-Elements BR 3.10

(27) Procedure: collect a sample of the apertured material position the sample on the reading surface of the microscope start the software catch a representative image of the sample perform the analysis of the properties by contrast technique involving highlighting of the areas occupied by the holes.

(28) The software calculates the diameters of the highlighted holes as major diagonal and minor diagonal of a rhombus inscribed in the hole. The ratio between the diameters is used to determine the actual average conformation of the holes to a circular shape, wherein a ratio of 1 implies a perfectly circular shape.

(29) The average hole area value obtained by means of the software is used to calculate the percent open area.

(30) Alternative methods for determining open area and hole diameter may be used, such as manual methods and methods based on scanning electron microscopy.

(31) Measurements of Fibre Diameter

(32) Methods for measuring the fibre diameter of a nonwoven material are known to the skilled man in the art. In the present case the fibre diameter were obtained by computerized measurements of pictures of the nonwoven material taken by an Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope XL 30-TMP from FEI Company. It is assumed that the fibre width is equal to the fibre diameter for both round and non-round fibres.