Illinois Tool Works Inc.

Parimal M Vadhar

Donald L Van Erden

Frederick A Kish

John P Wojcik

Juergen O Rathgeber

Geronimo E Lat

William L Gabriel

Robert W Wright

James W Stone

Dave C Hempfling

David E Fredericksen

Ronald J Huffmon

A method and apparatus for providing a coating on the exterior surfaces of a plurality of elongate members, such as wires, including positioning a plurality of elongate members substantially parallel to each other, coating the exterior surfaces of each member with a coating, removing any excess coating from desired portions of each member and curing the coating to adhere the coating to each member.

Method and apparatus for coating fasteners

A protective seam plate retains a flexible membrane of a roofing system in place without tearing the flexible membrane during high winds. The protective seam plate comprises a seam plate having a web with a periphery and top and bottom surfaces. A protective ring surrounds the seam plate web periphery and overlies the web top and bottom surfaces around and adjacent the web periphery. The protective ring has a smooth continuous surface that is contacted by the flexible membrane when the flexible membrane lifts off the roof during high winds. The protective seam plate may be manufactured by heat shrinking a tube of heat shrinkable material surrounding the periphery of the seam plate web. Alternately, the protective ring may be an L-shaped ring that is assembled to the seam plate by bending a leg over the web top surface. The protective seam plate may also be fabricated by bending a flange that is integral with the seam plate web such that the flange partially overlies the web top surface. In that design, the web bottom surface and the flange bottom surface cooperate to form the smooth continuous surface presented to the flexible membrane.

Protective seam plate

A coated fastener includes a coating comprised of one-hundred percent dry solids which is virtually free of solvent emissions when applied and during curing, covers substantially the entire exterior of the fastener, provides a protective coating to the fastener against corrosion, enables the fastener to be adhered to at least one other fastener, and provides increased holding power of the fastener after the fastener is driven into a desired surface.

Coated fastener

A seamless tube useful in making a roofing batten is extruded from a polymeric material consisting essentially of a major amount of poly(ethylene terephthalate) and a minor amount of at least one polyolefin, flattened in a vacuum sizer so as to define two plies, and milled and drawn so as to orient the tube longitudinally. As milled and drawn, the tube is oriented so as to have a tensile strength of at least about 25,000 psi in a longitudinal direction. The plies are punched so as to have holes therethrough at spaced intervals along the tube. When used to make a roofing batten to coact with conventional fasteners, such as roofing screws, the tube exhibits superior characteristics of split resistance and pull-through resistance.

Method of making roofing battens

A continuous, automated method and apparatus for transporting and electrostatically coating articles including providing a plurality of articles in an unoriented bulk state, each article having a first end portion, orienting each article and transporting them into a desired position, transferring each article in succession to a moving conveyor, suspending each article from the conveyor by its end portion and conveying the articles for electrostatic coating and curing.

Method and apparatus for electrostatic coating of articles

Method of forming a building structure incorporating a seamless tube

Seamless tube useful to make roofing battens for incorporation within a

Seamless tube useful to make roofing battens and related method

A flexible oriented plastic sheet of high tensile strength and which is resistant to corrosion and highly resistant to splitting when penetrated by a pointed article. The flexible oriented sheet of the invention can be cut into desired shapes and sizes so as to be useful in a variety of applications, such as roofing batten bars and fencing materials, which require high resistance to splitting and fastener pull-through. The sheets are produced by melt extruding and orienting a composition comprising a major amount of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and a minor amount of a polyolefin, preferably polypropylene.

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Prospect Heights, IL, United States of America

Parimal M Vadhar