Shirred sausage casings and method and apparatus for making same

Claim 2

A stick consisting of a circular-cylindrical casing that has been shirred to form a hollow cylinder, and displaying an outwardly projecting helical main fold and further displaying, in the extended and flattened state, secondary fold lines lying between the windings of the helical line of the main fold, said lines of the secondary fold consisting of a continuous, uninterrupted, uniform zigzag line which is substantially without further secondary folds, that the peaks of this zigzag line have a substantially constant distance from the helical line of the main fold, and that the individual sections of this zigzag line are helical sections which wind in the opposite sense to the helical main fold.

Claim 3

The stick according to claim 1 displaying secondary folds arranged between the windings of the main fold and the interior space of the hollow cylinder, with the casing material disposed between the interior space and the main fold being superimposed substantially in the form of a circular frustum, said secondary folds consisting of a single, continuous uninterrupted secondary fold which has a regular, backwardly crossing zigzag form and whose path within the double layer of casing material between superposed sections of the windings of the helical main fold is defined by a combination of the following characteristic features: a. the peaks of the zigzag line are arranged between the windings of the main fold and the interior space of the stick; b. the peaks consist of a first series of peaks lying upon a first layer of the double layer of casing material, and a second series of peaks lying upon the second layer of the double layer of casing material beneath said first layer; c. the peaks of the two series are offset along the circumference of the cylinder by about the same angle, referred to the axis of the stick, said angle being the same for both series of the same stick; d. from a first peak of the first series of peaks to the first peak of the second series of peaks, there extends a longer fold which contacts the interior space of the hollow cylinder in a point, points to said interior space, and is curved, said first peak and said other first peak being offset from each other in the direction of the circumference of the hollow cylinder; e. from the first peak of the second series of peaks to a second peak of the first series of peaks which is directly adjacent to the first peak, there extends a shorter fold which does not contact the interior space of the hollow cylinder, points away from said interior space, and is curved; f. from the second peak of the first series oF peaks to a second peak of the second series of peaks which is directly adjacent to the first peak of said second series there extends again a longer fold which may be defined as in (d), and this pattern of criss-crossing continuous zigzag folds continues in a helical line over the whole stick; and g. the longer and the shorter folds substantially correspond in length and shape within each group.

Claim 4

The stick according to claim 2, in which the casing consists of regenerated cellulose.

Claim 5

The stick according to claim 3, in which the zigzag-shaped secondary fold is arranged within the stick in a manner such that when the stick is extended and opened out along a generatrix of the cylinder, the shorter fold forms an angle Alpha of between about 50* and 60* with the cutting line, and the longer fold forms an angle Beta with the normal to the cutting line which about corresponds to the angle gamma between the helical main fold and the normal to the cutting line, but is inclined in the opposite direction.