Seal design

Hello…

I trying to design a gasket to seal against a coffee pod that is brewed under pressure.

This design is replacing a circular, die-cut, open cell foam seal that is prematurely breaking down due to exposure to high heat and oils from the coffees. However, this seal does work great (basically just a circular “pad” that mashes into the foil lid on the pod).

I’ve gone through several iterations for the molded elastomer replacement but none of the seals so far that are easily compressed are holding up to the pressures.

I’d love to find a great online resource for seal design or types to get this design figured out…

Thanks for the help…

J

It sounds like a tricky sealing job. Have you tried a tapered elastomer seal? A feathered edge can take up some of the compliance and increase the sealing force under pressure.

The difficulty is the unpredictable geometry of a foil cover. I can see why a foam version cas chosen in the first place. :smiley:

I’d look into keeping the seal physical design and consider a change of materials. I’d use Viton or some similar flouro elastomer.

:edit: (used “look into” too much)

cool, thanks for the responses. I like the proposed seal design but I think Handy Smurf’s right.

I ended up translating the ‘foam’ version into a injection moldable version that retians the flat surfaces of the foam version but uses molded rings on the backside to make it compressable. Lets hope it works, I expect the proto next week…

Thanks again…

J