Patent ID: 7182992

Claim:
A thermoplastic hook strand produced by a process comprising the steps of (a) extruding a thermoplastic resin in a machine direction through a die plate having a continuous base portion cavity and one or more ridge cavities extending from at least one face of the base portion cavity, (b) forming a film from the extruded thermoplastic resin, said film having a base film portion with at least two or more hook profiled ridges, (c) cutting the film in a first direction on at least one face through the two or more ridges to form a plurality of cut ridge portions, (d) orienting the cut film portions at least in the direction of the ridges thereby separating the cut ridge portions into discrete upstanding hook members, (e) continuously splitting the film in a second direction substantially along the direction of the two or more ridges so as to form two or more discrete strands having discrete upstanding hook members along the length of the strands the strands having a thermoplastic base layer with at least a first face and a second face with integral discrete hook members formed from thermoplastic resin of the base layer on at least one face in at least one row, the hook elements having hook engaging arms extending at an angle of from 1 to 90 degrees from the longitudinal direction of the strand wherein the base layer is the split oriented thermoplastic resin film.