Patent ID: 7611658

Claim:
A mould set for use in a method of moulding plastic articles wherein a preform is injection-moulded in an injection moulding cavity and the injection-moulded preform is blow-moulded in a blow-moulding cavity, said mould set comprising: an array of injection-moulding cavities; and an array of generally elongate blow-moulding cavities, each of the blow-moulding cavities having a neck region and a longitudinal axis, wherein each of the cavities in each of the arrays is defined by at least two mould parts separable in a respective mould separation direction, the mould separation directions of said injection-moulding cavities and of said blow-moulding cavities each define a common mould separation direction whereby the mould set opens and closes in the common mould separation direction to release both of the injection-moulded preforms and the blow-moulded products, the longitudinal axes of the blow-moulding cavities extend generally perpendicularly to the common mould separation direction and the neck regions are disposed adjacent to an edge of the mould set to be externally accessible in a direction that is transverse relative to the mould-separation direction and to the axes of said opening and closing movement, and the longitudinal axes of the injection-moulding cavities are arranged to extend generally parallel to the common mould separation direction.