Patent ID: 7914723

Claim:
A method of manufacturing a pattern bonded nonwoven fabric comprising the steps of: spinning and stretching thermoplastic fibers in a spunbonded process, laying the spunbonded thermoplastic fibers down to form a web, bonding the web by hot-roll calendering, through air bonding, cold-roll calendering or by passing the web through a saturated-steam chamber at elevated pressure, and embossing the web by passing the web between a flat roll and an embossed roll having protrusions, a first one of said protrusions comprising a first flat protruded portion having a length between 1.4 and 2.1 mm and a first convex side surface having a radius of 1.8 mm, and a second one of said protrusions adjacent to the first one of said protrusions comprising a second flat protruded portion having a length between 0.8 and 1.1 mm and a second convex side surface having a radius of 0.5 mm to create a basket-weave bond pattern in the web having bonded regions comprising fibers in a fully bonded state and non-bonded regions comprising fibers in a fully non-bonded state connected by transition regions of partially bonded fibers, the transition regions surrounding each of the bonded regions and having bonding that changes gradually from the fully bonded state to the fully non-bonded state, the convex side surface forming the transition regions, the bonded regions having an area comprising about 10% to 45% of the area of the web, the transition regions having an area of at least 100% of the area of the bonded regions.