Patent ID: 8440124

Claim:
A method of making a dryer bar comprising the steps: (a) providing a dryer bar composition suitable for use as a dryer bar; (b) extruding the dryer bar composition through a single screw extruder to make an extruded dryer bar composition comprising: (i) providing the single screw extruder, wherein the single screw extruder comprises: a channeled barrel comprising a channel containing a single screw within the channel, wherein the channeled barrel comprises at least the following regions: a feed region, a cooling region downstream from the feed region, and a heating/static mixing region downstream from the cooling region; wherein the single screw is capable of conveying the dryer bar composition through the channel of the feed region, cooling region, and heating/static region; (ii) packing the dryer bar composition into the feed region of the single screw extruder; (iii) rotating the single screw to convey the dryer bar composition down the channel of the channeled barrel from feed region to the cooling region and then to the heating/static mixing region; (iv) cooling the cooling region of the extruder to cool the dryer bar composition as the dryer bar composition is conveyed through the cooling region of the extruder; (v) static mixing and heating the dryer bar composition as the dryer bar composition is conveyed through the heating/static mixing region of the extruder to make the extruded dryer bar composition; (c) dieing the extruded dryer bar composition with a die to form a died dryer bar composition; and (d) stamping the died dryer bar composition with a stamp to form the dryer bar.