Patent ID: 6857634

Claim:
A blowout preventor for sealing engagement with a tubular within a wellbore, comprising: a blowout preventor body with a central bore; a pair of opposing ram block assemblies, each ram block assembly including a ram block at an inner end of a cylinder rod; a seal assembly carried by each ram block and radially moveable for sealing engagement and disengagement with the tubular, each seal assembly including a resilient seal for sealingly engaging the tubular and a plurality of inserts at least substantially embedded within the resilient seal for preventing extrusion of the resilient seal; each insert including a generally triangular shaped upper body, a generally triangular shaped lower body, and a rib fixedly interconnecting the upper body and the lower body, each upper body and lower body having a leading face, a trailing face, and a radially outward opposite face; a ledge in the upper body extending from one of the leading face and the trailing face in a direction away from the rib: a recess in the upper body of an adjacent insert extending toward the rib of the adjacent insert to receive the ledge and circumferentially interconnect the inserts; an antiextrusion ledge extending from the ledge in the upper body; and an antiextrusion slot in the trailing face of the upper body for receiving the antiextrusion ledge of an adjacent insert.