Patent ID: 7297387

Claim:
An air-filling cushioning material, comprising: a pair of overlapped sheets, said pair of overlapped sheets being adhered together at predetermined locations to form a plurality of cells having an air-fillable space, one of the overlapped sheets being flat, the other of the overlapped sheets being molded in a die to plastically deform said other sheet to have a configuration that the cells will have in an inflated state; an air passage for connecting the outside of the air-filling cushioning material and the cells, and a closure that closes the air passage; and a cell-to-cell air passage provided between the cells in a place where the overlapping sheets stay non-adhered, wherein the cell-to-cell air passage is adapted to remain in a substantially non-expanded state when air is filled in the cells, so that it becomes easy to fold the overlapping sheets at the cell-to-cell air passage, and when the overlapping sheets are folded at said cell-to-cell air passage, the cushioning material is formed into a three-dimensional configuration so that one of the overlapping sheets is disposed at an outer side while the other of the overlapping sheets is disposed at an inner side, said three-dimensional configuration having a space adapted to receive an article, wherein a shape of an outer dimension in the three-dimensional configuration remains substantially constant without regard to whether or not the cells are filled with the air, and wherein ends of the plurality of the cells are not pleated.