U.S. Patent No.: 8,246,597 B2 

Inventor(s): Akiyoshi Kinoshita, Kagawa, Japan; Natsuko Aoyagi, Kagawa, Japan; Kayoko Tanaka, Kagawa, Japan; and Yasuhiko Kenmochi, Kagawa, Japan.

Company: Uni-Charm Corporation, Ehime, Japan.

Filed: 4/20/09

Issued: 8/21/12

A pant-type wearing article having a front-rear direction, a vertical direction and a waistline direction and comprising: a crotch region; a front waist region extending forward from said crotch region; a rear waist region extending rearward from said crotch region; a liquid-previous inner sheet facing the skin of a wearer of the pant-type wearing article; a liquid-impervious outer sheet provided beneath the liquid-pervious inner sheet; a pair of front lateral zones of said front waist region opposed to each other in said waistline direction and extending in said vertical direction are detachably connected to a pair of rear lateral zones of said rear waist region opposed to each other in said waistline direction and extending in said vertical direction via a pair of fastener systems so as to form a waist-opening and a pair of leg-openings and said fastener systems extend from said waist-opening to said leg-openings; waist elastic members extending under tension along said waist-opening, leg elastic members extending under tension along peripheral edges of said leg-openings and intermediate elastic members provided between said waist elastic members and said leg elastic members as viewed in said vertical direction and extending under tension in said waistline direction; each of said fastener systems comprises a first fastener component on a side of said article facing the skin of a wearer and a second fastener component on a side of said article facing a garment won by the wearer and adapted to be lapped on said first fastener component from outside of said wearing article and to be repetitively engaged with and disengaged from said first fastener component and wherein said first fastener component is mounted on one of said front lateral zone and said rear lateral zone and said second fastener is mounted on other lateral zone; said first fastener component comprises a base sheet strip attached directly to said liquid-pervious inner sheet with said liquid-impervious outer sheet on an opposite side of the liquid-previous inner sheet than the base sheet strip at one of said front and rear lateral zones and including a distal region extending outward from said one of said front and rear lateral zones in said waistline direction and an engagement region adapted to be engaged with an inner surface of said second fastener component; said one of said front and rear lateral zones includes a fixed region in which an outer surface of said base sheet strip is partially bonded thereto and a free region lying outside said fixed region as viewed in said waistline direction so as to be left free with respect to said base sheet strip; and said free region normally takes a posture folded back configuration in said waistline direction so that an outer surface of said one of said front and rear lateral zones lie inside the folded back configuration, wherein said free region includes at least said waist elastic members and said intermediate elastic members and is kept in said posture folded back in said waistline direction under contraction of said waist elastic members and said intermediate elastic members in said waistline direction.