Crash-lock bottom carton
ECMA A60.20.00.03
Auto-bottom: glued flat, the floor drops into place when you open it. Tuck top.
- Example size
- 100 × 70 × 140 mm internal
- Blank
- 360 × 291 mm
- Pieces
- 1 blank
- Board choices
- 12 boards, 0.45 to 7 mm
Free to design and to check in 3D. €2.50 for the PDF, €3.50 for the DXF or SVG.
What this box is, in other words
Heavier retail products in carton board: jars, bottles, candles, small appliances. Also for packing by hand in volume, because the bottom needs no folding at the packing table.
How it closes. The bottom is glued at the factory while the carton is flat. Open the tube and the four bottom flaps swing into place and lock. The top closes with a tuck flap from the back panel.
Worth knowing. The glue on the four corner triangles is part of the box: without it the bottom does not lock. Folding by hand, glue them with the tube flat and the flaps folded in, then let the glue set before you open it. The wider pair of panels carries the large flaps; the tool picks that pair for you.
Also called
crash lock bottom auto bottom box auto lock bottom crash bottom carton automatic bottom pop-up bottom folding carton auto bottom crash lock crash bottom heavy jar bottle glued
Same construction, different trade. If you came looking for one of those, this is it.
How this one is built
- Crash-lock bottom: glue the four triangles (glue layer) to the minor flaps next to them while the tube is flat. Front and back carry the majors because they are the wider pair.
- Tuck top: the closing panel and tuck flap on the back panel.
- The tuck flap is 1.90 mm narrower on each side than the closing panel - a full caliper plus clearance - so it slides past the side walls and the glue seam.
- Closing order: dust flaps in, closing panel over them, tuck flap behind the wall.
Board options
The drawing changes when you change the board: thickness compensation is built into every fold, so a 4 mm C-flute blank is not the same shape as a 0.45 mm carton blank.
- F-flute corrugated (0.8 mm)
- E-flute corrugated (1.5 mm)
- B-flute corrugated (3.0 mm)
- C-flute corrugated (4.0 mm)
- EB double wall (4.5 mm)
- BC double wall (7.0 mm)
- SBS / GC1 board 350 gsm (0.45 mm)
- FBB / GC2 board 400 gsm (0.55 mm)
- Kraft / GD2 board 400 gsm (0.50 mm)
- Greyboard 1.0 mm (rigid)
- Prototype board 1.0 mm
- Prototype board 2.0 mm
Questions about this box
- What is a crash-lock bottom?
- A bottom that is glued while the carton lies flat and drops into place when you open it, also called an auto-bottom or auto-lock bottom. Two large flaps each have a 45-degree crease at one corner; the triangle beyond it is glued to the small flap next to it.
- What is the ECMA code for a crash-lock carton?
- ECMA A60.20.00.03. ECMA calls the crash lock an automatic (glued) closure (A60); the .20 is the tuck top this tool draws.
- Crash lock or 1-2-3 bottom?
- A crash lock costs a glue step but opens in one movement and carries more weight. A 1-2-3 bottom needs no glue and ships flat in the same way, but every carton has to be closed by hand in three folds.
- Is this dieline free?
- Designing it and folding it in 3D are free and need no account. Downloading it is paid: €2.50 for the PDF to print and measure on paper, and €3.50 for a production file - DXF or SVG - because those are the ones that go to a cutting table.
- What is a dieline?
- The flat drawing a box is cut from. It shows where the knife cuts, where the board is creased to fold, and where it is perforated. A die maker turns it into a steel rule die; a plotter or laser cuts it directly. It is also written as "die line" or "die cut template".
- What file format does a die maker need?
- DXF, almost always. Ours is R12 DXF at 1:1 in millimetres with cut, crease, reverse crease and perforation each on their own layer, which is what a cutting table expects. The SVG is the same geometry for Illustrator, Affinity, Inkscape and laser software.
- Can I use it commercially?
- Yes. The files are yours: modify them, print them, make any number of boxes from them. No attribution and no licence fee, ever.
What you can change
12 parameters on the first screen, 8 more behind advanced settings.
- Dimension mode
- Length (L)
- Width (W)
- Height (H)
- Board caliper (t)
- Top
- Gable rise — Height of the roof above the walls. The height (H) is the wall height.
- Handle panel height
- Hand hole
- Bottom
- Tuck direction
- Tuck flap corners