receptacles to allow ends of adjacent sleeves 20 to be inserted so they can be guided and held in alignment as a force is applied to movable sleeve 18 the reasons for using sleeves 20 can be better understood by examining fig1 and 2 together as shown in fig2 the internal sealing element 26 spans over sleeves 20 and spacer 24 as it extends between stationary sleeve 16 and movable sleeve 18 it also covers a seal ring 28 which has an internal o ring 30 for the purpose of internal sealing along the mandrel 10 the problem addressed by sleeves 20 is that when movable sleeve 18 is set in up hole motion the element 26 in the absence of sleeves 20 will tend to bunch up and contact the casing or wellbore at end 32 rather than uniformly along its length or more preferably from the up hole end 34 expansion initially at end 32 is not desirable because it can prevent sufficient contact pressure from reaching the up hole end 34 for a proper seal the present invention seeks to direct the pushing force from movable sleeve 18 through a mechanism other than the seal 26 for a predetermined portion of.