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•U.S. Patent No. 7,597,172
•Invented by: Stacy H. Turner of Fort Wayne; Joseph A. Kovach of Aurora, Ohio; James H. Blalock of Olive Branch, Miss.; Steven C. Rink of Lawton, Okla.; and Hao Zhang of Canfield, Ohio
•Assigned to Parker-Hannifin Corp., Cleveland
With gas prices, the economy and the environment, energy conservation is as important as ever. This is particularly the case with vehicles, including trucks.
This patent deals particularly with large industrial vehicles, such as garbage trucks, that use both an internal combustion engine and hydraulic motor systems. The internal combustion engine moves the vehicle while the hydraulic motor moves the trash-can loader and the dump lift for the bed.
A problem is these large vehicles produce a lot of energy when moving but lose a lot of energy when stopping. It would be useful to harness that energy even while the vehicle is stopped.
This patent describes an energy accumulator system that recovers kinetic energy from the vehicle by using electronic control systems and fluid circuitry.
It is particularly useful for garbage trucks because they use both gasoline and hydraulic motors. Energy can be stored to power either the drive or hydraulic systems when needed, rather than using the gas tank as the exclusive source of power.
•U.S. Patent No. 7,609,157
•Invented by: Scott A. McFarland of Fort Wayne
•Assigned to Radio Systems Corp., Knoxville, Tenn.
It may not be obvious from the title, but this patent is directed to wireless animal containing or excluding systems.
Like Invisible Fence-type systems, this patent describes keeping animals either in or out of a defined area by transmitting a stimulus-delivering signal to a receiver collar when it gets too close to the perimeter.
Instead of using a charged wire to define the containment area, however, the system described in this patent uses an antenna that transmits a signal. The defined area is created by the signal being an attenuating magnetic field radiating from the antenna.
A collar on the animal’s neck picks up the signal. The weaker the signal, the closer to the perimeter the animal is getting. If the animal gets too far from the antenna, a stimulus is applied.
This patent describes a transmitter that sends a special error correction coded signal. The collar detects and decodes that signal. In a typical situation when there are no data errors, the receiving collar does not apply a stimulus to the animal. When there are bit errors, however, the collar begins to deliver a stimulus to the animal.
The preceding are lay descriptions of patents obtained from the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s public records and are provided for general information purposes only. Nothing contained herein is a legal description of any claimed invention, identification of novelty, or offer of legal advice.
Because issued patents are based on applications often filed years earlier, the subject matter of some patents might have been available on the market for some time prior to the issuance of the patent. Additional information on these patents is available at www.uspto.gov.
