Did You Know...
...that the Slinky toy was the result of a failed attempt by engineer Richard James to produce an antivibration device for ship instruments? His goal was to develop a spring that would instantaneously counterbalance the wave motion that rocks a ship at sea. Instead, he developed the Slinky.
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 4743226 | High capacity continuous solid bowl centrifuge A high capacity continuous solid bowl centrifuge is disclosed having longitudinal vanes which cooperate with helical flights to form longitudinal channels. The longitudinal vanes may be curved vanes or they may be planar vanes disposed either radially or ... | 05/10/1988 |
| 4724532 | Vibrator response linearization circuit A method and apparatus for driving a seismic hydraulic vibrator in which a conventional sinusoidal drive signal in modified in such a manner as to improve vibrator response parameters. The sinusoidal drive signal is modified such that in the regions of th... | 02/09/1988 |
| 4706231 | Reaction mass acceleration feedback device An improvement for the drive control system of a vibratory sound source used in seismic exploration comprising apparatus for generating a feedback signal proportional to the instantaneous acceleration of the reaction mass structure of the sound source's h... | 11/10/1987 |
| 4692912 | Automatic force control for a seismic vibrator The present invention provides a method and apparatus for controlling the response of a seismic vibrator during its actuation period. The sweep input signal is modified in response to an average of the force applied to the earth by the vibrator over at le... | 09/08/1987 |
| 4685094 | Lateral compliance device for geophone springs A spring system for use with a geophone for suspending a reference mass axially and laterally. One spring of the spring system flexes more axially than laterally, and the other spring of the spring system flexes more laterally, although heavily damped, th... | 08/04/1987 |
| 4680741 | Method and apparatus for seismic exploration using non-linear sweeps A method and apparatus for generating a nonlinear sweep signal to be supplied to a seismic vibrator. A seismic sweep time is determined and is divided into a plurality of preselected time intervals. The rate of change of the frequency is determined for ea... | 07/14/1987 |
| 4623991 | Delta-shaped geophone spring For use in geophones to support either the coil or the permanent magnet, a spring formed from a disc, said spring having an outer ring, an inner ring, and three legs connecting the outer and inner rings. The legs are equidistant from one another and subst... | 11/18/1986 |
| 4557326 | Well tool locking apparatus A clamping apparatus for locking tools in a well is disclosed. A first piston sealably engages a hollow body member to form a chamber, which is filled with a working fluid. A bias member or spring moves the first piston, extending a clamping arm connected... | 12/10/1985 |
| 4519052 | Electronic roll-a-long switch An electronic roll-a-long switch for use in a seismic exploration system and method of seismic exploration are disclosed. For a group of N sequentially numbered receiver points, N/2 input channels are provided. Each input channel receives input from one o... | 05/21/1985 |
| 4512001 | Method and apparatus for seismic exploration using nonlinear sweeps The claimed invention is directed to seismic exploration wherein an earth surface vibrator sweeps through a frequency range with varies with time as a function of frequency.... | 04/16/1985 |
| 4510585 | Electronic filter An improved duty cycle controlled filter, wherein a resistance is included in every circuit path that exists between a switch terminal and an amplifier terminal. Such improved filter produces low distortion and has been found to be especially useful in da... | 04/09/1985 |
| 4505591 | Solids mixing well structure and method Solids mixing well structure and methods are disclosed for mixing a solid having a first specific gravity with a fluid having a second specific gravity to produce a slurry having an intermediate specific gravity and a resultant pressure greater than atmos... | 03/19/1985 |
| 4490606 | Transducer apparatus utilizing fiber optics for data transmission A transducer apparatus utilizing fiber optics for data transmission is disclosed in which an output optical signal is encoded with information representative of a parameter being measured and the encoded optical signal transmitted to a remote measurement ... | 12/25/1984 |
| 4479264 | Transducer for optical data transmission A transducer for optical data transmission is disclosed in which an optical signal is encoded with information representative of a parameter being measured and transmitted to a remote measurement and control apparatus site for decoding. An input optical s... | 10/23/1984 |
| 4458344 | Tapered geophone spring A geophone spring is disclosed in which an inner ring member and an outer ring member are connected by a plurality of leg members. Each leg member includes a tapered segment that is wider at its middle than it is at either end. The tapered segment is conn... | 07/03/1984 |
| 4448057 | Apparatus and method for testing a geophone during assembly An apparatus and method for testing a geophone during assembly is disclosed. The apparatus includes a light source cooperating with a photocell for generating a voltage signal in response to light. A member for support of the geophone to be tested is loca... | 05/15/1984 |
| 4392591 | Apparatus for metering semi-flowable material A multistage volumetric feeder has a storage hopper for storing a mass of semi-flowable material, such as strand fiberglass, asbestos, or titanium dioxide. The material is bottom unloaded and passed through several stages of pressure reduction, aeration, ... | 07/12/1983 |
| 4388050 | Manifold unit and assembly and fluid end assembly A suction manifold unit for mounting on a pump fluid end in association with at least one further suction manifold unit to provide a suction manifold assembly for supplying fluid to suction cylinders of such a pump fluid end. The manifold unit has at leas... | 06/14/1983 |
| 4366756 | Electronic tractor guidance system An automatic tractor guidance system for controlling the steering of a tractor to follow a previously plowed furrow is disclosed. A furrow follower is provided with a sensor for sensing the direction of the path relative to the direction of travel of the ... | 01/04/1983 |
| 4361446 | Sphere launching method Spheres are sequentially released into a pipeline from a sphere storage barrel in response to the opening and closing of a valve closure member by means of a sphere launching apparatus. The apparatus has a releasing means, pivotable about a first axis, fo... | 11/30/1982 |
| 4359797 | Plug and ball injector valve A plug and ball injector valve is provided which utilizes seals mounted in standard grooves and an arrangement of pressure balancing cavity areas brought into communication with the seals to balance the fluid pressure across the seals before such seals ar... | 11/23/1982 |
| 4360729 | Seismic cable connector with optical transceiver A seismic cable connector is provided for use with a dual fiber cable in a fiber optic seismic exploration system. The connector contains a digital transceiver which includes an optical detector connected to one fiber of the cable and a fiber optic transm... | 11/23/1982 |
| 4357577 | Instantaneous floating point amplifier An improved instantaneous floating point amplifier is provided having a plurality of cascaded amplifier stages, wherein the gain of a given stage of the amplifier is the square of the gain of the immediately succeeding stage of the amplifier. The number o... | 11/02/1982 |
| 4345539 | Warning system with pneumatic function generator A totally pneumatic crane warning system is disclosed capable of use in oil well environments. The crane warning system utilizes a pneumatic function generator. The pneumatic function generator includes a means for receiving a linear pneumatic signal that... | 08/24/1982 |
| 4345841 | Multi-stage centrifugal mixer An apparatus and method for mixing liquid or a drilling mud with solids and a second liquid is disclosed. The apparatus provides an annular housing having a plurality of mixing chambers. An inlet passageway is tangentially connected to the innermost mixin... | 08/24/1982 |
| 4333486 | Electronic valve controller An electronic valve controller for controlling a meter valve system is disclosed. The electronic controller includes circuitry for enabling a multilevel shutdown of a meter valve system. The meter valve system includes a preset batch counter, positive dis... | 06/08/1982 |
| 4326863 | Centrifugal degasser A centrifugal degasser is provided using the principal of centrifugal force to separate gas from a gas-cut flowable material such as drilling mud. The device passes a gas-cut material through a centrifugal force field to accomplish the degassing. The inve... | 04/27/1982 |
| 4323994 | Geophone spring A new geophone spring is disclosed wherein the outer and inner rings of the spring are connected by leg members having a substantially straight segment which will pivot about an outer portion of the leg in a manner which will reduce the lateral bending fo... | 04/06/1982 |
| 4308959 | Roll sorting apparatus An apparatus for sorting articles based upon the presence of defects on the surface thereof is characterized by a roller conveyor carrying a random array of articles in transverse channels defined between adjacent rollers. As the conveyor is advanced thro... | 01/05/1982 |
| 4307790 | Weight-drop seismic exploration system A method of seismic exploration and a system which provides the capability for increasing the number of depth points from which seismic data are acquired are disclosed. This increase in data is realized without increasing the number of recording channels ... | 12/29/1981 |
| 4306629 | Pneumatic weighing device and method Disclosed is a device for detecting the weight of an article by measuring the amount of pressure required to support the article. The weighing device is characterized by a weighing table having a plurality of apertures for receiving compressed air. The pr... | 12/22/1981 |
| 4303100 | Kelly valve An improved kelly valve of a type wherein a flexible inner valve body closes the valve passageway responsive to the pressure of a gaseous control fluid contained within a sealed chamber and opens the passageway responsive to exterior pressure of drilling ... | 12/01/1981 |
| 4302769 | Trichromatic beam splitter An optics arrangement utilizing a trifurcating beam splitter is characterized by a first half-silvered element disposed at a 45° angle with respect to the axis of an incident light beam. Second and third half-silvered elements are each disposed perpendic... | 11/24/1981 |
| 4295369 | Dual magnetic drive for gear meters A gear meter is characterized by a dual magnetic drive used for driving meter accessories. The measuring gears within the gear meter are provided with driver magnets which urge the rotation of driven magnets mounted on rotatable shafts arranged within the... | 10/20/1981 |
| 4286621 | Dual acting check valve dampener A dampener for a clapper valve wherein a rotor member having radially outwardly extending vanes which subdivide each of two fluid cavities defined in a housing into first and second fluid volumes is characterized by radially extending, first and second pa... | 09/01/1981 |
| 4281765 | Article-detect signal separating network A network for separating an article-detect signal into a number of parts corresponding to the number of articles randomly disposed in next-abutting relationship is characterized by a circuit arrangement adapted to sample and hold a predetermined percentag... | 08/04/1981 |
| 4276620 | Method and apparatus for obtaining a composite field response _to a variable source array using weighting coefficients A multi-channeled digital seismic field stacking system is disclosed for obtaining the composite response to a variable source array. A variable source array is synthesized by applying preselected weighting coefficients to the seismic signals produced in ... | 06/30/1981 |
| 4271968 | Ejector dwell controller for a sorting apparatus A sorting apparatus for sorting a stream of articles and for ejecting unacceptably classified articles therefrom is characterized by an ejector dwell controller operative to control the duration of operation of an ejector element in accordance with the le... | 06/09/1981 |
| 4268932 | Sphere launching apparatus A sphere launching apparatus for use with a valve closure member for sequentially ejecting spheres in a pipeline, said apparatus having a releasing means pivotable about a first axis for engaging a valve closure member and a sphere catcher means pivotally... | 05/26/1981 |
| 4264286 | Multiple fluid pump A multiple fluid pump for providing multiple output fluid streams at varying pressures with high pressure reciprocating plungers of the pump having equal intervals between their compression strokes to minimize vibrations and shocks in the high pressure ou... | 04/28/1981 |
