Did You Know...
...that several people are credited with the invention of the flush toilet? Most people have heard of Thomas Crapper (1837-1910), the sanitary engineer who invented the valve-and-siphon arrangement that made the modern toilet possible. Another claimant to "the throne" was British inventor Alexander Cumming who patented a toilet in 1775. Then there's a nameless Minoan (a native of ancient Crete) who lived 4,000 years ago who supposedly was ahead of his time and created the first flush toilet!
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 7854051 | Method of assembly of low cost oil/grease separator A container for receiving and holding effluent water containing oil/grease to be removed has sectional covers. A main sectional cover supports a partially immersed rotatable disk; a drive on the main sectional cover rotates the disk; a trough on the main sectional c... | 12/21/2010 |
| 7748096 | Recycling facilitating system, recycling facilitating program, and recycling facilitating method A recycling facilitating system including an item identification data input unit for inputting item identification data, an item disassembly data memory for storing item disassembly data in correspondence with the item identification data, an item disassembly data r... | 07/06/2010 |
| 7431819 | Method and apparatus for releasing metal-resin joint A method for separating a metal-resin joint including the steps of: (1) immersing an article including a metal-resin joint with a counter electrode in an alkaline solution; and (2) applying a voltage over a certain time period between the metal portion of the joint ... | 10/07/2008 |
| 7377214 | Apparatus and method for temporarily compressing loose, multiply bent, pieces of scrap sheet metal into compacted wafers The bulk volume of large numbers of loose, separated, multiply bent, irregularly shaped scrap sheet metal is temporarily reduced, for transportation and storage of the metal for recycling purposes, by compressing the metal into temporary, compacted wafers formed of ... | 05/27/2008 |
| 7363255 | Apparatus unit replacement assisting method and system By providing an apparatus unit replacement assisting method, in which, upon receipt of a request from a first user to replace a first unit comprising part of an apparatus with a second unit, the second unit is offered to the first user at a price after the deduction... | 04/22/2008 |
| 7328503 | Recycling system for engine oil filter A recycling system is used for processing an engine oil filter and comprises a frame, a filter net, a cutting device, a dividing device, and a compressing device. Thus, all of the parts of the used engine oil filter can be divided, processed and reused respectively,... | 02/12/2008 |
| 7318265 | Recovery method for an electric appliance A mark is displayed to a manually scrapped component capable of being disassembled manually without disassembling or crushing by machine at the time of discard or recovery of an electric appliance after use, and the manually scrapped component is manually scrapped f... | 01/15/2008 |
| 7299530 | Ball grid array rework using a continuous belt furnace Disclosed is an apparatus for separating interconnects between, for example, a card and a substrate. The apparatus includes one or more rotationally biased (e.g., spring-loaded, etc.) partial-circle structures (e.g., blades, squeegee, plow, etc.) and one or more tem... | 11/27/2007 |
| 7296340 | Apparatus of recycling printed circuit board The present invention provides a recycler that recycles a printed circuit board for separating and retrieving a metallic material, which includes a printed metallic material, and an insulating material, both composing the printed circuit board. The insulating body b... | 11/20/2007 |
| 7187075 | Stress relieving film for semiconductor packages Techniques for reducing the mechanical stress imposed upon semiconductor dice by protective molding compounds during times of temperature fluctuation. A thermoplastic material is attached to a top surface of a die to relieve the stress. The thermoplastic material se... | 03/06/2007 |
| 7162785 | Method of recycling a process cartridge The recycling of metal materials is performed by efficiently recovering the metal materials from component materials of a process cartridge. To achieve this object, there is provided a method of recycling a process cartridge containing a toner, wherein in a crushing... | 01/16/2007 |
| 7140108 | Method of designing device Provided is a method of designing a device, comprising the steps of determining a disposing process for each component of the device, the disposing process being selectable from a melting process, a shredding process and a renovating process, and designing a connect... | 11/28/2006 |
| 7107661 | Method of recycling printed circuit board The present invention provides a method and apparatus of recycling a printed circuit board for separating and retrieving a metallic material, which includes a printed metallic material, and an insulating material, both composing the printed circuit board. Both the m... | 09/19/2006 |
| 7080435 | Recycling facilitating system, recycling facilitating program, and recycling facilitating method A recycling facilitating system including an item identification data input unit for inputting item identification data, an item disassembly data memory for storing item disassembly data in correspondence with the item identification data, an item disassembly data r... | 07/25/2006 |
| 6986192 | Method for reclamation of precious metals from circuit board scrap The present invention springs from the discovery that mild acids could be utilized to shear undesired metals away from desired precious metals that have been plated onto circuit board runners or contacts. This shearing action occurs at a high rate when metal scrap s... | 01/17/2006 |
| 6966105 | Process for reclaiming rubber-metal waste For a workpiece having a metal part bonded to a rubber part, a method is devised to separate the metal and rubber parts. A flame is used to heat a portion of an exposed surface of the metal part, while moving the flame relative to the metal part until substantially ... | 11/22/2005 |
| 6951050 | Process and apparatus for recovering materials from installation cables with a bunched conductor A process and apparatus for recovering conductor material from an installation cable with bunched conductors and plastic insulation cuts the installation cable into segments, presses and rolls the segments at an increased temperature ranging from 70° to 130° C. wi... | 10/04/2005 |
| 6944926 | Method for disassembling refrigerator, compressing device, and device for disassembling the same A refrigerant gas is collected and a compressor is removed from a discarded refrigerator, a heat-insulating housing including a heat insulator is cut/processed and separated into a plurality of pieces, and the pieces are compressed/processed by compression rollers o... | 09/20/2005 |
| 6938318 | Method for collecting a foam resin from a housing of a refrigerator A method for disassembling a discarded refrigerator that uses a foamed resin as a heat insulator according to the present invention includes the processes of cutting and separating a heat-insulating housing of a refrigerator into pieces having a predetermined size a... | 09/06/2005 |
| 6898834 | Barrel stave reclaim A method of reclaiming non-wine affected oak wood from a stave removed from a wine barrel or cask. The wine affected wood is removed as by sawing, the remaining non-wine affected wood is sawn into battens, dressed, straightened and toasted. The reclaimed oak battens... | 05/31/2005 |
| 6836947 | Method of dismantling air conditioner Using a cutting device (10) including a rotor (11) with a principal plane, a spindle (13) provided in a normal direction to the principal plane and at least one impacting body (100) mounted on the spindle rotatably, in which the impacting... | 01/04/2005 |
| 6732416 | Refrigerator recycling method and system A system and method for recycling materials from appliances, such as refrigerators and freezers, including a conveyor system having a number of stations to remove material from the appliance, and a band saw to cut the appliance into at least two pieces. The cut piec... | 05/11/2004 |
| 6722023 | Recycling equipment for used-automobiles The present invention provides a scrapping system of used-automobiles, comprising a reusable parts collecting station A, a liquid collecting station B for collecting liquids including fuel, oil and coolant, a prearrangement station C for collecting chlorofluorocarbo... | 04/20/2004 |
| 6694588 | Method of renovating and recycling a vehicle A method of renovating and recycling a vehicle, comprises the steps of: (a) designing the vehicle, wherein the step of designing comprises the steps of: (a-1) determining a way of treatment, such as melting, crushing or renovating, for mach part of the ve... | 02/24/2004 |
| 6675454 | Method for recycling used printed circuit boards A method of recycling used printed boards includes the steps of removing components from the used printed boards or parts of them and joining the resulting used printed boards to form a composite board. The method further provides for separating outer con... | 01/13/2004 |
| 6594877 | Method and equipment of recycling used-automobiles A scrapping system of used-automobiles includes a reusable parts collecting station, a liquid collecting station for collecting liquids including fuel, oil and coolant, a prearrangement station for collecting chlorofluorocarbon, batteries, seats, tires, e... | 07/22/2003 |
| 6584665 | Method and apparatus for separating components of filters for oil and fuel A method and apparatus is provided for separating an internal filtering component from an outer casing of an internal combustion type oil or fuel filter. The apparatus includes a holder having an opening extending therethrough and a peripheral support abo... | 07/01/2003 |
| 6513218 | Accessing fiber fracture surfaces in fiber optic connectors Methods and apparatus for extracting a fiber from connector. In accordance with our method the extraction does not compromise any failure evidence located within the ferrule of the fiber connector. The method comprises the steps of metallic etching, follo... | 02/04/2003 |
| 6497023 | Apparatus for forming metal feedstock from waste metal products An apparatus for forming a metal feedstock from waste metal products is disclosed. The apparatus includes devices for: crushing the metal products into pieces; magnetically separating sheet-shaped ferrous scraps and ferrous cast blocks from the crushed pi... | 12/24/2002 |
| 6349457 | Process and apparatus for disassembling tape cassettes Processes and apparatuses for partly disassembling tape cassettes having at least one closure flap comprise separating the closure flap from the cassette or from the cassette housing at an early time, before, during or shortly after the opening of the cas... | 02/26/2002 |
| 6276250 | Method and apparatus for separating a pipe from a cable A method of separating a pipe (1) from an elongate flexible element (2) used to pull the pipe (1) from the ground comprises drawing the flexible element (2) past or through separating means which splits the pipe (1) along its length as it passes to thereb... | 08/21/2001 |
| 6249949 | Apparatus and method for removing bead wires from vehicle tires An automated apparatus and method for removing the bead wires from discarded tires prior to further processing of the rubber of the tire casing employs an intermittently movable infeed conveyor that brings each tire to a position where it drops into a chu... | 06/26/2001 |
| 6237216 | Apparatus for automatically dismantling a windshield glass and a rear glass from a disused automobile A system for recycling the components dismantled from a disused automobile, which includes a main body having a control part, front and rear glass removers connected with the main body for dismantling the glass from the body of the disused automobile, two... | 05/29/2001 |
| 5990247 | Base and solvent-decomposed molding of thermosetting resin and aliphatic polyester The thermosetting composition of the present invention includes an unsaturated polyester, an addition polymerizable monomer, a low shrink agent other than an aliphatic polyester, and an aliphatic polyester decomposed in a decomposing solution containing a... | 11/23/1999 |
| 5979033 | Method of recycling waste printed circuit boards A method and a device for treating waste printed circuit boards with molten tin include process of throwing printed circuit boards into a molten tin bath in treating furnace, letting the boards proceed crashing, stirring and carbonizing treatment for sepa... | 11/09/1999 |
| 5951275 | Method for removing oily substances from metallic articles Combustibles such as oily substances adhered to or impregnated in metallic articles are removed, before the articles are subjected to a heat-treatment for carburizing or sintering them, by heating them in a heating chamber with a combustion tube, and disc... | 09/14/1999 |
| 5890273 | Method for detaching plastic components from automobiles and other products An improved method and apparatus for effecting separation of plastic components from associated metal components where the plastic and metal components are attached to one another by fasteners, e.g., effecting separation of plastic components from a disca... | 04/06/1999 |
| 5830258 | Method of recovering resources in resin-molded electrical rotating device A method of recovering resources in a resin-molded electrical rotating device (1,2) in which electromagnetic members (1a,1b,2a) are molded with resin molding (1c,2c) with fine voids so as to be integrally made into a solid body, and a resin for molding of... | 11/03/1998 |
| 5814412 | Base and solvent-decomposed thermosetting molding with aliphatic polyester The thermosetting composition of the present invention includes an unsaturated polyester, an addition polymerizable monomer, a low shrink agent other than an aliphatic polyester, and an aliphatic polyester decomposed in a decomposing solution containing f... | 09/29/1998 |
| 5809875 | Apparatus for crushing scrap vehicle wheels Apparatus for crushing scrap vehicle wheels includes a frame constructed from three radially disposed rectangular tube beams each mounting a hydraulic cylinder and crushing head which converge and operate radially to deform a scrap wheel supported at the ... | 09/22/1998 |
