US Patent Issued to Apex Industrial on Sept. 1 for "Through-hardened valve seat for hydraulic fracturing" (Wisconsin Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Sept. 1 -- United States Patent no. 12,723,662, issued on Sept. 1, was assigned to Apex Industrial LLC (Middleton, Ohio).

"Through-hardened valve seat for hydraulic fracturing" was invented by Erik Rasmussen (Hayward, Wis.) and Steven J. Metz (Oshkosh, Wis.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A valve seat for hydraulic fracturing valves employs a through-hardening process, for example, with austempering, to provide greater wear resistance at the interface between the valve seat and the valve plug as well as resistance to abrasion and leakage in the interface between an alignment ring of the valve seat and a bore in the pump body."

The patent was filed on Nov. 11, 2024, under Appl...