ALEXANDRIA, Va., Aug. 12 -- United States Patent no. 12,703,288, issued on Aug. 11, was assigned to Caterpillar Global Mining Equipment LLC (Denison, Texas).
"Dump body with faceted shape" was invented by Steven J. Fujan (Oro Valley, Ariz.), Earl Richard Thompson (Oro Valley, Ariz.), Nathan R. Wagner (Tucson, Ariz.) and Vaitheeswaran Ponnuchamy (Chennai, India).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "It is advantageous for the dump body of a mining or off-road truck to be both strong and lightweight. Accordingly, a dump body with a faceted floor is disclosed. The dump body comprises a floor formed from a plurality of planar plates, arranged in two dimensions, and joined at angles to form a pseudo-curva...