US Patent Issued to Deere & Co. on Feb. 17 for "Residue sensor protection on a harvester" (German, American Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Feb. 17 -- United States Patent no. 12,550,819, issued on Feb. 17, was assigned to Deere & Co. (Moline, Ill.).

"Residue sensor protection on a harvester" was invented by Nathan R. Vandike (Geneseo, Ill.), Martin Franz Unterpaintner (Saarbrucken, Germany), Benjamin Peschel (Contwig, Germany) and Stephen R. Corban (Geneseo, Ill.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A residue sensor is mounted to a combine harvester to sense a characteristic of residue. The residue sensor can be mounted to a spreader, to a sidewall of a chopper, or in a bypass system. The residue sensor can also be protected by an air curtain that directs air to inhibit contact between the residue sensor and the resid...