ALEXANDRIA, Va., Aug. 26 -- United States Patent no. 12,397,385, issued on Aug. 26, was assigned to DENGENSHA TOA Co. LTD. (Kanagawa, Japan).
"Bolt feeder" was invented by Yoshiaki Iwamoto (Kanagawa, Japan), Toshiyuki Ogata (Kanagawa, Japan) and Yoshihiro Arai (Kanagawa, Japan).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A bolt feeder includes: a rotating plate (12) arranged adjacent to a hopper (27) storing bolts (10); one or more magnets (15) to attract the bolts (10), from a back surface of the rotating plate (12), onto a front surface of the rotating plate (12); a selection block (13) having a gap space (13a) through which one bolt in a predetermined orientation out of the bolts (10) attracted by the o...