ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 4 -- United States Patent no. 12,318,986, issued on June 3, was assigned to VMI HOLLAND B.V. (Epe, Netherlands).
"Festooner and method for buffering a strip" was invented by Gerrit Roy Nijland (Epe, Netherlands), Teunis Johannes Verbruggen (Epe, Netherlands), Jochem Johannes Van Steenis (Epe, Netherlands) and Gerrit Mulder (Epe, Netherlands).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Disclosed is a festooner and a method for buffering a strip, wherein the festooner includes a first holder and a second holder which are oppositely movable towards and away from each other in a buffer direction to vary a buffer capacity of the festooner, and a first set of buffer rollers and a second set...