ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 12 -- United States Patent no. 12,298,010, issued on May 13, was assigned to W.C. Bradley Co. (Columbus, Ga.).
"Pellet auger release system" was invented by Anthony Hamilton (Hamilton, Ga.), Bruce Roberts (Phenix City, Ala.), Donnie Terkalas (Columbus, Ga.), Sleiman Abdallah (Columbus, Ga.) and William Dixon (Columbus, Ga.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A system has a drive mechanism affixed to an auger to selectively impart rotational forces to the auger for movement of pellet fuel for a cooking grill, and a lever arm affixed in a pivoting relationship to the drive mechanism and to a fixed location separate from the drive mechanism such that manipulation of the lever ar...