ALEXANDRIA, Va., Oct. 28 -- United States Patent no. 12,446,491, issued on Oct. 21, was assigned to Aerow Manufacturing Ltd. (Saskatoon, Canada).
"Swath lifter" was invented by Ryan Ray Sommerfeld (Medstead, Canada) and Ben K. Voss (Saskatoon, Canada).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A swath lifter includes a rotor over which the crop is carried with the rotor driven in a direction so that an underside of the rotor adjacent the ground is driven opposite to the direction of movement. The rotor carries rows of tines at angularly spaced positions around the rotor each associated with a flexible strip of a resilient material located in front of the tines and covering an inner part of the tines with ...