ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 30 -- United States Patent no. 12,372,117, issued on July 29, was assigned to ARRAY TECH INC. (Albuquerque, N.M.).
"Torque tube interface wear guard" was invented by Kevin Krautbauer (Albuquerque, N.M.) and Nathan Schuknecht (Golden, Colo.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Exemplary embodiments of the present disclosure address problems experienced in conventional solar panel tracking systems, including problems associated with wear and damage that can be caused at load bearing interfaces between a bearing and a bearing housing. Embodiments disclosed herein address this issue by positioning a wear guard at the interface between the bearing and the bearing housing. The wear ...