US Patent Issued to Caterpillar Global Mining Equipment on Oct. 14 for "Positioning system for blast hole drilling operations" (Illinois, Texas Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Oct. 21 -- United States Patent no. 12,442,259, issued on Oct. 14, was assigned to Caterpillar Global Mining Equipment LLC (Denison, Texas).

"Positioning system for blast hole drilling operations" was invented by Isaac A Jones (Mackinaw, Ill.), Christopher R. Beasley (Peoria, Ill.) and Matthew Meredith Noble (Gainesville, Texas).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A method and system for capturing and aligning a drill pipe of a surface drill includes a first arm assembly and a second arm assembly. Each arm assembly features an end effector coupled to a position adjustment mechanism configured to receive a plurality of shims for positional adjustments relative to the drill pipe. The...