US Patent Issued to Caterpillar Global Mining Equipment on Sept. 9 for "Slidable current collector and method for contacting conductor rail" (Arizona Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Sept. 10 -- United States Patent no. 12,413,035, issued on Sept. 9, was assigned to Caterpillar Global Mining Equipment LLC (Denison, Texas).

"Slidable current collector and method for contacting conductor rail" was invented by Igor Strashny (Tucson, Ariz.) and Roopa Rajesh (Tucson, Ariz.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A slidable current collector has an array of terminals with carbon brushes for contacting conductor rails to deliver electrical power to a moving work machine. The terminals have upper sections with a conductive post, lower sections that include a reservoir of liquid metal, and bladders that connect the upper sections with the lower sections. Magnets surround o...