ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 31 -- United States Patent no. 12,509,301, issued on Dec. 30, was assigned to Laitram LLC (Harahan, La.).
"Conveyor system for selectively diverting objects" was invented by Jeffrey S. Schwai (Walkersville, Md.) and Joseph F. Kovacs (New Orleans).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A conveyor system includes a conveyor belt having a plurality of article-diverting conveyor belt rollers. An underlying drive roller assembly includes a plurality of pivotable rollers carriers, each having a freely rotatable drive roller that contacts the conveyor belt rollers from below. An actuator moves a movable orientation plate along an arc-shaped path to pivot the carriers and change the orie...