ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 9 -- United States Patent no. 12,286,194, issued on April 29, was assigned to SHIMANO INC. (Sakai, Japan).
"Sprocket support body" was invented by Hiroshi Fujita (Sakai, Japan), Kazuki Koshiyama (Sakai, Japan) and Takashi Nakanishi (Sakai, Japan).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A sprocket support body comprises at least ten external spline teeth including a plurality of external-spline driving surfaces. The plurality of external-spline driving surfaces each includes a radially outermost edge, a radially innermost edge, and a radial length. A total of the radial lengths of the plurality of external-spline driving surfaces is equal to or larger than 7 mm. At least one extern...