The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 21, 1978
Filed:
Dec. 22, 1976
Clifton Martin Jones, Santa Monica, CA (US);
Other;
Abstract
An open frame structure has spring fingers for lightly gripping a tennis ball. A shaft rotatably mounts a napping wheel in the open frame structure, the periphery of the napping wheel having bristles except for a given circumferential section. Also secured to the shaft is a radially extending arm terminating in a friction pad to one side of the napping wheel and positioned to engage the tennis ball when gripped in the spring fingers. The arrangement is such that rotation of the napping wheel causes the bristles to successively engage the tennis ball to rotate the same about an axis parallel to the axis of the napping wheel shaft. Once each rotation, the friction pad on the radially extending arm will engage a side portion of the tennis ball and rotate it slightly about a different axis so that the bristles will engage a different circumferential path portion about the ball resulting in substantially the entire area of the ball being napped after several rotations.