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:
May. 19, 1998
Filed:
Jan. 08, 1997
Lester M Yeakley, Estes Park, CO (US);
Other;
Abstract
A high torsional stiffness, low axial deflection stiffness, low angular deflection stiffness and low radial deflection stiffness tape drive coupling apparatus includes a base adapted for attachment to a drive motor and a driver engageable with a cassette reel. First and second pairs of parallel flexible rolling tubes are positioned between the base and driver, and the two pairs are disposed orthogonally with respect to each other. In this configuration, the driver is movable axially and angularly with respect to the base by compression and expansion of the flexible tubes. The driver is movable radially with respect to the drive axis by rolling of at least one of the pairs of tubes. The driver is relatively torsionally rigid with respect to the base to facilitate rotational driving engagement of the cassette reel when there exists axial, radial or angular misalignment between the driver and cassette reel.