Patent No.: 10,767,677 (get PDF)

Title: Blind fastener

Assignee: Sky Climber Tower Solutions LLC

Abstract: A blind fastener device for fastening at least two workpieces, including a sleeve, an expander having a tensioning section, a locking section, and an expansion section, and a nut. A portion of the expander passes through the sleeve to cooperate with the nut so that relative rotation of the expander and nut draws the expander’s distal end toward the sleeve’s proximal end thereby drawing a portion of the expansion section of the expander into a structural region located on the sleeve and expanding at least a portion of the sleeve’s structural region, and drawing a portion of the locking section past the sleeve’s distal end toward the sleeve’s proximal end and deforming at least a portion of the sleeve’s distal end to a locked state.

About Us: I am a patent lawyer with experience in the sporting goods and recreation industries, with a knack for all things related to sports equipment, fitness equipment, and performance improvement gear, including biofeedback inventions. As a mechanical engineer and patent lawyer, I help inventors with freedom-to-operate clearance projects to avoid unintentionally infringing the patents of their competitors, as well as identifying unique protectable aspects of the clients’ inventions and crafting clever claims to cover their inventions and make it as hard as possible for competitors to develop invalidity positions. The art of innovative patent claim creation is difficult, and something that is beyond most patent attorneys who just aren’t that creative. I love the challenge of identifying unusual aspects of an invention and crafting claims directed to these aspects, while carefully viewing them from the perspective of a competitor. As you can see, our IP attorneys are experienced with clever and creative patent claims, and making it difficult for competitors to formulate non-infringement opinions and invalidity opinions. While my intellectual property law firm is located in central Ohio, I regularly travel across the country to meet with clients face to face when they realize protection of an invention is just too important, and the investment in development has been too high, to short change the patent prosecution aspects.