Abstract: To stabilize the inserted position of an endotracheal tube and to protect it against bite-damage, a bite-block of relatively rigid tough plastic has integrally connected front-edge flanges for overlying the upper and the lower lips of a patient for attachment thereto as by strips of adhesive tape, and has a forwardly extending vertically-on-edge flange for attachment thereto of the endotracheal tube as by adhesive tape wrapped therearound.

Abstract: To greatly increase the size and thus the strength and life of the valve-closing spring of a high-performance (e.g. automobile-racing) engine, a rocker arm is employed to couple the much larger remotely located spring to the valve stem, from which was removed the smaller short-lived spring for which the much larger spring is substituted. The rocker arm and the substituted large spring are mounted on a base plate attachable to the engine-head assembly, and a cover shell is made removable for access to the parts, which include an adjustable-length spring-pressure-adjusting hold-down device.

Abstract: A pliers-like head-gripping tool for immobilizing and holding fish for skinning or scaling, or animals for skinning, has a flat-faced mouth-insertable lower jaw and an upper jaw provided with a skull-penetrating sharp-tipped conical point depending from a flat surface roughly parallel to the (preferably serrated) flat face of the upper jaw during normal use. The handle members of the tool are dip-coated with a tough and preferably slightly resilient plastic material. The lower handle member is downwardly and forwardly curved to partly embrace the hand of the user as an aid to a pulling action. The tool parts are so shaped and proportioned that the sharp tip of the point will be protectedly slightly spaced from the lower jaw surface when the handle members touch. A clip-on centrally apertured disc adjusts the tool to smaller game by reducing the effective dimensions of the conical point and the jaw gap.

Abstract: A traction-increasing attachment for driven vehicle-wheels has at least one L-shaped rigid member for extending diametrically over the face of a disk-type wheel and has a cleat-like extension extending transversely over the tire tread of the wheel. A quickly and easily mountable and demountable support member diametrically spans the face of the wheel and has anchoring fingers receivable in conventional slots in the wheel adjacent its tire-receiving rim. The support member can be formed of two length-adjustable straps or it can be a slightly bowed single strap, which, when straightened by being assembled with the wheel, has its ends thereby extended to anchor in the wheel slots.

Abstract: A device for warning a person carrying or wearing it of the presence of dangerous microwave radiation is fully powered by the radiations being detected. A very low-wattage gas-discharge lamp is energized by a broadly or a sharply tuned receiver circuit including dipole antennas or one antenna and a "grounding" casing element. The casing may be largely and uniformly transparent or have different areas gradedly light-transmissive to indicate varying radiation intensities. The casing can be made in the shape of a pocket watch, fountain pen, bracelet or finger ring, etc.

Abstract: A commercially available farm tractor having a rear-mounted upwardly swingable power lift, is provided with a pair of hay-bale-penetrating tines rigidly parallelly connected at their base ends by a member that is easily and quickly detachably mountable on the free ends of parallel lift arms. A delta-shaped frame is attached to the front of the tractor to carry a second pair of parallel bale-impaling tines which are upwardly swingable by a single hydraulic cylinder. The assemblage provides quick and easy loading and unloading of two bales, and a weight-balanced load during carrying.

Abstract: A somewhat resilient stopper seals the throat of a conventional glass coffee-maker flask and is provided with a pouring passage. The passage is valved by a horizontally swingable blade spring-biased toward its passage-closing position but movable to its passage-opening position by a timer-controlled mechanism. The timer can be set for different time periods by a manually movable member which can either be normally fixed to the timer or be easily removable so that it can be retained at the coffee-making station to insure against purpose-defeating resetting.

Abstract: A track-mounted trunk-type luggage-carrier body is longitudinally movable from its transporting position on the top of a station wagon (or van, panel-truck or like vehicle) to its loading position when pulled-down at the back of the vehicle. The tracks are C-shaped in cross-section and the carrier has a pair of wheels adjacent its front end guided therein. Tensioned coil springs may be used to pull the carrier body forwardly. Removable stop means normally prevent the wheels from leaving the rear track ends. Resilient bumpers on the bottom of the carrier prevent damage to the top and rear surfaces of the vehicle. Optionally, roller means can be attached to the vehicle surface adjacent the junction of its top and rear surface portions to protectively and easily guide the carrier body past the junction area.

Abstract: A device for sensing overheating of bearings comprises a high-heat-conductivity metallic (copper) sheet adapted for shape-conforming fixed face-contact with an exposed surface of a bearing assemblage. A flat-bottomed brass cup is fixed to the upper surface of the copper sheet, as by pop-type rivets passing through flanges extending laterally from the cup bottom. A snap-disc thermostat lies within and against the bottom of the cup for good heat-exchange with the cup and with the sheet and thus with the bearing assemblage. The cup houses a pair of normally separated switch arms, one of which is engageable by a button of insulating material (attached to the thermostat disc) when the disc snaps to its bearing-overheated position. The device is housed by a piece of plastic tube that snugly embraces the end of the sheath of a two-wire insulated cable electrically connected to the switch.

Abstract: A conventional ammonia refrigeration system is modified by adding thereto an automatic oil-separation and re-use system, which comprises a gravity-type separation tank installed between the bottom of a surge drum and the compressor and an intermittently operated valve for controlling draining of the separated oil from the bottom of the separation tank. The valve is opened for a widely pre-adjustable short time period at the beginning of each compressor-ON cycle, which is when the oil has had maximal time for settling-out from its mixture with the liquid ammonia. Then the oil is safely returned to the compressor.

Abstract: A commercially available four-wheel-drive loader has a conventional "quick-attachment" front plate liftable by operator-controllable hydraulic-cylinder means; and it has the transplant digging machine easily detachably mounted on said front plate for movement between rows of trees, etc., to a position laterally opposite one selected for transplanting (or root pruning). The transplant digging machine has a U-shaped undercutting blade mounted for downwardly swinging ground-penetrating movement and then horizontal root-cutting movement, by separate sequentially operable hydraulic cylinders. The first cylinder swings a slide-in-guide carrier for the blade through an arc from a downward inclination to a horizontal orientation. The second cylinder is in the carrier, and is operated to force the blade horizontally under the root "ball" being cut.

Abstract: A miniature device for sensing overheating of bearings has a small flat-bottomed circular cup (e.g. fifteen millimeters in diameter) and has an integrally connected co-axial heat-conducting rod extending downwardly from its lower surface for good heat-exchange insertion into a bore made for it in a bearing element. The rod is preferably threaded to improve both its anchorability and its heat-exchange value. A bimetallic snap-disc thermostat lies in and on the bottom of the cup. A small inverted cup of electrically insulating hard plastic has a beaded lip embraced by the crimped rim of the metallic cup to form a housing for a normally closed switch whose spring-arm contact elements are fixed to the inverted plastic cup. An insulating disc closes the bottom of the inverted cup, forms a shallow retaining chamber for the snap-disc, and is centrally axially bored to serve as a guide for an insulating pin by which the thermostat disc operates the switch.

Abstract: Porosity or other types of small leaks in metallic vessels designed to hold fluids under pressure or partial vacuum are repaired by: (1) sealing the chamber of the vessel, (2) introducing (preferably inert) gas at high pressure into the chamber, (3) immersing the vessel in a liquid (water) bath to locate and mark the leak(s), (4) mechanically cleaning the leak areas(s) while the gas pressure is maintained, (5) releasing the gas pressure and drawing a high partial vacuum in the chamber, (6) applying solvent to the leak area(s) to be suction-drawn through, and to clean, the leak(s), (7) while maintaining the partial vacuum, applying a liquid epoxy cement filled with a powdered metal compatible with that of the vessel, and (8) promptly heating the repaired area(s) to a moderate temperature and then releasing the vacuum. The repair will set in a few minutes and cure in several hours. The repair area(s) can be lightly abrasion-cleaned to remove any excess cement.

Abstract: A credit-card-size clear-plastic-encased device which can be worn or carried by a person to warn him of the momentary presence of dangerous intensitives of ultra-violet and/or X-ray radiations. A base lamina (e.g. of cardboard) is coated with a material (e.g. zinc-cadmium sulfide or lead-barium sulfate) which fluoresces under such radiations. Numerals, letters, words or symbols are printed over the fluorescent coat with a material inhibitory to said radiations so that a warning message in dark print will appear on a light background when dangerous intensities of said radiations are present. An X-ray-warning area is covered with an ultra-violet absorbing screen so that said area will glow only under X-rays (which rays will also activate the remaining ultra-violet-responsive area). The colors of the laminas and the coats are so selected that the messages are not visible when dangerous radiations are not present.

Abstract: Two telescopically mated tubes carry on their opposite ends laterally extending flanges for engaging the inner faces of opposite panels of rectangular fiberboard ducts to brace them against sagging and/or buldging caused by air-pressure-difference and/or gravitational forces. The inner tube has a series of notches or apertures formed therein and the outer tube has a tongue or pin engageable with a selected notch or aperture to lock the tubes in length-adjusted relative positions. Optionally, the opposite tube ends can have a bendable tongue or a barbed pin for penetrating through the fiberboard wall. The tongue can be bent over the outer face of the duct panel to brace the panel against outward buldging. The barbed pin can receive a pressed-on resilient nut for the same purpose. The tubes can be economically formed from sheet-metal strips bent to define, in cross-section, nearly closed triangles or nested U's.

Abstract: A coin-controlled dispenser for heated cans of food or beverage has separate heat-insulated chutes for holding cans of different commodities. Each chute is divided by a heat-barrier into an upper unheated storage section and a lower can-heating section. Coin-controlled apparatus of known construction releases the lowermost one of several cans from the lower heating section and substantially simultaneously releases the lowermost can from the upper unheated storage section to maintain in the heating section only the number of cans desired to be therein in anticipation of daily sales, whereby the quality of the heated commodities will be protected against quality-lowering prolonged heating.

Abstract: A toggle-bolt-like blind-end connector fastens sheet-metal panels to fiber-board ducts by passing through pre-bored holes in the metal panel and punching its own hole in the fiber-board by a sharply pointed conical head mounted on a barbed-ring shaft. An expandable spider is fixed at the base of the head and is held collapsed against the shaft by a short sleeve. The sleeve has an end flange to limit its following the head and spider through the hole punched in the fiber-board, thus allowing the spider to expand inside the duct, after which expansion the shaft is pulled outwardly to press the expanded spider against the inner surface of the fiber-board. Next a resilient-material nut having shaft-gripping barbed-rings in its bore is pushed onto the exposed end of the shaft to engage the sheet-metal panel. The barbed-rings on the shaft facilitate breaking-off the unneeded end of the shaft.

Abstract: A lazy-tongs device is formed of length-adjustably snap-connected colorless transparent or translucent plastic elements sufficiently small so as not to interfere with the folding of the drapes and so as to be substantially concealed behind the traverse rod when the controlled drapes are fully unfolded. In one disclosed species, large plastic trim rings also substantially conceal the low-visibility lazy-tong elements when the drapes are folded. In a second species the drapery supports hold the top of the drapes close to the traverse rod for substantial concealment of the lazy-tongs when fully closed.

Abstract: A two-wheeled trailer has a V-shaped hay-bale-holding cradle pivoted about an axis closely above and parallel to the wheel axle. In its bale-loading position, parallel arms of the cradle extend rearwardly from the trailer and close to the ground for sliding under a large cylindrical bale when the trailer is backed-up by a tractor. The then-upright part of the cradle is tiltable forwardly and downwardly into its upright-V bale-carrying position in which it is automatically latched. The trailer is hitch-connected to a tractor by a tow-bar which is longitudinally extendably attached to the trailer chassis. A cable connects the cradle to the front end of the tow bar so that an extending pull thereon (when the wheel brakes are set) causes the cradle to tilt to its latched bale-carrying position. A latch normally holds the tow bar in its slightly extended hauling position.

Abstract: A platform-shaped device is designed to be placed over the illuminating aperture of a color-controllable light-box of known construction, and under a camera which is loaded with a roll of color film of slide-forming size and character, and which is focused on the central area of the platform. The device has at opposite sides a reel for holding, guidedly feeding and receiving a roll of developed black-and-white negatives previously made from the usually much larger black-and-white art work. The device also has means (e.g. a geneva-movement mechanism) for accurately sequentially positioning in the camera field, each one of a series of frames to be converted to color-slide frames in the camera. A pair of laterally movable thin blackened masking plates are manually movable in guides to expose different laterally constricted areas of the negative for each color to be projected therethrough from the light-box.