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Have any autistic people on this forum created a product?

Larger companies are typically very patent savvy and will have their attorneys review new products for patentable ideas. Generally, when you work for a company, either as an employee or a contractor, they own the ideas you come up with, so the patents list you as an inventor but list the company as the owner.

Patents are expensive - like $10,000 - $50,000 to get a patent. The U.S. used to give you a year after you publish something to file a patent on it, but I think they're moving to follow international law and say that the first person to file a patent gets it. So you're really best off filing something before you make any part of it known publicly.

If you produce the designs and contract with a manufacturing company to build it, you usually get them to sign something that says that you own all rights to it. It would be good to have a lawyer on retainer to advise you before you disclose anything and to review any legal agreements.
I also know how to legally protect an idea for under $50, so there is no question as to the date you did it.
 
Bump stop mould:
bump stop.jpg


There are the parts of a mould that formed a suspension bumpstop for a NASCAR racecar.
I got drawings for the finished part on Monday, engineered the shrink allowances into those dimensions, wrote the tool paths and delivered it on Wednesday evening.
On Thursday, the final products were cast, then loaded onto an airplane to be installed for a Friday practice session. I'm not sure if the part had anything to do with the outcome, but it finished in first place on Sunday.

There was also an internal plug that formed the hollow in the bumper and the top collar that are not in this image.
 
I also know how to legally protect an idea for under $50, so there is no question as to the date you did it.

I hope this is read in the tone of a "brain dump" and not in an argument-voice. Consider it one of those times that I can't help but start spewing facts. I'm not a lawyer, but I have worked closely with a lot of patent attorneys in the past and absorbed quite a bit from them. I helped them study the technical details of a lot of patents, compare our patents to our competitor patents, reviewed patents that were offered to us for sale, looked at competitor products to determine if they were infringing our patents, and have over 100 patents myself. At one point, I was studying for the patent bar, but I decided that I loved engineering more.

I assume the $50 is to get it into a trade journal or something like that? Any publication will suffice as evidence that you invented something first, so long as "persons interested and ordinarily skilled in the subject matter or art, exercising reasonable diligence, can locate it.” (2128-“Printed Publications” as Prior Art).

However, a publication only establishes that you invented it and prevents others from patenting it. It does not get you a patent. Under the international standard, if you don't file a patent application before you publicly disclose something, you lose all rights to patent it - it becomes free for anyone to copy and use. In the U.S., there used to be a one-year grace period to file a patent application after publicly disclosing something. Now, I don't know what it is - I heard that the U.S. was going to adopt the international standard, but that was several years ago and I don't know where the U.S. stands now.

I believe the U.S. still lets you file a provisional application, in which you describe your idea and show the U.S. patent office that you were the first one to come up with it. After that, you have until some deadline (one year, I think) to file a real patent application based off the provisional. I wonder if the U.S. adopting international law changed this, too?

Anyway, the oversimplified version is that if you get a patent, you have the right to exclude others from implementing your idea, but you need lawyers and sometimes a court case to enforce that right. If you publish your idea, no one can patent it and anyone can do it. Trying to do both is a gray area.
 
No, I use an old copyright trick that involves a notary seal on the original documents and the postal service for post marks on the same documents.
That gives you two legal date stamps that cannot be denied.
The intention of showing it to the public isn't a part of the deal, because that could open it up to being taken from you.

I fully understand that after someone infringed on your original idea, it will require lawyers to help protect your own rights.
After that, the full patent process would be in order if you wanted to retain rights to it.

I'm not very well versed on international patent law, so I can't speak much for it.

I have dozens of ideas worthy of a patent, but at this stage of the game realize that it's not worth my effort to fund the process.

One of my biggies is a wheel washing method for airliners prior to mounting new tires on them.

The other is in effect a variable lift and duration valvetrain for reciprocating internal combustion engines that eliminates most of the monkey motion associated with them at this stage of the game.
 
No, I use an old copyright trick that involves a notary seal on the original documents and the postal service for post marks on the same documents.

That works for copyrightable material, but not for patents. For patents, if you “conceal, suppress, or abandon” the idea - that is, if you document it but then bury it and don’t do anything with it - you lose your right to patent it.
 
I have dozens of ideas worthy of a patent, but at this stage of the game realize that it's not worth my effort to fund the process.

I am all code, formulas, and theories on paper, and I have absolutely no experience or skill making anything mechanical or electronic. But I have some ideas for devices that anyone could have for free if they would just make me one.
 
That works for copyrightable material, but not for patents. For patents, if you “conceal, suppress, or abandon” the idea - that is, if you document it but then bury it and don’t do anything with it - you lose your right to patent it.
Ok, I guess I was misinformed.
 
Larger companies are typically very patent savvy and will have their attorneys review new products for patentable ideas. Generally, when you work for a company, either as an employee or a contractor, they own the ideas you come up with, so the patents list you as an inventor but list the company as the owner.

Patents are expensive - like $10,000 - $50,000 to get a patent. The U.S. used to give you a year after you publish something to file a patent on it, but I think they're moving to follow international law and say that the first person to file a patent gets it. So you're really best off filing something before you make any part of it known publicly.

If you produce the designs and contract with a manufacturing company to build it, you usually get them to sign something that says that you own all rights to it. It would be good to have a lawyer on retainer to advise you before you disclose anything and to review any legal agreements.

Very true. I have a cousin who invented a number of different things when he worked for Kennecott Copper as a metalurgist and later as plant manager, including a copper smelting process that is the gold standard today. He, of course, was very well paid for his job but Kennecott owns all the patents on his inventions.

My younger brother worked as an engineer for Toyota for a number of years and invented a couple of things for them. Toyota holds the patents, not him. He tells a funny story about his first week at work. He requested a piece of plexiglass from the machine shop for something he was working on but he failed to make the proper math conversion to the metric system. The machinist delivered his 6 inch piece of plexiglass to him, which was supposed to be about the size of a windshield, so he just pretended that everything was exactly what he needed. LOL. And he paid closer attention to metric conversions thereafter.
 
Custom CNC engraved logo aircraft wheel chocks from 2 1/2" 6061 T6 aluminum angle

IMG_1498.JPG
 
Size 8 CNC horseshoe fixture with two finished still resting on the sacrificial part of the fixture plate.
An aluminum top plate was necessary in order to not wreck the cutting edge by hitting the steel plate beneath it.

I'm not sure why this image was captured, but lack of the hold down bolts are indicating a possible stop mid setup to take a measurement.
size 8 horseshoes.JPG


Yellow: raw material after machining
Green: sacrificial under plate
Red: sacrificial plate hold down bolts
Purple: raw material hold down bolt locations
Blue: steel fixture base
 
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