NH Inventor Testing New Fastener Tech

Inventor Dale E. Van Cor has partnered with a mechanical engineer in Massachusetts to test his patented nuts and bolts. The fastener technology, he said, results in fasteners that are stronger and more durable than standard ones. He has designed five threaded connections, three of which have been patented. Engineers have been resistant to adopt Van Cor’s wave thread nuts and bolts, however, and testing is vital to moving his product to market, he said.

Mechanical engineer Harrison Frye of Lowell, Mass., has been testing the Van Cor-designed threaded connections using fasteners made from a 3-D printer. Frye pressure tested a wave threaded cap-and-tube connection that held 20 pounds of water pressure for one hour without using glue or gaskets.

According to Van Cor, “The wave thread is a total surface contact thread, a new genre in physical connections. The goal is to relegate O-rings to secondary seals using the wave threads inherent sealing capacity.” The advantages to the wave thread design is that there is total surface contact, which transmits vibration instead of absorbing it, and efficient heat conduction. They are also less prone to erosion because of the complete seal.Frye said the best applications for this innovation would be in the construction of airplanes or space shuttles, machines.“The reason being is that these threads are much stronger than traditional threads because they are fully contacting,” Frye said.