How long does it take, for a jet engine patent to expire?

[Alexandre Julião]

Having worked my whole life in the toy industry, I know for a fact that patents on this type of product expire after 20 years. I found out by asking online, that the same period of time goes for gun patents.

So, for example, if an industry capable of doing it, decided to produce a clone of the General Electric F404 or the F414, could it do so legally? Both engines are well over 20 years old. So, if the same period of time is valid for this type of product, then cloning them without being sued would be possible.

Maybe that's a silly question I know... But I'm curious about it.

 

[F119Doctor]

Data rights for US military engines developed using USG funds are owned by the government. They had P&W build F404 engines for a short while as “competition” for GE. The only part that that the data was not provided for was the 7th stage compressor blade, which P&W had to reverse engineer since it was proprietary GE data. Interestingly, the GE 7th blades had a fatigue failure mode that the P&W blades were immune to.

Patents are a different story, but most engines designs themselves are not patentable.

 

[Alexandre Julião]

Data rights for US military engines developed using USG funds are owned by the government. They had P&W build F404 engines for a short while as “competition” for GE. The only part that that the data was not provided for was the 7th stage compressor blade, which P&W had to reverse engineer since it was proprietary GE data. Interestingly, the GE 7th blades had a fatigue failure mode that the P&W blades were immune to.

Patents are a different story, but most engines designs themselves are not patentable.

Thanks! This is very interesting. I had no idea about this.

 

[F119Doctor]

There are are patents on unique engine configurations, with P&W having patents on certain aspects of the commercial geared turbofan engine. There are patented components, such as turbine blade cooling configurations, blade tip treatments, outer air seal designs, etc.

 

[Nicknick]

If there is no revoulutionary engine concept, the patents will "only" affect detail solutions which might be new. Sometimes companies try to potect a design by simply trying to patent every little detail, but in most cases, thoses patent will be invalid if they are validated at a court.

The patent rights very a lot from country to country, in the US you can get patents on details like "round edges on smarthones" which would't work in Germany. Here, the protecting rights for styling features and technical innovations are strictly seperated.