Low-Viscosity Oil Bearing Patents: Top Companies & Trends 2026
- Concentration is modest at the top. the leader holds 44 records but the top 5 combined are only 22.0% of all 569 records in scope — most of the field sits in a long tail.
- Filing has cooled since its 2021 peak. activity ran 25 in 2017 to a peak of 26 in 2021, then eased toward a 2022 midpoint of 10, with the most recent year understated by publication lag.
- F16C dominates the class mix. 63.1% of records carry a shafts-and-bearings classification, while adjacent classes like gas turbines and earth drilling show the technology travels well beyond engines.
Filing growth compares 2021 (26 records) with 2024 (6) — a three-year span. 2024 is the most recent year we treat as complete: publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so 2025 onwards are still filling in and any growth rate that ends there would understate the field. Top-5 share is the combined record count of the five largest assignees divided by all 569 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
This landscape tracks patent activity where low-viscosity engine oil and journal bearing design intersect: minimum oil film thickness, mixed lubrication regimes, surface texturing, bearing material and overlay selection, start-stop wear, and oil aeration. The search spans 569 published records from 2015 through the 2026-07-31 cut-off, drawn from title/abstract and title/abstract-plus-claims fields.
The dataset is filing-side, not litigation-side: it shows where claim space is occupied and where it is thin, not which patents have been tested or enforced. Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the final year of any trend line always understates real activity.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 569 records: how filing volume has moved year over year, and how the underlying technology classes overlap.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filings opened the window at 25 in 2017, rose to a peak of 26 in 2021, then declined toward a 2022 midpoint of 10 — a flat-to-declining pattern once the understated final year is set aside.
IPC subclass composition
F16C (shafts, bearings & couplings) appears on 63.1% of the 569 records, far ahead of F16H gearing (11.2%) and F02C gas-turbine plants (9.8%). Records can carry more than one class, so shares add up past 100%; E21B earth/rock drilling at 8.6% and G11B storage at 3.0% mark the field's less obvious edges.
Shares are the percentage of the 569 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Low-Viscosity Oil and Bearing Design Interaction with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about low-viscosity oil and bearing design interaction and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaMost-cited records and a representative filing
US20180372585A1 — System and method for improved journal bearing operations
Filed by AI Alpine US Bidco Inc and published 2018-12-27, the application describes a wear-protocol method that derives start-stop wear and steady-state operating-hours wear for a test journal bearing system, then applies a physics-based model and transfer function to sensor-observed engine operation to determine actual bearing wear in the field.Abstract text is drawn directly from the published filing.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US4738322A | Polycrystalline diamond bearing system for a roller cone rock bit | 517 |
| 2 | US20100331139A1 | Epicyclic gear system with superfinished journal bearing | 425 |
| 3 | US4802539A | Polycrystalline diamond bearing system for a roller cone rock bit | 282 |
| 4 | US6068070A | Diamond enhanced bearing for earth-boring bit | 133 |
| 5 | US4007679A | Press and safety latch therefor | 122 |
| 6 | US4410284A | Composite floating element thrust bearing | 104 |
| 7 | US4765205A | Method of assembling drill bits and product assembled thereby | 99 |
| 8 | US6460635B1 | Load responsive hydrodynamic bearing | 95 |
| 9 | EP2270361A2 | Epicyclic gear system with load share reduction | 86 |
| 10 | US5685797A | Coated planet gear journal bearing and process of making same | 86 |
Citation counts favour older records simply because they have had more time to accumulate them — read them as a signal of influence within this corpus, not of current commercial weight.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three read-throughs from the concentration, class and citation data above.
Leadership without lock-up
The single leader holds 44 records, well ahead of tenth place at 14, yet the top 5 combined amount to only 22.0% of all 569 records in scope. That gap between a clear leader and a shallow top-5 share points to a field with room for new entrants rather than one sealed off by a handful of portfolios.
Activity has cooled from its peak
Filings climbed from 25 in 2017 to a peak of 26 in 2021, then eased to a 2022 midpoint of 10. Several previously active assignees show zero filings in the latest year, though the most recent year is always understated by publication lag before conclusions are drawn.
One class dominates, several ride alongside
F16C bearings and couplings anchors nearly two-thirds of records, but gas-turbine plants (9.8%), earth drilling (8.6%) and plastics shaping (3.5%) show the same lubrication and material problems recur across sectors far removed from automotive engines.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to low-viscosity oil and bearing design interaction, with the prior art for and against each one.
| Assignee | Co-assignee | Shared families |
|---|---|---|
| Mahle Engine Systems UK | Mahle International GmbH | 11 |
| Federal-Mogul Corporation | MALLOY CASSIE MARIE | 3 |
| Federal-Mogul Corporation | LIEN GERALD THOMAS | 3 |
| Federal-Mogul Corporation | AVULA RAMESH R | 3 |
| Federal-Mogul Corporation | Federal-Mogul Corporation | 2 |
| Delaware Capital Formation Inc | SWANN MICHAEL K | 2 |
| Delaware Capital Formation Inc | NEW NIGEL HENRY | 2 |
| Federal-Mogul Corporation | JAMES BENJAMIN B | 1 |
Co-assignee pairing in this dataset is thin — 8 pairs total, with the strongest link appearing 11 times between two related entities in one corporate family, suggesting most work here is filed independently rather than jointly.
Who is filing, and where the gaps sit
The ranking covers 100 companies; concentration is real at the very top but thins out fast, leaving several sub-areas with little dedicated claim coverage.
A clear but not dominant leader
The top-ranked assignee holds 44 records against a fifth-place figure of 17 and a tenth-place figure of 14 — a steep drop after the leader but a gentler slope from there, typical of a field with one long-established program and many smaller ones.
Multiple established filers have gone quiet
A number of assignees active earlier in the window show zero filings in the latest year, including some with historically large portfolios. That pattern is consistent with either program maturity or a shift of R&D investment elsewhere, and it opens room for newer entrants to stake claims uncontested.
US and Europe lead, UK is unusually strong
The United States receives the largest share of filings at 192, with Europe (EPO) at 105 and the United Kingdom at 81 — a UK concentration that stands out relative to most bearings-adjacent landscapes and likely reflects the presence of turbine and drilling-equipment manufacturers headquartered there.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Rolls-Royce plc | 0 | -100% |
| GLACIER METAL | 0 | — |
| General Electric Co | 0 | — |
| United Technologies Corp | 0 | — |
| Federal-Mogul Corporation | 0 | — |
| Seagate Technology LLC | 0 | — |
| Delaware Capital Formation Inc | 0 | — |
| Mahle Engine Systems UK | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to specific next steps depending on whether the goal is freedom-to-operate, portfolio strategy, or spotting an entry point.
Check freedom-to-operate against the most-cited records
The highest-cited documents in this set concern polycrystalline diamond bearing systems and superfinished journal bearings for gear systems — both are foundational and worth clearing before filing in adjacent overlay or coating claims.
Explore citation networkWatch for re-entry from quiet assignees
Several previously active filers show zero filings in the latest year. A renewed filing from any of them would be an early signal that the flat trend since 2021 is turning.
Track assignee activityTest claim language in the under-claimed branches
Surface texturing, overlay selection under start-stop cycling, and oil aeration sensing show thinner coverage than the core F16C bearing class — draft and search a first claim there before committing to a full application.
Open Eureka workspaceCommon questions on this landscape
One assignee leads the ranked list with 44 records, noticeably ahead of the fifth-place holder at 17 and the tenth-place holder at 14. However, the top 5 assignees combined account for only 22.0% of all 569 records in scope, so leadership at the top does not translate into control of the field overall. The ranking covers 100 companies, and most of them hold only a handful of filings each, indicating a long tail of smaller programs rather than a market locked up by a few large portfolios.
Filing activity was 25 records in 2017, rose to a peak of 26 in 2021, and had fallen to a midpoint of 10 by 2022, indicating a flat-to-declining trend over the period. Several assignees that were active earlier in the window show zero filings in the most recent year. That said, the very latest year in any patent dataset is understated because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so recent quarters should not be read as a hard stop.
F16C, covering shafts, bearings and couplings, appears on 63.1% of the 569 records in scope and is by far the largest single classification. Gearing and transmissions (F16H, 11.2%) and gas-turbine plants (F02C, 9.8%) follow well behind, with earth and rock drilling (E21B, 8.6%) and internal-combustion engines (F02B, 5.1%) rounding out the mid tier. Because a single record can carry multiple IPC classes, these shares add up to more than 100% of the record total and should be read as overlapping technology footprints rather than a strict breakdown.
Relative to the dense core of F16C bearing claims, several adjacent branches show thinner dedicated coverage, including surface texturing specifically for mixed-lubrication regimes, overlay material selection under start-stop wear cycling, and oil aeration sensing at low-speed/high-load conditions. These are technically specific enough to support a defensible first claim rather than a broad, easily-designed-around one. Confirming white space requires a targeted novelty search against the most-cited foundational patents before committing to drafting.
US20180372585A1, filed by AI Alpine US Bidco Inc and published 2018-12-27, describes a method for deriving journal bearing wear from start-stop and steady-state operating-hours data using a physics-based model and sensor observation of engine operation. It is a representative example of the shift from purely physical bearing and overlay claims toward diagnostic and predictive-modeling claims layered on top of conventional bearing hardware. Anyone filing wear-prediction or condition-monitoring claims for journal bearings in start-stop duty cycles should review it as part of freedom-to-operate work.
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Disclaimer. This page is generated from Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent and scientific-literature records, and is provided for general information and reference only.
Patent data carries inherent limitations: recent filings (typically the most recent 18–24 months) are under-counted due to standard publication lag; counts may be reported at either a patent-family or a patent-record basis and are not always directly comparable; classification, applicant-name, and citation data may contain errors, duplicates, or omissions; and the underlying search query defines and constrains the scope shown. As a result, the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing on this page constitutes an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate, or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial, investment, or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Any patent, commercial, or strategic decision should be verified independently and reviewed with qualified patent, legal, and domain professionals. Patsnap makes no warranties, express or implied, as to the accuracy, completeness, or fitness for any particular purpose of the information presented.
Machine translation. Assignee and organisation names originally recorded in Chinese, Japanese or Korean have been rendered into English by an AI translation step so that the tables stay readable. These renderings are best-effort and may not match a company’s registered English name; the original name is what the underlying patent record carries, and it is what any Eureka query launched from this page uses.