Can you tell the age of something with a patent number?

Answer 1

A patent number will not identify the object but only some feature that was new and different enough for a company to get exclusive rights to use it after obtaining a patent. Patent numbers are issued chronologically and you can easily determine the EARLIEST year something could have been manufactured using that patent number. The uspto.gov website has lists and databases to help with that, or similar lists for patents issued in other countries. A patented invention may have been used on several models by that company and it could have sold the right to use this feature to other companies, so the same number could be on hundreds of thousands of items manufactured after the patent was issued. Many companies are still using patents issued in the 1890's on items made today. Of all the things marked on an item, the patent number is probably the least useful to identify the model or manufacturer. Now, if it were a SERIAL number and you can tell us what manufacturer's name and model number are on the item, someone may be able to give you a year of manufacture.