Local businessman and self-proclaimed inventor Isaac Boatwright is hoping that years of hard work will pay off in a patent for his invention - the Power Visor. Boatwright recently submitted paperwork on the Power Visor to the United States Patents Office and is expecting a patent pending number in the next two months.

            "I have gone through the process of having my invention researched, and I have submitted everything," he said. "Now, I just have to wait."

            The Power Visor is a car visor which reacts automatically to sunlight in the driver's face.

            "When the visor detects direct sunlight, it will automatically come down and adjust itself to the sun," Boatwright said. "It can also be controlled from the steering wheel as well. Any car manufactured from 1995 forward can use the Power Visor."

            It has been a long journey for Boatwright building a successful mobile car detailing company along the way. His car detail business has been the source of funding for his invention.

            "I came to Statesboro from Savannah in 1999 as a single parent with four children," he said. "The ages of my children at the time were, three, five, six, and sixteen. The only thing I knew how to do was to go to work, so I stopped on College Street and knocked on Mr. Carlton Wiggins office door, and asked him if I could wash his car. He hired me to do that, and I am still washing his car today."

            The name of Boatwright's business is the Auto Salon Mobile Car Wash. Boatwright said he has customers in Statesboro, Richmond Hill, Pooler, and Metter.

            "We can detail as many as 20 cars in a day, but we usually average less than ten," he said. "It just depends. I have as many as three people that work with me, and we work Monday through Saturday."

            Local accountant Carlton Wiggins said Boatwright has been coming around to wash his car every two weeks or so the last several years.

            "Isaac has been very dependable, and is a hard worker," Wiggins said. "I really don't know him that well personally, but I do know that he is always dreaming about a better way to do things."

            Boatwright said it is his nature to try and improve things.

            "I was a school bus driver in Savannah, and I knew of some children that had been run over by cars because drivers, blinded by the sun, hadn't seen them," he said. "It just seemed like to me that car visors should come down automatically when the sun hits them, then people would not have to reach up and do it."

            "A lot of things in automobiles have automatic such as windows, locks, and stereo systems. I just seemed like to me that visors should be automated as well because they are so important."

            Boatwright said once he receives his patent pending number, it will be another two and a half years before the patent would be issued.

            "It's been a long process, but I am very excited about where things are now," he said. "I am looking for investors so that we can manufacture a real nice prototype of the Power Visor. I want people to know that the Power Visor can be used with cars that are over ten years old, back to 1995 models."

            "I have other inventions, but this is the first one that I have gotten this far with."