DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Status
This Office action is in response to the amendments filed 6/15/2026. Claims 21-23, 26, 28-29, 31, and 33 are currently pending. Claims 21 and 33 have been amended. The cancelation of claim 34 is acknowledged. Claims 1-20, 24-25, 27, 30, and 32 have been previously canceled.
Specification
The amendment filed 10/28/2024 is objected to under 35 U.S.C. 132(a) because it introduces new matter into the disclosure. 35 U.S.C. 132(a) states that no amendment shall introduce new matter into the disclosure of the invention. The added material which is not supported by the original disclosure is as follows: On pg. 2, “a carton is moved by an inbound conveyor 41 over the cavity 40 and beneath the plunger and the plunger is allowed to drop” comprises new matter.
Applicant is required to cancel the new matter in the reply to this Office Action.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 21-23, 28-29, 31, and 33-34 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Moen (US 4661091) in view of Pohle (US 2120679).
Regarding claim 21, Moen discloses a forming machine (Fig. 1) for erecting a packaging article, the machine comprising a female cavity (50 – Fig. 7) and a plunger (48 – Fig. 7) which moves up and down in a generally vertical cycle and which can push a packaging article down into the cavity when moving down (col. 5, line 64 – col. 6, line 2).
However, Moen does not disclose that the plunger is driven to move up and is allowed to drop under its own weight.
Pohle teaches a machine comprising a plunger (132 – Fig. 3) which moves up and down in a generally vertical cycle, in which the plunger is driven to move up and is allowed to drop under its own weight (pg. 2, col. 2, lines 29-53), in which the machine comprises a cam shaft (98 – Fig. 1) with a cam (105 – Fig. 1) for pushing the plunger up (pg. 2, col. 2, lines 34-38), and a cam follower (113 – Fig. 1) is provided which rolls on top of the cam profile and which is coupled to the plunger (pg. 2, col. 1, lines 15-16; pg. 2, col. 2, lines 34-35; and see Figs. 1 and 3), the cam profile is generally elliptical in shape (in Fig. 1 in can be seen that 105 has a generally elliptical profile), is substantially symmetrical (note that the phrase “substantially symmetrical” does not require the cam profile to be symmetrical, since the cam profile is mostly symmetrical with respect to the midline, the cam profile is interpreted to be substantially symmetrical about the midline) along a midline (see annotated Fig. 1 below), and defines at the midline a straight edge (see annotated Fig. 1 below) opposite a first curved edge (see annotated Fig. 1 below) and positioned directly between a second curved edge (see annotated Fig. 1 below) and a third curved edge (see annotated Fig. 1 below), wherein the second curved edge and the third curved edge curve away from the straight edge in a direction towards the first curved edge (see annotated Fig. 1 below), and in which the plunger is not directly connected to a mechanical drive (the plunger is not directly connected to 91 – Fig. 1), whereby the plunger is not driven in the down direction when forming an article (pg. 2, col. 2, lines 29-53). One of ordinary skill in the art, upon reading the teaching of Pohle, would have recognized that the plunger actuating mechanism of Pohle is analogous to the mechanism that actuates the plunger of Moen and is capable of being used to actuate the plunger of Moen without altering the intended function of Moen.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of applicant’s claimed invention, to have substituted the plunger driving mechanism of Moen for the plunger actuating mechanism of Pohle, thereby resulting in a forming machine in which the plunger is driven to move up and is allowed to drop under its own weight since the plunger actuating mechanism of Pohle is a well-known mechanism in the art for actuating a plunger and one of ordinary skill in the art would have the skill to substitute known equivalents.
Annotated Fig. 1
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Moen, as modified by Pohle, further teaches:
Claim 22, the plunger (132 – Fig. 3, Pohle) comprises a plunger arm (165 – Fig. 1a, Pohle; note that this rejection is based on an interpretation of Pohle in which the plunger includes 165) and the cam follower (113 – Fig. 1, Pohle) is coupled to the plunger arm (via 109, 111, Pohle).
Claim 23, the plunger arm (165 – Fig. 1a, Pohle) pivots up and down (pg. 2, col. 2, lines 38-41 in view of Fig. 1a, Pohle).
Claim 28, an inbound conveyor (col. 6, lines 23-36, Moen).
Claim 29, an outbound conveyor (42 – Fig. 1, Moen).
Claim 31, said cam follower (113 – Fig. 1, Pohle) is continuously engaged with said cam (105 – Fig. 1, Pohle) over the while of said generally vertical cycle of the plunger (132 – Fig. 3; pg. 2, lines 15-16 and 29-41, Pohle).
Claim 33, the same limitations as those above are met in the manner set forth above with Moen further disclosing a carton hopper (44 – Fig. 1).
Claim 26 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Moen (US 4661091) in view of Pohle (US 2120679) and Yamamoto (JP 11342500 A). Note that for convenience, citations to Yamamoto refer to the attached translation.
Moen, as modified by Pohle, teaches essentially all of the elements of the claimed invention in claim 21.
However, Moen and Pohle do not teach that the camshaft is a balanced camshaft.
Yamamoto teaches a machine comprising a plunger (4 – Fig. 1) a non-circular eccentric cam (8 – Fig. 1), wherein the non-circular eccentric cam is mounted on a balanced camshaft (5 – Fig. 2) in order to reduce vibrations of the machine (abstract).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of applicant’s claimed invention, to have modified the camshaft of Moen and Pohle to be a balanced camshaft as taught by Yamamoto in order to reduce vibrations of the machine.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 5/12/2025 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Regarding the objection to the specification, applicant argues that the specification as originally filed supports the added “a carton is moved by an inbound conveyor 41 over the cavity and beneath the plunger and the plunger is allowed to drop” since para. 0003 recites that a female cavity and a plunger that that moves up and down to push a package into the female cavity. Accordingly, it follows that to push the package down into the cavity, the plunger must be above the cavity. As such, the conveyor must inherently move the package over the cavity and beneath the plunger.
In response it is noted that a simple disclosure of a plunger pushing a packaging into a cavity does not necessarily mean that the conveyor moves the package over the cavity. The objected to new matter recites that the inbound conveyor moves a carton over the cavity and beneath the plunger. Nowhere does the written description expressly disclose this or do the drawings show this. Note that the conveyor is indicated in Fig. 3 of the drawings as element 41, but the number associated with the conveyor simply points to a piece of the machine whose structure cannot be clearly seen and it is not clear how this structure extends to the cavity. There may be other ways to deliver the package to a cavity besides the conveyor such as another conveyor, a slide, or a gripper system. Therefore, applicant’s argument is found to be not persuasive.
Regarding claim 21, applicant argues that the previously indicated “generally flat portion” which now is indicated as the “straight edge” cannot correspond to the claimed “straight edge” because the edges on either side of the indicated straight edge in Pohle curve away from the curved edge opposite the straight edge.
However, although the indicated second and third edges as set forth above in the rejection of claim 1 initially point away from the first curved edge, the first and second curved edges begin to curve at some point towards the first curved edge as they must necessarily do to connect with the first curved edge. Hence, the second and third curved edges curve towards the first curved edge. Therefore, applicant’s argument is found to be not persuasive.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to THOMAS M WITTENSCHLAEGER whose telephone number is (571)272-7012. The examiner can normally be reached MON-FRI: 9:00-5:00.
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/THOMAS M WITTENSCHLAEGER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3731
6/30/2026
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