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 Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Otsuki (US 2007/0250206).
Regarding claim 1, Otsuki teaches a controller (Fig. 8) for a laser machine (Fig. 3) including a nozzle (1), the controller comprising: a tool center path calculation unit that creates an offset vector (PA’ to PB’) for a machining program path (PA to PB) based on an analysis result of a machining program and calculates a tool center path, through which a center of the nozzle passes, based on the offset vector (abstract; para. 0063); a first inclination direction calculation unit that calculates an inclination direction of the nozzle with respect to the machining program path based on the analysis result of the machining program (abstract; para. 0011-0012; para. 0053); a tool posture calculation unit that calculates a posture of the nozzle based on the inclination direction of the nozzle calculated by the first inclination direction calculation unit and an inclination angle in the inclination direction of the nozzle from a direction perpendicular to a plane of a workpiece in a plane orthogonal to the machining program path (abstract; para. 0011-0012; para. 0033-0053); a drive axis stroke calculation unit that calculates a stroke of a drive axis based on the tool center path calculated by the tool center path calculation unit and the posture of the nozzle calculated by the tool posture calculation unit (para. 0011; 0117; 0127); and a drive axis control unit that controls the drive axis based on the stroke of the drive axis calculated by the drive axis stroke calculation unit (para. 0011; 0117; 0127).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-5 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: allowable subject matter is indicated for claims 2-5 because the prior art of record does not show or fairly suggest a controller for a laser machine comprising an inclination direction calculation switching unit that switches between calculation of the inclination direction of the nozzle with respect to the machining program path by the first inclination direction calculation unit and calculation of the inclination direction of the nozzle with respect to the tool center path by the second inclination direction calculation unit, depending on a shape of the machining program path as recited in claim 2.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure: US 2016/0306341, US 2003/0200005 and US 6,823,230.
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/ALBA T ROSARIO-APONTE/Examiner, Art Unit 3761 01/09/2026
/STEVEN W CRABB/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3761