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 Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1 and 7-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
In claim 1, line 21, applicant claims “an internal body”. There is a prior mention of “an internal body” (line 10) and it is unclear as to exactly how many “internal bod(ies)” the applicant is attempting to claim in that under 35 USC 112 each distinct feature/limitation is required to have an exact nomenclature and subsequent references to the same feature/limitation should be preceded by a “said” or “the”. The lack of clarity renders the claimed subject matter indefinite.
In claim 1, line 24, applicant claims “the internal body”. Because of the above lack of clarity as to how many “internal bod(ies)” are attempted to be claimed it is now unclear as to which is being referred and therein rendering the claimed subject matter vague.
Claims 7-11 are rejected based on their claim dependencies.
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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 1 and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over McLeod (USP 5,795,222) in view of Yamamoto (USP 4,572,063).
Regarding claims 1 and 12: McLeod discloses the general state of the art agricultural products cleaning machine (as seen in figures 1-7) comprising a grain transport and elevation system (column 9, lines 8 to 10) and operatively connected to a grain bin (as seen in figure 5, at 54 and 98) containing an agricultural product.
Also McLeod discloses the cleaning machine further employing an inferior centrifugal fan (as seen in figure 2, at 114),
a sieving system composed of three overlapping sieves (as seen in figure 2, at 84,86,88),
an extracting auger below the sieve system (as seen in figure 2, at 100),
a principle centrifugal superior fan (as seen in figure 2, at 92) positioned at the superior aspect of the sieving system (as seen in figure 2),
a separating decelerator (as seen in figure 2, generally 106) for air/impurities,
a conduit for impurities (as seen in figure 2, at 48),
a decelerator return air duct (as seen in figure 2, area of 104), an entry inlet (as seen in figure 2, at 74) for agricultural products,
an exit outlet (as seen in figure 2, at 94) for clean agricultural products; and,
a gravity discharge outlet (as seen in figure 2, area of 108) of the impurities separated by the decelerator.
Further, McLeod discloses the machine having an internal body (as seen in figure 5, area 80) that corresponds to a covering that contains the sieving system (as seen in figure 3, 5 and 6) but fails to show the device being entirely enclosed by a covering. However, Yamamoto discloses that it is well known in the agricultural products cleaning machine art to completely enclose in a covering all working components of the machine (as seen in figure 4A). Further, Yamamoto discloses that it is also known to employ an overlapping sieve system (as seen in figure 4B, at 70) as well as to have a secondary internal body (as seen in figure 4B, area of 89) to contain that sieve system. Therefore it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the device of McLeod with the teachings of Yamamoto in order to provide an agricultural products cleaning machine which could better contain the material being worked as well as protect that material from outside environmental impacts, absent any showing to the contrary.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 7-11 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ROBERT ERIC PEZZUTO whose telephone number is (703)756-1320. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 7am-3:30pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Joseph M. Rocca can be reached at 571-272-8971. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ROBERT E PEZZUTO/Examiner, Art Unit 3671