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 .
Drawings
Figure 1 should be designated by a legend such as --Prior Art-- because only that which is old is illustrated. See MPEP § 608.02(g). Corrected drawings in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d) are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. The replacement sheet(s) should be labeled “Replacement Sheet” in the page header (as per 37 CFR 1.84(c)) so as not to obstruct any portion of the drawing figures. If the changes are not accepted by the examiner, the applicant will be notified and informed of any required corrective action in the next Office action. The objection to the drawings will not be held in abeyance.
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 7-9 is 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.
Claim 7 recites the limitation "the body portion" in line 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. Claim 3, however, does mention this “body portion” as a component of the cooling member originally recited in claim 1. For the sake of this Office Action and compact prosecution, claim 6, the claim upon which claim 7 depends, will be examined as if it is dependent upon claim 3. Claims 8 and 9 are rejected due to their dependency on claim 7.
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 –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) by Omura (US 2021/0296721 A1). Omura discloses a battery module with a pack case [0053] comprised of a plurality of batteries with a busbar (Fig. 2, 40) that electrically connects them (abstract). A cooling plate (Fig. 2, 50) that is proximate to the busbar is located underneath the battery module as seen in the figure below.
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Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claim 10 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Omura as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Yamanaka (US 2020/0207220 A1). Omura fails to teach the usage of their battery pack in a device. Yamanaka is analogous art to Omura because both discuss batteries in their disclosure. Yamanaka discloses a power unit of an electric vehicle that may be connected to a battery (abstract). Omura’s battery pack is suitable for use in most electric devices, including Yamanaka’s electric vehicle. Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to use Omura’s battery in Yamanaka’s electric vehicle because Omura’s battery is suitable to use in the vehicle. See MPEP 2144.07.
Claims 1 and 2 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Song (KR 20180060388 A) and further in view of Jiang (US 2009/0159354 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Song discloses a battery pack (Fig. 4, 38) comprising a pack case (Song’s upper and lower housing, 32 and 34), a cooling member provided underneath the pack case (Fig. 4, 36), and a battery (Fig. 4, 38). Song, however, fails to teach a battery with a plurality of battery modules in the pack case. Jiang is analogous art to song because both discuss batteries in their disclosures. Jiang teaches a battery pack comprised of a plurality of battery cells (Jiang; abstract). Jiang’s battery pack comprised of a plurality of battery cells is suitable for use in Song’s disclosure, especially since Song’s device uses multiple busbars (Song; Fig. 4, 20a, 20b, 20c, and 20d) that can help connect the different battery cells within the plurality of cells. Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to use Jiang’s battery pack in Song’s device because Jiang’s pack is suitable for use in Song’s disclosure. See MPEP 2144.07.
Based on the original orientation of Song’s Fig. 4, it is not immediately apparent that the cooling member is under the pack case. However, if one were to orient modified Song’s device such that a portion of the cooling plate is below the pack case, one could reasonably interpret the cooling plate being beneath the pack case. The reorientation of a device without a change in function is an obvious modification. See MPEP 2144.04 (VI) (C).
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Regarding claim 2, the pack case is further separated into an upper pack case (Fig. 4, 34) and a lower pack case (Fig. 4, 32). The Examiner understands that Song’s disclosure refers to upper pack case and lower pack case as the lower housing and upper housing, respectively. This ground of rejection, however, requires that the naming be inverted. The lower pack case comprises the upper housing as well as the busbar housing component depicted in Song’s Fig. 2 that is immediately below. Therefore, the lower pack case also comprises a first slit (Fig. 2, 14) where in the busbar extends through the first slit.
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Claims 3-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Song and Jiang as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Okada (US 2009/0142628 A1). The combination of all these references will be referred to as modified Song.
Regarding claims 3 and 5, Song, modified by Jiang, teaches a cooling member that comprises a body portion (the heat sink plate that is present in Song’s Fig. 4, element 36). Song and Jiang, however, fail to teach the usage of a cooling pipe inside of the body portion. Okada is analogous art to Song and Jiang because all of their disclosures involve batteries. Okada teaches a cooling plate that has a cooling pipe inside of it through which coolant flows [0027]. A cooling pipe inside of such a cooling plate would reasonably be described as “buried” within the plate (as required by claim 5). One of ordinary skill in the art would expect that including a cooling pipe inside of the heat sink plate would improve the overall cooling effect of the plate with a reasonable expectation of success. Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to include Okada’s cooling pipe inside of modified Song’s heat sink plate to improve the device’s cooling with a reasonable expectation of success. See MPEP 2143 (I) (A).
Regarding claim 4, the body portion comprises a second slit that the busbar extends through, as seen in Fig. 2 above.
Regarding claim 6, modified Song teaches busbars that comprise a horizontal portion and vertical portions formed at opposite edges of the horizontal portion. See the figure below:
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Claim 10 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Song and Jiang as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Yamanaka. Song fails to teach the usage of their battery pack in a device. Yamanaka is analogous art to Song because both discuss batteries in their disclosure. Yamanaka discloses a power unit of an electric vehicle that may be connected to a battery (abstract). It would be reasonable to one of ordinary skill in the art to use Song’s battery pack in Yamanaka’s electric vehicle with a reasonable expectation of success because it is source of energy. Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to use Song’s battery in Yamanaka’s electric vehicle with a reasonable expectation of success. See MPEP 2143 (I) (B).
Claims 7-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over modified Song as applied to claim 6 above, and further in view of Davis (US 4590397 A).
Regarding claim 7, modified Song fails to teach a horizontal portion of a busbar that is buried within the body portion of the cooling member. Davis is analogous art to modified song because both discuss electrical machines. Davis teaches an electric machine that comprises bus bars (abstract). Davis continues to teach that the bus bars are exposed to a cooling source “along substantially their entire length to enhance the operating efficiency of the machine” (column 2, lines 6-9). In order for this to occur, modified Song’s busbars would need to be greatly extended throughout the heat sink plate in a horizontal, buried manner. The busbars would still extend through the vertical slit, but would extend horizontally through the heat sink plate before it fully vertically extends from one side of the heat sink to the other. Furthermore, for the sake of a rejection of claim 7 over modified Song in view of Davis, the location/interpretation of the ”horizontal portion” needs to be changed. In claim 6, the horizontal portion is located near the bottom of the battery pack as seen above in the annotated figure. However, to account for the modification to modified Song based on the teachings of Davis, the required “horizontal portion” must be interpreted as the horizontal portion located near and within the cooling member.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to extend modified Song’s busbars horizontally throughout the heat sink plate such that most of the busbar’s length is exposed to a cooling source in order to enhance the operating efficiency of the battery pack.
Regarding claim 8, positioning the cooling pipe such that it is located lower than the buried horizontal and vertical portions of the busbar is an obvious design choice with respect to the arrangement of elements within the device. Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to position the cooling pipe lower than the buried portions of the busbar. See MPEP 2144.04 (VI) (C).
Regarding claim 9, the decision to integrally form the busbar, cooling pipe, and the body portion is an obvious modification absent evidence of unexpected results. See MPEP 2144.04 (VI) (B). Furthermore, the limitation of where these elements are “formed…by insert injection molding” is a product-by-process limitation. “[E]ven though product-by-process claims are limited by and defined by the process, determination of patentability is based on the product itself. The patentability of a product does not depend on its method of production. If the product in the product-by-process claim is the same as or obvious from a product of the prior art, the claim is unpatentable even though the prior product was made by a different process." In re Thorpe, 777 F.2d 695, 698, 227 USPQ 964, 966 (Fed. Cir. 1985). See MPEP 2113.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Shin (US 2019/0074557 A1) discloses a busbar that coupled to a cooling plate that cools the batteries.
Kuroda (US 2022/0059883 A1) discloses a sort of busbar that is directly coupled to a radiator which indirectly cools the batteries through the busbar.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RYAN K BLACKWELL-RUDASILL whose telephone number is (571)270-0563. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
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/R.B.R./Examiner, Art Unit 1722
/ANCA EOFF/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1722
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