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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election without traverse of Group I (claims 13-17) in the reply filed on 03/19/2026 is acknowledged.
Claim Objections
Claim 17 is objected to because of the following informalities: the claim recites “thea” instead of “the” on line 12 of claim 17 and “is acid” in line 2nd form the bottom instead of “in acid”. Appropriate correction is required.
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(s) 13-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over Zhao et al. (CN 112011817 A, machine translation) in view of Antropov et al. (SU 1024532 A1, translation provided with IDS) and Tanno et al. (JP S5481129 A, translation provided with IDS).
Considering claims 13-16, Zhao discloses a method of production of a coated steel substrate comprising the following steps: providing a steel substrate (abstract); electroplating the steel substrate with an electroplating solution having a pH of from 3.3 to 3.7, which overlaps the claimed range of form 2 to 6 (abstract) and containing 250 g/l of NiSO4 (page 2, 2nd paragraph from bottom), which is within the claimed range of 100g/l to 500g/l and 10 g/l of MoS2 (page 2, 2nd paragraph from bottom), which is within the claimed range of 1g/l to 15g/l by applying a current density from 4 A/dm2 for 30-40 minutes to generate a layer of Ni-MoS2 coating (page 2, step 3).
Zhao does not disclose applying a current density from 15 A/dm2 to 45 A/dm2 during 30 seconds to 300 seconds; rinsing the electroplated steel substrate; and drying the electroplated steel substrate to obtain a coated steel substrate.
However, Antropov teaches current density of 1-50 A/dm2 in a similar plating formulation (page 3, last paragraph).
Zhao and Antropov are silent about the deposition time.
However, Tanno teaches that with current deposition of 5-20 A/dm2, the time of deposition is 0.5 to 5 minutes (30-300 seconds) ([0002] on page 3).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to use current density of 15 A/dm2 to 45 A/dm2 in the method of Zhao, because Zhao only provides one current density example, and Antropov teaches a wider range of 1-50 A/dm2 in a substantially similar plating formulation. Therefore, one would have been motivated to use a higher current density as taught by Antropov, in order to form the coating layer faster, with the deposition time of 0.5-5 minutes as taught by Tanno. Furthermore, the limitations of rinsing and drying the plated substrate are conventional in electroplating art, which are performed to remove electroplating salts and acidic conductions that could corrode the substrate.
Claim(s) 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over Zhao et al., Antropov et al. and Tanno et al., as applied to claim 13 above and further in view of Alibeigi (WO 2019122965 A) and Jo (KR 20190076109 A, machine translation).
Considering claim 17, Zhao is silent about processing of the steel substrate.
However, Alibeigi discloses the steel substrate submitted to the electroplating step is a cold rolled steel sheet obtained though the following steps: providing a semi-finished product of steel; reheating the semi-finished product to a temperature from 1000°C to 1280°C (page 8, lines 6-15); rolling the semi-finished product in the austenitic range with a hot rolling finishing temperature above 850°C to obtain a hot rolled steel sheet (page 8, lines 6-15); cooling the sheet at an average cooling rate above 30°C/s to a coiling temperature below 650°C and coiling the hot rolled steel sheet (page 8, lines 19-22); cooling the hot rolled steel sheet to room temperature (page 8, lines 23-27); optionally performing a scale removal step on the hot rolled steel sheet; optionally annealing the hot rolled steel sheet at a temperature from 400°C to 750°C (page 11, lines 8-13); optionally performing a further scale removal step on the hot rolled steel sheet (page 11, lines 8-13); cold rolling the hot rolled steel sheet with a reduction rate from 35 to 90% to obtain a cold rolled steel sheet (page 9, lines 6-9); then performing annealing by heating the cold rolled steel sheet at a rate heating rate greater than 2°C/s to a soaking temperature which is from Ac1 to Ac3 + 100°C where the cold rolled steel sheet is held for 10 seconds to 500 seconds (page 9, lines 17-27); then cooling the sheet at a rate greater than 5°C/s to a temperature below 550°C (page 9, lines 17-27), wherein during the cooling the cold rolled steel sheet can optionally be held a temperature ranges from 150°C to 500°C for a time from 10 to 1000 seconds, to obtain a cold-rolled steel substrate (page 9, lines 21-27).
Zhao and Alibeigi does not disclose acid pickling the cold rolled steel substrate is acid for 5 seconds to 100 seconds at a temperature range from 30°C to 100°.
However, Jo discloses pickling of a steel substrate at a temperature of 30°C for 10 seconds before plating (page 6, 3rd paragraph) in order to remove effectively removing oxide scales present on the metal surface (page 5, 6th paragrpah).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have the steel sheet of Alibeigi coated with the corrosion protection layer of Zhao in order to form a protective layer with excellent corrosion resistance on steel surface. Furthermore, it would have been obvious to subject the surface of steel of Alibeigi to pickling, because Jo discloses pickling of a steel substrate at a temperature of 30°C for 10 seconds before plating in order to remove surface oxides from the metal surface thus reducing surface defects formed during electroplating (page 2, 1st paragraph).
Conclusion
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/WOJCIECH HASKE/ Examiner, Art Unit 1794
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