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 § 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.
Claims 1-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over
JP-08/169930 to Murayama et al. (Cited on IDS).
As to claims 1-6, Murayama discloses a adhesives for binding fiber bundles to housings or for electrical appliances (0001, structural adhesive) comprising a polyisocyanate component and a polyol component wherein the polyisocyanate component comprises 80/20 of a component (a) and (b) and 90/10 of (a)+(b) / (c) (0021-0022, Table) wherein component (a) is an NCO-terminated prepolymer derived from toluene diisocyanate and a macropolyols (0031-0033), component (b) is a carbodiimide-modified MDI (0036-0037, and component (c) is an NCO-terminated prepolymer derived from hexamethylene diisocyanate and 1,3-butanediol or 2-butyl-2-ethyl-1,3-propanediol (0040, 0042). Murayama discloses a polyol component comprising castor oil and 2-hydroxypropyl ethylene diamine (0062-0064).
Murayama further discloses wherein the polyol used to modify HDI is selected from polytetramethylene glycol, polypropylene glycol, or polybutylene adipate (0020) and has molecular weights that range from 60 to 5,000 (0020).
At the time of filing it would have been obvious to substitute the short chain diols used in the examples of Murayama with the high molecular weight polyether polyols when modifying HDI to arrive at an adhesive with the desired properties. The rationale is based on the fact that Murayama teaches the substitution as an alternative to the low molecular weight diols. It is noted that the use of patents as references is not limited to what the patentees describe as their own inventions or to the problems with which they are concerned. A reference may be relied upon for all that it would have reasonably suggested to one having ordinary skill in the art, including non-preferred embodiments (MPEP 2121(II)). Further, disclosed examples and preferred embodiments do not constitute a teaching away from a broader disclosure or non-preferred embodiments (MPEP 2123 (II)).
Conclusion
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/MICHAEL L LEONARD/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1763
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