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 § 102
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 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(s) 1 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Lee (WO 2019146957). Lee discloses a steering apparatus (1) for an industrial vehicle (100) including a hydraulic pump (2) discharging hydraulic oil and a steering cylinder (120) operated by the hydraulic oil supplied thereto to steer a steered wheel (see Par. 0050 and 0025), the steering apparatus for the industrial vehicle comprising:
a manual steering circuit (4) which includes a first valve (43) opened or closed according to an operation of a steering wheel (see Par. 0066 and 0068) and supplies the hydraulic oil discharged from the hydraulic pump to the steering cylinder through the first valve (see Par. 0066 and 0068 and figures 3 and 10);
an automatic steering circuit (5) which includes a second valve (57) opened or closed according to a calculation result of automatic operation control (130, see Par. 0094) and supplies the hydraulic oil discharged from the hydraulic pump to the steering cylinder through the second valve (see figure 11, Par. 0094 and 0096); and
a branching valve (3,31,32) which is disposed between the hydraulic pump and the first and second valves (see figures 9-11) and branches the hydraulic oil to the manual steering circuit and the automatic steering circuit (see Par. 0029),
wherein the branching valve (3,31,32) is a priority valve (see Par. 0037 and 0038) which preferentially supplies the hydraulic oil to the manual steering circuit at a designed flow rate equal to or larger than a predetermined flow rate for operating the steering cylinder (see Par. 0108).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 7-10 are allowed.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance:
Regarding claim 7, the art of record did not include “a branching valve that supplies hydraulic oil to a manual steering circuit at a first flow rate and supplies hydraulic oil to an automatic steering circuit at a second flow rate which is an excess flow rate excluding the first flow rate in the hydraulic oil discharged from the hydraulic pump” in combination with what has been claimed in the rest of the body of claim 7.
Since the prior art Pedersen (US 20190241212) teaches a hydraulic system for an industrial vehicle that lacks said features, the prior art does not anticipate the claimed subject matter.
Furthermore, it would not have been obvious to a skilled artisan to have modified the prior art in order to arrive at the claimed invention without resorting to impermissible hindsight.
Any comments considered necessary by applicant must be submitted no later than the payment of the issue fee and, to avoid processing delays, should preferably accompany the issue fee. Such submissions should be clearly labeled “Comments on Statement of Reasons for Allowance.”
Claims 2-6 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.
Regarding claim 2, the prior art of record did not include “unloading means for decreasing a pressure of the hydraulic oil supplied from the hydraulic pump and applied to the second valve compared to a case in which a predetermined automatic steering non-operation condition for suspending the supply of the hydraulic oil through the second valve is not satisfied, when the automatic steering non-operation condition is satisfied”.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Marlon A Arce whose telephone number is (571)272-1341. The examiner can normally be reached 8AM - 4:30PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Valentin Neacsu can be reached at 571-272-6265. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MARLON A ARCE/Examiner, Art Unit 3611 /VALENTIN NEACSU/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3611