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
Claims 1-7, 12-19 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected invention, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 07/28/2026.
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) 8-11 and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yamanaka et al. (JP2013151734A) in view of Takeda et al. (US20200325554A1) in further view of Choi ("Improved surface morphology and corrosion resistance for galvannealed coatings by pre-electroplating iron." Corrosion science 58 (2012): 152-158.)
Regarding Claims 8-9, Yamanaka teaches a Fe-based electroplated steel sheet which may be used for automobiles [0001] comprising a coating amount of 10-70 g/m2 [0008] (greater than the claimed range of 1 g/m2 or more);
The electroplated layer contains Fe in a range of 2-10% and a transition metal such as one or more of Co, Ni, Mo, and W in a range of 0.1-5% [0080] overlapping with the claimed range of 100-10000 ppm (0.01-1% wt);
Yamanaka is silent regarding whether the base steel contained 0.5-3% wt Si, however, Takeda teaches a method of forming a high strength steel product for automobiles [0002], where the base steel may have an electroplating layer [0148] and where the base metal may comprise Si in a range of 0.10-2.5% Si for the purpose of enhancing steel sheet strength [0082]; therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art seeking to form steel automotive parts and giving the steel corrosion resistance by plating would have been motivated to ensure the base steel has Si in the claimed range for the purpose of forming an automobile part with high mechanical strength.
The prior art is silent regarding the average grain size being 1 micron or less, however, Choi teaches that steel may be electroplated before reduction annealing to improve surface quality and corrosion resistance (abstract) and serves to refine grains to less than 10 microns (See Fig 1b) where reduction annealing was performed for 1 minute at 800 C in a reducing atmosphere (Section 2, Page 153). Therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to perform reducing heat treatment similar to the treatment performed by applicant in [0104] to refining grains of the electroplated layer in the claimed range for the purpose of improving surface quality and corrosion resistance of the electroplated steel of Yamanaka.
Regarding Claim 10, Takeda teaches spot welding (a type of resistance welding) may be used to join body and or automobile components such as hot-dip galvannealed steel sheets and galvannealed steel sheets [0003, 0062], therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to resistance weld the product of Yamanaka with a hot dip galvanized structural member for the purpose of assembling automobile steel components such as for a frame.
Regarding Claims 11 and 20, Choi teaches the automotive steel sheet may comprise a hot dip galvanized steel product made by subjecting the electroplated steel that has been annealed into a hot dip bath (See Section 2, Page 153)
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/RICARDO D MORALES/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1738
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