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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 6 February 2026 has been entered.
Summary
The Amendment filed on 6 February 2026 has been acknowledged.
Claims 1 – 3, 6 – 9 and 12 – 13 are amended.
Claims 10 – 11 are cancelled.
Currently, claims 1 – 9 and 12 – 13 are pending and considered as set forth.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1 – 13 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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.
Claims 1 – 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Izumikawa (US 2017/0183845 A1) in view of Narikawa et al. (Hereinafter Narikawa) (US 2020/0141091 A1) and in further view of Arimatsu et al. (Hereinafter Arimatsu) (US 2016/0251834 A1).
As per claim 1, Izumikawa teaches limitations of:
a shovel (See at least abstract), comprising:
a lower traveling body (See at least abstract; A shovel includes a lower-part traveling body 1);
a swiveling actuator configured to rotate the upper swivel body (See at least figure 1);
an upper swiveling body mounted to the lower traveling body (See at least abstract; an upper-part swiveling body 3 installed in the lower-part traveling body so as to be rotatable relative to the lower-part traveling body);
an attachment including a boom attached to the upper swiveling body, an arm attached to an end of the boom, and an end attachment attached to an end of the arm (See at least abstract and paragraph 18; an attachment attached to the upper-part swiveling body … A boom 4 is attached to the upper-part swiveling body 3. An arm 5 is attached to a tip of the boom 4, and a bucket 6 as an end attachment is attached to a tip of the arm 5. The end attachment may be a bucket for slope of embankment, a dredge bucket, a breaker, or the like.); but does not teach limitations of:
a hardware processor configured to specify, from among a plurality of surfaces forming a predetermined construction surface, a first surface upon which an operation is to be performed by the shovel, based on a positional relationship between the end attachment and the predetermined construction surface; and
in response to specifying the first surface, cause the upper swiveling body to face the specified first surface by automatically operating the swiveling actuator and automatically stopping the swiveling actuator.
Narikawa teaches the limitations of:
a hardware processor configured to specify, from among a plurality of surfaces forming a predetermined construction surface, a first surface upon which an operation is to be performed by the shovel, based on a positional relationship between the end attachment and the predetermined construction surface (See at least abstract and paragraph 3; notify an operator of operation support information in accordance with a distance between a predetermined target surface, out of a plurality of discretionally set target surfaces, and a work implement (1A), the work machine including a current terrain profile acquisition device (96) that acquires a position of a current terrain profile, the controller including a target surface comparison section (62) that compares the position of the current terrain profile (800) with a position of the predetermined target surface (700) to determine a vertical position relationship between the current terrain profile and the predetermined target surface. The notification control section (374) changes content of the operation support information in accordance with a result of determination by the target surface comparison section. … a processing section configured to determine, among a plurality of measurement reference points that are preset along an outer shape of a buttock part of the bucket for measuring a position and that include at least the tip end of the bucket, a measurement reference point closest to the design surface on the basis of the information about the position of the tip end of the bucket and the outer shape information about the bucket.); and
in response to specifying the first surface, cause the upper swiveling body to face the specified first surface by automatically operating the swiveling actuator and automatically stopping the swiveling actuator (See at least paragraph 157 – 158; in a case where an operator operates the operation device 45b to perform horizontal excavation by an arm crowding motion, then the solenoid proportional valve 55c is controlled in such a manner that the tip end of the bucket 10 does not enter the target surface 700, and a motion of raising the boom 8 is performed automatically. It is noted that the control executed as the MC is not limited to the automatic control over the boom raising motion described above, and control may be executed in such a manner as, for example, to automatically rotate the bucket 10 and to keep constant an angle formed between the target surface 700 and a bottom portion of the bucket 10).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include a control device configured to specify, from among a plurality of surfaces forming a predetermined construction surface, a first surface upon which an operation is to be performed by the shovel, based on a positional relationship between the end attachment and the predetermined construction surface as taught by Narikawa in the system of Izumikawa, since the claimed invention is merely a combination of old elements, and in the combination each element merely would have performed the same function as it did separately, and one of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that the results of the combination were predictable.
The combination of Izumikawa and Narikawa does not explicitly teach the limitation of:
a first surface which is to be faced by the upper swiveling body such that a virtual plane crossing the attachment in a longitudinal direction and perpendicular to a swiveling plane includes a normal to the first surface and upon which an operation is to be performed by the shovel, the first surface being inclined relative to a plane in which the lower traveling body is positioned.
Arimatsu teaches the limitation of:
a first surface which is to be faced by the upper swiveling body such that a virtual plane crossing the attachment in a longitudinal direction and perpendicular to a swiveling plane includes a normal to the first surface and upon which an operation is to be performed by the shovel, the first surface being inclined relative to a plane in which the lower traveling body is positioned (See at least figure 8 – 9 and paragraph 94 – 97).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include a first surface which is to be faced by the upper swiveling body such that a virtual plane crossing the attachment in a longitudinal direction and perpendicular to a swiveling plane includes a normal to the first surface and upon which an operation is to be performed by the shovel, the first surface being inclined relative to a plane in which the lower traveling body is positioned as taught by Arimatsu in the system of the combination of Izumikawa and Narikawa, since the claimed invention is merely a combination of old elements, and in the combination each element merely would have performed the same function as it did separately, and one of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that the results of the combination were predictable.
As per claim 2, the combination of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu teaches limitations of:
wherein the hardware processor is configured to select, as the first surface, a surface that is directly below the end attachment (Narikawa, see at least paragraph 76).
As per claim 3, the combination of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu teaches limitations of:
wherein the hardware processor is configured to select, as the first surface, a surface whose vertical distance to the end attachment is shortest, among surfaces that are directly below the end attachment (Izumikawa, see at least paragraph 42 – 43).
As per claim 4, the combination of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu teaches limitations of:
wherein the hardware processor is configured to select, as the first surface, a surface crossing a vertical line drawn from a predetermined part of the end attachment (Izumikawa, see at least paragraph 23 and 44).
As per claim 5, the combination of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu teaches limitations of:
wherein upon leftward swiveling, a surface crossing a vertical line drawn from a left end of the end attachment is selected as the first surface, and upon rightward swiveling, a surface crossing a vertical line drawn from a right end of the end attachment is selected as the first surface (Narikawa, see at least paragraph 82 and 85).
As per claim 7, Izumikawa teaches limitations of:
wherein the positional relationship is a distance between the end attachment and the predetermined construction surface, the distance being calculated based on information obtained from a boom angle sensor, an arm angle sensor, a bucket angle sensor, a machine body tilt sensor, a swivel angular velocity sensor, a space recognition device, a position measurement device, a communication device, an input device, or any combination thereof (See at least paragraph 41 – 42 and 45).
As per claim 8, Izumikawa teaches the limitation of:
wherein the upper swiveling body is caused to face the predetermined construction surface straight by starting controlling to automatically cause the upper swiveling body to face the predetermined construction surface straight or automatically reducing a swiveling speed of the upper swiveling body to stop the upper swiveling body, in response to a performed predetermined operation (See at least paragraph 58 and 60 – 61).
As per claim 12, the combination of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu teaches limitations of: wherein the hardware processor is configured to cause the shovel to perform the operation on the specified first surface (Izumikawa, see at least paragraph 23 and Narikawa, see at least abstract).
As per claim 13, the combination of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu teaches limitations of:
wherein the hardware processor is configured to: calculate the positional relationship between the end attachment and the predetermined construction surface, and specify the first surface based on the calculated positional relationship (Narikawa, see at least abstract and paragraph 45).
Regarding claim 6:
Claim 6 is rejected using the same rationale, mutatis mutandis, applied to claim 1 above, respectively.
Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu in view of Chiba et al. (Hereinafter Chiba) (US 2020/0277751 A1).
As per claim 9, the combination of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu teaches all the limitations of the claimed invention but does not explicitly teach the limitation of:
wherein the predetermined operation is an operation of a swiveling operation lever with a predetermined switch being pressed.
Chiba teaches limitation of:
wherein the predetermined operation is an operation of a swiveling operation lever with a predetermined switch being pressed (See paragraph 84 – 85).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include wherein the predetermined operation is an operation of a swiveling operation lever with a predetermined switch being pressed as taught by Chiba in the system of Izumikawa, Narikawa and Arimatsu, since the claimed invention is merely a combination of old elements, and in the combination each element merely would have performed the same function as it did separately, and one of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that the results of the combination were predictable.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to IG T AN whose telephone number is (571)270-5110. The examiner can normally be reached M - F: 10:00AM- 4:00PM.
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/IG T AN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3662
IG T AN
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3662