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 claims 13-20 in the reply filed on 1/23/2026 is acknowledged.
Claim Objections
Claims 1-12 objected to because of the following informalities: The withdrawn claims should include the correct status identifiers. 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.
Claim(s) 13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Chen (CH-110976880). Chen discloses a golf club head comprising a body having a top rail opposite a sole, a toe opposite a heel, a hosel coupled to the club body and having a first end proximate the heel and a second end opposite the first end and an outer surface comprising a QPQ finish (S5). The QPQ finish comprises a nitride layer (3), a first oxide layer (4), and a second oxide layer (7); wherein the outer surface comprises a grade 3 QPQ finish. The grade 3 finish is satisfied by Chen because the disclosure makes clear the QPQ process greatly improves corrosion resistance, which is the definition of a grade 3 finish. While the specification does not disclose the term grade 3 the finish type is indicated. One of ordinary skill in the art would enhance the finish type to a grade 3 for increase durability. Chen does not disclose the uniformity of the layers from 1 to 1.25 but does make clear the nitriding time is set to make sure the product has a smoother surface and to further reduce local pitting. A smooth surface and no pitting would obviously produce a uniform layer within applicant’s uniformity range from 1 to 1.25. Increasing or decreasing the value to obtain a smooth surface as close to 1 as possible is within the capabilities of on skilled in the art. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 14-20 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.
Conclusion
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/RAEANN GORDEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3711
March 31, 2026
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