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 .
Response to Amendment
The amendment filed January 20th, 2026 has been entered. Claims 1-8 remain pending in the application. Claims 1-2, 4, and 7 are currently amended. Applicant’s amendments to the claims have overcome the objections to the claims and the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112 and 35 U.S.C. 103 previously set forth in the Non-Final Office Action mailed October 21st, 2025.
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 1-5 and 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kano (US 2020/0236919A1) in view of Toma (JP 2009005590A).
Regarding Claim 1, Kano, Figures 1-2, teaches a dual-bearing reel (See Kano, Para. 0030, Ln. 1) comprising:
a spool braking device 20 rotatably supporting a spool 7 between side plates 1A, 1B of a reel body 1 and configured to apply a braking force to a rotation of the spool 7 (See Kano, Para. 0035, Ln. 1-5), the spool 7 comprising a line winding drum portion 7a around which a fishing line is to be wound (See Kano, Para. 0030, Ln. 13-14), and flange portions 7b on both sides of the line winding drum portion 7a, wherein
the spool braking device 20 comprises a conductive ring 25 configured to rotate integrally with the spool 7 (See Kano, Para. 0036, Ln. 9-10), a ring-shaped magnet 21 facing the conductive ring 25, a holding portion 22 having a cylindrical shape and holding the ring-shaped magnet 21, and a movement operation mechanism 23a that is on the reel body 1 and that moves the holding portion 22 having the cylindrical shape in an axial direction of the spool 7 (See Kano, Para. 0038, Ln. 11-16),
the conductive ring 25 comprises a facing surface 25a facing the ring-shaped magnet 21 (See Kano, Para. 0036, Ln. 14-18),
the ring-shaped magnet 21 is fixed such that a distal end side of the ring-shaped magnet 21 protrudes inward in the axial direction with respect to an inner peripheral surface 22a of the holding portion 22, and
a portion 21a of the distal end side of the ring-shaped magnet 21 that protrudes with respect to the inner peripheral surface 22a of the holding portion 22, the portion 21a of the distal end side of the ring-shaped magnet 21 facing an inner surface of the line winding drum portion 7a in a radial direction.
Kano teaches all the elements of the dual-bearing reel except for a magnetic member.
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Figure 1. Annotated Figure 2 from Toma
However, Toma, Figures 1-2 and annotated Figure 1 above, teaches a magnetic member 70 (yoke 70 … is formed of a magnetic material; See Toma, Para. 0023) covers at least a portion 14b of the distal end side 14a of the magnet 14, the portion 14b of the distal end side 14a of the magnet 14 facing an inner surface 3a of the line winding drum portion 3 in a radial direction (See Toma, Para. 0023).
Although Toma does not illustrate the magnet having a protruding portion which is covered by the magnetic member, Kano illustrates the magnet being exposed on its protruding end (See Kano, Fig. 2), and it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Kano and Toma to provide a magnetic member that covers at least a portion of the distal end side of the ring-shaped magnet that protrudes with respect to the inner peripheral surface of the holding portion for the purpose of increasing casting distance (i.e., leakage and dispersion of magnetic field lines, and unnecessary braking force during casting, are suppressed by the magnetic member) (See Toma, Para. 0008, 0011).
Regarding Claim 2, Kano in view of Toma are advanced above.
Toma further teaches wherein the magnetic member 70 is a tubular body (implied by second magnet holding portion 12a being annular and yoke 70 completely covering the outer peripheral surface of magnet 14; See Toma, Para. 0016, 0023) covering the portion 14b of the distal end side 14a of the magnet 14, and
an end 70b of the tubular body is located at the same position as an end of the magnet 14, or protrudes inward in the axial direction from the end of the magnet 14 (See Toma, Fig. 2).
Although Toma does not illustrate the magnet having a protruding end which is covered by the magnetic member, Kano illustrates the magnet being exposed on its protruding end (See Kano, Fig. 2), and it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Kano and Toma to provide the magnetic member as a tubular body covering the protruding portion of the distal end side of the ring-shaped magnet that protrudes, and an end of the tubular body located at the same position as an end of the ring-shaped magnet, or protruding inward in the axial direction from the end of the ring-shaped magnet for the purpose of increasing casting distance (i.e., leakage and dispersion of magnetic field lines, and unnecessary braking force during casting, are suppressed by the magnetic member) (See Toma, Para. 0008, 0011).
Regarding Claim 3, Kano in view of Toma are advanced above.
Toma further teaches wherein the magnetic member 70 covers an outer surface 14b of the magnet 14 and an end surface 14c on an inner side of the magnet 14 in the axial direction (See Figure 1 above; See Toma, Para. 0023).
Although Toma does not illustrate the magnet having a protruding end which is covered by the magnetic member, Kano illustrates the magnet being exposed on its protruding end (See Kano, Fig. 2), and it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Kano and Toma to provide a magnetic member that covers an outer surface of a protruding end of the ring-shaped magnet and an end surface on an inner side of the ring-shaped magnet in the axial direction for the purpose of increasing casting distance (i.e., leakage and dispersion of magnetic field lines, and unnecessary braking force during casting, are suppressed by the magnetic member) (See Toma, Para. 0008, 0011).
Regarding Claim 4, Kano in view of Toma are advanced above.
Kano further teaches wherein the conductive ring 25 is fixed to a movement member 28 movable in the axial direction with respect to a rotating shaft 5 of the spool 7, and a position of the conductive ring 25 facing the ring-shaped magnet 21 in the radial direction is changeable by a movement of the movement member 28 in accordance with a rotation speed of the spool 7 (See Kano, Para. 0045, Ln. 3-18).
Regarding Claim 5, Kano in view of Toma are advanced above.
Kano further teaches wherein the conductive ring 25 comprises a cylindrical portion 25a facing the ring-shaped magnet 21 in the radial direction.
Toma further teaches the cylindrical portion 40 is located not to overlap the magnet 14 in the radial direction when the spool 3 is in a non-rotation state (See Toma, Fig. 2, Para. 0022).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide Kano with a cylindrical portion of the conductive ring which does not overlap the ring-shaped magnet when the spool is in a non-rotation state, as taught by Toma, for the purpose of removing braking force when the spool is not rotating (i.e. preventing the conductive ring from being affected by the magnetic field of the ring-shaped magnet) (See Toma, Para. 0022, 0024).
Regarding Claim 8, Kano in view of Toma are advanced above.
Kano further teaches wherein the movement operation mechanism 23a comprises an adjustment dial 23A that is rotatably provided on the reel body 1 and that moves the holding portion 22 having a cylindrical shape in the axial direction of the spool 7 (See Kano, Para. 0038, Ln. 4-16), and
the ring-shaped magnet 21 is held by the holding portion 22 such that at least a part of the ring-shaped magnet 21 is movable in the axial direction within a range inside the flange portions 7b of the spool 7 in the axial direction when the adjustment dial 23A is rotationally operated (See Kano, Para. 0039, Ln. 1-7).
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kano (US 2020/0236919A1) in view of Toma (JP 2009005590A) as applied to claims 1-5 and 8 above, and further as evidenced by Ohara (US 2015/0115087A1).
Regarding Claim 7, Kano in view of Toma are advanced above.
Although Kano in view of Toma do not explicitly teach wherein the magnetic member is plated, plating components having the potential to be exposed to seawater is a well-known and commonly used practice in the art of fishing reels as evidenced by Ohara (See Ohara, Para. 0048, Ln. 1-11). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide Kano in view of Toma with a magnetic member which is plated for the purpose of enhancing corrosion resistance and preventing the formation of rust.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 6 is 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.
Claim 6 would be allowable for disclosing a minimum gap between the inner surface of the line winding drum portion of the spool and an outer surface of the ring-shaped magnet in the radial direction of 1.0 mm or less, and a thickness of the magnetic member of less than or equal to half of the minimum gap.
The braking force (i.e., the magnitude and direction of the magnetic force between components) of the magnetic spool braking device is influenced by the relative spacing and thickness of the magnetic components. The dimensional relationship described in the claim limitations above are absent from the cited references and these references would not have allowed for anticipation of nor an obvious modification resulting in a device with all the limitations of claim 6. Therefore, this combination of features is considered to be allowable.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments, see Pg. 5-8, filed January 20th, 2026, have been fully considered.
Regarding the objections to the Claims, Applicant has submitted acceptable amendments. Therefore, the objections have been withdrawn.
Regarding the rejection of Claims 4-5 under 35 U.S.C. 112(b), Applicant has amended the claims. The amendments are sufficient to overcome the previously set forth rejections. Therefore, these rejections have been withdrawn.
Regarding the rejection of Claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. 103, Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim 1 have been considered and are persuasive (e.g., Tsutsumi does not explicitly or implicitly disclose component 42 as magnetic), but further arguments are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any other teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Kano in view of Toma are utilized in the current rejection of claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. 103 (See Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 above).
Regarding the rejections of Claims 2, 4-5, and 7-8, the claims are dependents of rejected claim 1 and Applicant has provided no additional arguments. Therefore, these claims are also rejected based on the new ground of rejection presented above.
Regarding the rejection of Claim 3, the previously indicated allowable subject matter of this claim is currently rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 in light of a newly found reference (See Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 above). Rejection is non-final due to new ground of rejection which was not necessitated by amendment.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to TIFFANY DOMONIQUE JEFFERSON whose telephone number is 571-272-0403. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 10am-7:30pm ET.
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/T.D.J./Examiner, Art Unit 3654
/Victoria P Augustine/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3654
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