Detailed Office Action
The communication dated 12/2/2025 has been entered and fully considered.
Claims 1-16 and 18 are pending with claims 16 and 18 withdrawn from consideration.
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 Interpretation and allowable subject matter
Claim 7 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.
In claim 7 it is stated that the fine fraction can pass through a 200-mesh screen. The Examiner interprets this to be substantially all the fine fraction and only allowing a de minimis amount not passing through the screen.
The prior art GILKEY (cited below) discloses a 0.175 mm-hole size which is equivalent to an 80 mesh. It would not meet the claim language because there would be a substantial amount of fines and particles above the 200-mesh size which would not pass through.
Election/Restriction
In the 10/23/2025 restriction the Examiner grouped claim 15 as part of group II and claim 16 as part of group III. Claim 15 should be part of group I, claim 16 as part of group II, and claim 18 as part of group III.
Claim 15 is therefore being examined with group I and the restriction to claim 15 is withdrawn.
Claims 16 and 18 remain withdrawn without traverse.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-6 and 8-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. 5,133,832 GILKEY in view of The World of Market Pulp by NANKO et al., hereinafter NANKO.
As for claim 1-3 and 6, GILKEY discloses taking deinked papermaking stock and fractionating the deinked papermaking stock on a belt filter [abstract]. The fraction is separated into long fibers as a dewatered retentate and short fibers in a filtrate [col. 1 lines]. GILKEY discloses that that the filtrate can comprise percent of the total solids.
GILKEY discloses that a 50%-50% fines/long fiber split)and that substantially all long fibers are maintained [col. 3 lines 24-26]. GILKEY discloses a feed consistency of 1% and a retained consistency of 5% [col. 4 lines 30-40]. This means that the 20% of the suspension which doesn’t pass through still contains the fines. Therefore about 40% of the total which passes through [50% fines* 80% liquid pass through = 40%]. The total amount that passes through can be optimized based on the hole size of the wire, the stock fed to the fractionator and the consistency from the fractionator.
GILKEY does not disclose the SR of the pulp or the content of fibers having a length of greater than 7 million fibers per gram [pg. 222 Fiber Morphology].
NANKO discloses an example recycled pulp which has a population of 12.6 million fibers per gram and a Canadian standard freeness of between 360 to 190 (SR of about 35 to 52) which overlaps the instant claimed ranges [pg. 223 PFI Table]. NAKNO has 13.8% britt jar fines which will pass through at least the same rate as the fines of GILKEY (13.8*0.8 =10.72%).
At the time of the invention it would be obvious to the person of ordinary skill in the art to substitute one known recycled paper source for another known recycled paper source [MPEP 2144.06 (II)]. The person of ordinary skill in the art would expect success as the process of GILKEY does not limit the type of recycled paper that may be treated.
As for claims 4 and 5, GILKEY discloses a feed consistency of 1% and a retained consistency of 5% [col. 4 lines 30-40] which means 80% of the suspension passes through.
As for claim 8, GILKEY discloses the speed of the device is 3,000 ft/min or 914 m/min which falls within the claimed range [col. 3 lines 45-50]. This is much higher than the claimed apparatus. This suggests that a much higher flow of liquid can through the belt. The mesh further has hole sizes of 0.175 mm squared [col. 3 lines 20-25] which means the holes (~80 mesh) are bigger than the 200-mesh hole fractionation claimed; bigger holes mean bigger flow. Therefore it is the Examiner’s position that the belt of GILKEY has an air permeability greater than 4,000m2/m2/hour.
As for claim 9, GILKEY discloses the speed of the device is 3,000 ft/min or 914 m/min which falls within the claimed range [col. 3 lines 45-50].
As for claim 10, GILKEY discloses a belt speed of 914 m/min which is much higher than the instant claimed belt speed which suggests a much lower residence time. In the alternative it would be obvious to optimize the residence time through routine experimentation. The person of ordinary skill in the art would look to have a lower residence time as this would increase the production rate.
As for claim 11, the belt fractionator is a single-wire device with belt (25) [Figure 2]
As for claim 12, GILKEY discloses that the fines can be recombined after separation and treatments [Figure 1].
As for claims 13-15, some of the fines will be lost to the floatation froth of the flotation cells (50) and therefore less fines will be reintroduced during recombination [Figure 1]. As less fines are added it would be excepted that the SR and the WRV would change in substantially the same way.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANTHONY J CALANDRA whose telephone number is (571)270-5124. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 7:45 AM -4:15 PM.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Abbas Rashid can be reached at (571)270-7457. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
ANTHONY J. CALANDRA
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 1748
/Anthony Calandra/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1748