DETAILED ACTION
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 submissions on February 18, 2026 and March 18, 2026 have been entered.
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, 2, 4-8, 12, 13, and 19, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Flonc (US 5,080,851) in view of Abrams (US 20100332016).
As to claim 1, Flonc teaches a method for manufacturing a composite article that could be used as a wind turbine blade component (Fig. 5E) comprising providing a fabric material (1) and at least one binding agent (4), cutting the fabric material (1) into a plurality of fabric sheets (Abstract, “cutting”) using a fabric cutting tool (inherent) and stacking (Fig. 1) with the binding agent (4) is arranged in and/or in between the stacked fabric sheets. Flonc teaches arranging the stack of the cut fabric sheets on at least one preform mold tool (6) with a convex molding surface and consolidating the stack of fabric sheets (3:16-22) which adapts to the shape of the molding surface to form a preformed part (7). Flonc teaches and arranging the preform part (Fig. , item 7) inside a resin injection mold tool (Fig. 4). Flonc teaches injecting resin into the preform part (4:9-18) and curing the resin (4:12-18). The Flonc article could be used as a wind turbine blade root or root segment (see semicircular segments in Figs. 5B-5F).
Flonc is silent to treating the part/component using at least one treatment tool.
Abrams teaches performing a treating process on two halves of a bonded article (a wind turbine blade component) using a treatment tool (Fig. 2, items 40, 52, 52) using a stand (beneath 110) that meets the claimed holding means. Abrams teaches a root specifically ([0041], “the illustrate root end of the wind turbine blade”).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art prior to filing to incorporate the Abrams process into Flonc because Flonc teaches/suggests fabricating a workpiece and Abrams provides a trimming process for workpieces, and the Flonc process is interpreted to be within the scope of the Abrams teaching/suggestion (“composite materials” in [0005] of Abrams and the composite manufacturing process in Flonc).
As to claim 2, Flonc teaches/suggests automated processing (1:59-61). Since Flonc teaches arranging the fabric sheets on a preform mold tool (Fig. 1) and arranging the preform inside the resin injection mold tool (Fig. 4) and Abrams teaches arranging a finished part on holding means (stand beneath 110), providing automated processing of each one of these steps would have been obvious.
As to claims 4 and 5, Flonc teaches solid particles provided between the fabric sheets (3:10) and activating using heat in the stack (3:17-20).
As to claim 6, Flonc uses a vacuum bag as a consolidation device (3:39-50) which meets the claimed consolidation means described in the specification as “an at least partly flexible preform mold tool”.
As to claims 7 and 8, Flonc teaches a resin transfer molding tool comprising upper and lower molds (Fig. 4, items 9a and 9b) which would obviously been rigid in order to function as molds. Flonc teaches a preform (Fig. 4, item 7) arranged on the lower mold before the mold was closed. Flonc teaches injecting resin (4:15) in a resin transfer molding process (6:1-2).
As to claims 12 and 13, Abrams provides to the combination a cutting process which includes an automated camera measurement inspection during the cutting ([0024]).
As to claim 19, Abrams performs a treating process on the cured part. Even if Abrams shows removing flash on an assembled wind turbine blade, the Abrams process is focused on flash removal generally and does not require this feature in all embodiments. See the Abstract, for example. Even if the Abrams drawings were representative of all embodiments, the claimed process represents an obvious rearrangement of steps, and one of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that flash could be remove before or after assembly and the same part results in either order of steps.
Claim 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Flonc (US 5,080,851) in view of Abrams (US 20100332016), and further in view of Jones (US 20090148647). Flonc and Abrams teach the subject matter of claim 1 above under 35 U.S.C. 103.
As to claim 3, Flonc provides a fabric arranged and stacked on a preform mold tool, or stacked on a storage means and moved to a mold tool (Fig. 1, item 2, Fig. 2, item 6). Flonc is silent to the cutting successively and arranging.
Jones teaches successively cutting and arranging since each successive length of composite is arranged and cut before the next length ([0038]-[0039] and [0045]).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art prior to filing to incorporate the Jones process into Flonc because this is the use of a known technique to improve a similar process. Flonc teaches a base device and the prior art of Jones provides a layup process improved in the same way as the claimed invention using an automated system for cutting and arranging plies of composite. One of ordinary skill in the art could have applied this known improvement of an automated cutting and arranging process in the same way to Flonc to provide the predictable result of forming a composite preform.
Claims 9 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Flonc (US 5,080,851) in view of Abrams (US 20100332016), and further in view of Graf (US 20150343717). Flonc and Abrams teach the subject matter of claims 1 and 8 above under 35 U.S.C. 103.
As to claims 9 and 10, Flonc teaches injecting resin and heating the mold to the curing temperature (4:9-18) which would inherently use a heating device, but Flonc is silent to the claimed resin injection pressure and the press.
Graf teaches closing a molding tool using a press ([0006]; [0036]) and injecting resin at temperatures above 35 bar ([0013]) in a press ([0087]; [0036]).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art prior to filing to incorporate the Graf press and injection pressure into Flonc because teaches/suggests resin injection into a preform in a closed mold (Fig. 4; col. 4) and Graf provides a mechanism for closing a mold and a particular resin pressure sufficient to inject resin into a preform within the scope of the Flonc teaching/suggestion.
Claim 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Flonc (US 5,080,851) in view of Abrams (US 20100332016), and further in view of De Waal Malefijt (US 20150033544). Flonc and Abrams teach the subject matter of claim 1 above under 35 U.S.C. 103.
As to claim 11, Flonc is silent to the pivotable holding means and adapting the orientation of the part prior to or during the treatment.
De Waal Malefijt provides a pivotable holding means for holding a wind turbine blade (Figs. 12-13). In the combination with the modified Flonc process, the De Waal Malefijt pivoting would obviously occur prior to the trimming process in Abrams.
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art prior to filing to incorporate the De Waal Malefijt pivoting step into Flonc because Flonc teaches/suggests an article formed from two halves, and De Waal Malefijt provides a device and step for assembling two halves of large articles. One would have either found the De Waal Malefijt step to be within the scope of the Flonc teaching/suggestion for assembling article halves, or alternatively, one would have been motivated to incorporate the De Waal Malefijt apparatus and step motivated by its suitability for assembling large articles (De Waal Malefijt, [0053]).
Claims 14 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Flonc (US 5,080,851) in view of Abrams (US 20100332016), and further in view of Lieberknecht (US 20140314576). Flonc and Abrams teach the subject matter of claim 1 above under 35 U.S.C. 103.
As to claims 14 and 15, Flonc is silent to the holding means using an automated placing means adapted for moving and packing the wind turbine blade.
Lieberknecht teaches a mechanism capable of lifting a wind turbine blade (crane, [0022]) and packaging the wind turbine blade (Figs. 6-9). While Lieberknecht does not specifically teach that the crane is automated, providing an automatic mechanism to operate the Lieberknecht crane to replace a manual activity which accomplishes the same result would have been obvious. See MPEP 2144.04(III).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to incorporate the Lieberknecht crane into the Flonc process because one would have been motivated to provide a machine to replace human movement/lifting of the Flonc article.
Claim 17 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Flonc (US 5,080,851) in view of Abrams (US 20100332016), and further in view of Eggleston (US 20100132137). Flonc and Abrams teach the subject matter of claim 1 above under 35 U.S.C. 103.
As to claim 17, Flonc is silent recording measurement values or parameters recorded and allocated to an individual wind turbine blade during manufacturing.
Eggleston teaches recording parameters for an individual wind turbine blade during manufacture ([0029]-[0030]). The parameters are obviously allocated to an individual turbine blade when the data and stored images in memory ([0029]).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art prior to filing to incorporate the Eggleston inspection step into the modified Flonc process motivated by identifying defects within the article ([0015]).
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed February 18, 2026 and March 18, 2026 have been fully considered but they are addressed by the revised rejection above.
In the February 18, 2026 arguments, Applicant argues on page 8 that Abrams’ entire system is designed to address the problem of flash at a joint between two assembled blade shell halves, not treatment of an individual component. Applicant further argues that the Abrams device is suitable for large workpieces, not small blade root segments prior to assembly, and that there would be no motivation to use the Abrams system without first assembling the wind turbine component.
The Examiner respectfully disagrees. The Examiner interprets Abrams to be more broad than Applicant’s arguments suggest and is primarily for “trimming flash from the body of a workpiece.” (Abstract). While there is discussion in Abrams about overlapping joints, this is not a required feature of Abrams and the Abrams steps would have been obvious for use on “trimming of flash from molded parts, particularly contoured molded parts” generally (Abrams, [0003]), not limited to flash only on assembled parts.
In the March 18, 2026 response, Applicant’s arguments recognize that Flonc could be mapped in a different way to the instant claims (bridging pages 8-9 of the arguments), and the instant rejection does interpret the mandrel 6 as the preform mold tool consistent with Applicant’s alternative interpretation. Flonc’s item 6 meets the preform mold tool because it is clearly convex, and the distinction between Flonc’s Figs. 2 and 3 shows that consolidation has occurred on item 6. Even if Applicant’s argument on page 8 were accepted that consolidation and shaping occur on the same tool, it is unclear how this represents a distinction from Flonc. The claim technically does not require that individual flat layers be placed/stacked on a convex preform mold tool. When the claim is carefully parsed with this distinction in mind, “arranging a stack of the cut fabric sheets” is met by placing a stack of the cut fabric sheets on the convex preform mold tool, which is why Flonc still meets the claim. The claim requires the consolidation to cause the stacked fabric sheets to adapt to the molding surface of the preform mold tool, and Flonc’s different depiction of the binder and curved shape in Figs. 2 and 3 shows that consolidation and adaptation to the molding surface of Flonc similarly occurred in the Flonc process.
Also in the March 18, 2026 response, Applicant addresses the fact that Abrams does not specifically use the treatment tool on a “cured part” (page 10) and appears to argue that Abrams is only for trimming flash at joints (page 11) on large parts instead of the individual root segments in this case (page 12). Abrams further argues that there is no motivation to use the Abrams process (on the Flonc parts or in the instant process) because no joint or seam is present. The Examiner believes Applicant has viewed the Abrams reference too narrowly. Flonc was relied upon for steps of forming a cured composite part in the rejection above (Flonc, 4:12-18), and Abrams does not need to specifically teach the same step to be considered relevant and combinable with Flonc. Abrams suggests the dynamic trimming process for cutting flash generally (Abstract) on composite articles ([0005]), and is not limited to parts of any particular size or those that have been bonded. Since Applicant’s argument regarding rationale/motivation is based upon the bonding process in Abrams, which is not required in all embodiments, it is not persuasive.
Applicant’s arguments on pages 14-15 are on the grounds that the other claims are allowable by dependence on allowable claim 1 is not persuasive since the rejection of claim 1 is being maintained.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MATTHEW J DANIELS whose telephone number is (313)446-4826. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday, 8:30-5:00 pm.
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/MATTHEW J DANIELS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1742
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