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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claim(s) does/do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because a “computer readable storage medium” could be an electromagnetic wave. The applicant should amend to “a non-transitory computer readable medium”.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-3, 6, 14 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1)& (a)(2) as being anticipated by Yazici et al. (U.S. Patent No. 5,726,905, hereinafter Yazici).
With respect to Claim 1, Yazici discloses a computer-implemented method comprising:
receiving current data samples from a current sensor [10] configured to measure current drawn by a motor [column 2, lines 18-21];
determining a frequency of the supply, fs [column 3, line 9];
determining a speed of the motor, S [column 3, lines 12-21];
determining a characteristic frequency, fb, of a bearing fault [column 2, line 66-column 3, line 8];
processing the current data samples to obtain a frequency spectrum of the current [column 2, lines 53-65];
determining whether the current frequency spectrum contains an indication of the bearing fault using the motor supply frequency, fs, and the characteristic frequency, fb, of the bearing fault [see claim 1]; and
providing a fault notification according to the determined indication [column 6, lines 45-51].
With respect to Claim 2, Yazici discloses that the supply frequency, fs, is determined using a Fast Fourier Transform [column 2, lines 60-65], FFT, analysis of the current data samples.
With respect to Claim 3, Yazici discloses that the supply frequency, fs, is determined as a frequency of a power grid connected to the motor. [A/C frequency, column 2, lines 24-29]
With respect to Claim 6, Yazici discloses that processing the current data samples comprises applying an FFT to the current data samples [column 2, lines 60-65].
With respect to Claim 14, Yazici discloses an apparatus comprising: a current sensor [10] configured to measure current supplied to or used by a motor, a processor [18] and a memory [processor’s inherently have cache, a type of memory] the memory storing instructions which, when executed, cause the processor to perform the method of claim 1.
With respect to Claim 15, Yazici discloses a computer readable storage medium storing instructions which, when executed by a processor [processor 18 has a cache with instructions], cause the processor to perform the method of claim 1.
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 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yazici in view of Davis (U.S. Patent No. 3,852,626, hereinafter Davis).
With respect to Claim 4, Yazici does not disclose that the motor speed, S, is determined as the motor synchronous speed according to the number of poles of the motor and the supply frequency, fs.
Davis shows that determining motor speed from the number of poles and frequency is known. See column 4, lines 47-55.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Yazici such that the motor speed, S, is determined as the motor synchronous speed according to the number of poles of the motor and the supply frequency, fs for the benefit of accurately determining motor speed.
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yazici in view of Rodriguez et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2015/0276823, hereinafter Rodriguez).
With respect to Claim 5, Yazici does not disclose that the coefficients related to the characteristic fault frequencies, fb, of the at least one bearing fault is determined from a look-up table.
Rodriguez shows looking up bearing fault frequencies from a look up table. See para 42.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Yazici such that the coefficients related to the characteristic fault frequencies, fb, of the at least one bearing fault is determined from a look-up table for the benefit of precisely knowing which frequencies indicate bearing faults.
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yazici in view of CN111504676, hereinafter CN.
With respect to Claim 7, Yazici does not disclose that processing the current data samples further comprises performing a Hilbert analysis to demodulate the supply frequency, fs, prior to applying the FFT.
CN discloses performing a Hilbert analysis to demodulate the supply frequency, fs. See page 9, para starting “for the current”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Yazici such that processing the current data samples further comprises performing a Hilbert analysis to demodulate the supply frequency, fs, prior to applying the FFT for the benefit of applying the FFT to more clearly detect the fault.
Claims 8-12 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yazici in view of Hedeen et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2002/0139191, hereinafter Hedeen).
With respect to Claim 8, Yazici does not disclose that the current frequency spectrum is determined to contain an indication of a bearing fault if the current frequency spectrum contains a peak at sidebands of the supply frequency, fs, wherein the sidebands are offset from the supply frequency, fs, by the characteristic frequency, fb, of the bearing fault.
Hedeen discloses that the current frequency spectrum is determined to contain an indication of a bearing fault if the current frequency spectrum contains a peak at sidebands of the supply frequency, fs, wherein the sidebands are offset from the supply frequency, fs, by the characteristic frequency, fb, of the bearing fault. See para 23 and 24.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Yazici such that the current frequency spectrum is determined to contain an indication of a bearing fault if the current frequency spectrum contains a peak at sidebands of the supply frequency, fs, wherein the sidebands are offset from the supply frequency, fs, by the characteristic frequency, fb, of the bearing fault for the benefit of accurately determining bearing faults.
With respect to Claim 9, Hedeen discloses that the sideband is offset from the supply frequency, fs, by a harmonic of the bearing fault's characteristic frequency, fb. See para 23.
With respect to Claim 10, Hedeen discloses that the current frequency spectrum is determined to contain an indication of a bearing fault if the current frequency spectrum contains a peak at demodulated sidebands, fh,of the supply frequency, fs, wherein the sidebands, fh, are offset from the supply frequency, fs, by the characteristic frequency, fb, of the bearing fault and demodulated by the supply frequency, fs. See para 34.
With respect to Claim 11, Hedeen discloses that the sideband is within an offset range from the supply frequency, fs, the offset range defined by the characteristic fault frequencies, fb, of the bearing fault and upper and lower range limits. See para 23 and 24.
With respect to Claim 12, Hedeen discloses that the steps of determining a bearing fault characteristic frequency, fb, and determining whether the current frequency spectrum contains an indication of the bearing fault are performed for at least two of the following bearing faults: fundamental train frequency/cage frequency, FTF; ball pass frequency of inner ring/inner race, BPFI; ball pass frequency of outer ring/outer race, BPFO, and ball spin frequency, BSF. See para 24.
With respect to Claim 16, Hedeen discloses that the sideband is within an offset range from the supply frequency, fs, the offset range defined by the characteristic fault frequencies, fb, of the bearing fault and upper and lower range limits. See para 23 and 24.
Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yazici and Hedeen in further view of Piety et al. (U.S. Patent No. 5,875,420, hereinafter Piety).
With respect to Claim 13, Yazici discloses fault notification [column 6, lines 45-51] but not that providing a fault notification comprises providing a severe fault notification when the number of determined indications is greater than or equal to a threshold, providing an incipient fault notification when the number of determined indications is above 0 and below the threshold.
Piety discloses a similar bearing fault device that reports multiple levels of faults determined [column 1, line 57-column 2, line 55] and that the number of indications, in the form of peaks determines how severe the fault is [column 10, lines 26-40].
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to subdivide the fault levels such that a fault notification comprises providing a severe fault notification when the number of determined indications is greater than or equal to a threshold, providing an incipient fault notification when the number of determined indications is above 0 and below the threshold for the benefit of conveying the severity of the bearing fault to the user..
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ALEX T DEVITO whose telephone number is (571)270-7551. The examiner can normally be reached 12pm- 8 pm EST M-S.
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/ALEX T DEVITO/Examiner, Art Unit 2855
/JOHN E BREENE/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2855