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/Restriction
Applicant’s election of Species 1 and Subspecies B is acknowledged. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 03/26/2026. Claims 1-11 are pending. Claims 4-11 are withdrawn from further consideration under 37 C.F.R. § 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected invention.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 C.F.R. § 1.55.
Drawings
Although the drawings are sufficiently clear for examination purposes, they are compromised in terms of clarity. That is, due to the submitted format of the drawings, Figs. 1-13 are dithered and in grayscale/halftones, where lines and text intended to be solid, clean, and black appear jagged and grayed. This loss of quality can be seen by comparing the drawings in the file wrapper (IFW) dated 03/04/2024 with the drawings of the submitted Japanese priority document. It is Examiner’s understanding that should this application issue as a patent, the drawings published on the issued patent will look exactly like those in the U.S. Patent Application Publication, unless Applicant resubmits the drawings in a different format.
The drawings are not objected to at this time for clarity. Nevertheless, Examiner suggests submitting clearer drawings for the purpose of proper notice to the general public. Applicant should note the following drawing standards:
Black and white drawings are normally required; India ink, or its equivalent that secures solid black lines, must be used for drawings. 37 C.F.R. § 1.84(a)(1);
Every line, number, and letter must be durable, clean, black, sufficiently dense and dark, and uniformly thick and well-defined, and the weight of all lines and letters must be heavy enough to permit adequate reproduction. 37 C.F.R. § 1.84(l);
The clarity of the drawings must be sufficient for clear reproduction to two-thirds size. 37 C.F.R. § 1.84(k).
For examples of acceptable drawing clarity and quality, see US 20220362902 A1, US 20230076152 A1, US 20230286103 A1, and US 20240009795 A1. Examiner suggests outputting and resubmitting the drawings as vector graphics and uploading them to USPTO Patent Center as “Drawings-other than black and white line drawings”, which should cause the filed image file to be stored in the SCORE database without any image conversion.
Claim Objections
Claim 3 is objected to because of the following informalities:
“a time period” (claim 3, line 3) should be changed to --a first time period-- (for clarity);
“a time period” (claim 3, line 6) should be changed to --a second time period-- (for clarity).
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections – 35 U.S.C. § 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.
Kawabata
Claims 1-2 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by JP 2012171417 A (“Kawabata”) (citations are to the translation filed herewith).
Regarding claim 1, Kawabata discloses a wiper controller (Abstr.; Figs. 1-3, controller 1) comprising:
an acquirer configured to acquire a value related to an electric current flowing through a wiper motor driving a wiper reciprocating between a first position and a second position (Figs. 1-3; ¶¶ 0020-0030, current detection unit 15 acquires a value related to the electric current flowing through wiper motor 21, which drives a wiper between a first position (Fig. 2, position at time A/F) and a second position (Fig. 2, position at time C/D);
and a determiner configured to determine that a position of the wiper is either the first position or the second position based on a temporal change of the electric current flowing through the wiper motor (Figs. 1-3; ¶¶ 0020-0030, control unit 17 determines that the wiper position is at a first position or second position based on a temporal change of the current flowing through the wiper motor 21 (e.g., the determination of the wiper being at the second position corresponds to the “characteristic change” in the current at time C/D (Fig. 2), at which time the control unit 17 instructs output unit 16 to output to a low signal).
Regarding claim 2, Kawabata discloses the wiper controller of claim 1 as applied above and further discloses wherein the determiner is configured to determine that the position of the wiper is either the first position or the second position when a change amount of the electric current flowing through the wiper motor changes from a negative value to a positive value (Figs. 1-3; ¶¶ 0020-0030, control unit 17 performs the recited function (e.g., the determination of the wiper being at the second position corresponds to the “characteristic change” in the current at time C/D (Fig. 2), at time period C, the current change amount is a negative value (see Fig. 2), and at time period D, the current change amount is a positive value (see Fig. 2)).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 3 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, and if rewritten to overcome the claim objections.
As allowable subject matter has been indicated, Applicant’s reply must either comply with all formal requirements or specifically traverse each requirement not complied with. 37 C.F.R. § 1.111(b) and MPEP § 707.07(a).
The following is Examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance:
Regarding claim 3, Kawabata discloses the wiper controller of claim 1 as applied above. However, Kawabata does not disclose:
wherein the determiner is configured to specify whether the position of the wiper is the first position or the second position based on a [first] time period from when the position of the wiper reaches the first position to when a change amount of the electric current flowing through the wiper motor changes from a positive value to a negative value and a [second] time period from when the position of the wiper reaches the second position to when the change amount of the current flowing through the wiper motor changes from a positive value to a negative value.
Although Kawabata discloses using the detection of the electrical current “characteristic change” (Fig. 2, current shown at time period C/D) to determine whether the wiper is at the second position (upper end position), Kawabata does not disclose basing this detection on the recited two different time periods of electrical current change due to the forward/upwards or reverse/downwards wiper motion (see Spec. Fig. 6; ¶¶ 0060-0061, time periods Δt1 and Δt2)).
Although the determination and comparison of time intervals is generally known in the art (see, e.g., US 5892343 A (“Mack”) Figs. 1-3; 3:18-5:28, determining the actual time interval required for a wiper to complete a half cycle and comparing it with a maximum allowable time), the prior art of record does not appear to teach the use of time intervals in a manner related to the electrical current of a wiper motor where one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application would have modified Kawabata to implement claim 3 as recited without hindsight based on Applicant’s disclosure.
In view of the prior art of record and its deficiencies, Applicant’s invention is novel, non-obvious, and allowable as claimed.
Status of Claims
Claims 1-11 are pending. Claims 4-11 have been withdrawn from further consideration under 37 C.F.R. § 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected invention.
Claims 1-2 are rejected. Claim 3 is objected to.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record on Form PTO-892 and not relied upon is considered pertinent to Applicant’s disclosure because the references pertain to windshield wipers using electronic controls and techniques related to determining the position of the wipers and/or determination of wiper motor current usage.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KENT N SHUM whose telephone number is (703)756-1435. The examiner can normally be reached 1230-2230 EASTERN TIME M-TH.
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, MONICA S CARTER can be reached at (571)272-4475. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571)273-8300.
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/KENT N SHUM/Examiner, Art Unit 3723
/MONICA S CARTER/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3723
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