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 .
Claim Objections
Claim 15 is objected to because of the following informalities: in line 11, the word “on” should be inserted before the word, “in”. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claims 13 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over JP6-159877 to Yamauchi, hereinafter referred to as Yamouchi, (see English language translation provided herewith), in view of JP5746584 to Morishita, hereinafter referred to as Morishita, (see English language translation provided herewith).
In reference to claim 13, Yamauchi and Morishita disclose the claimed invention.
Yamauchi discloses an ice maker comprising:
a tray (34) having a cell to form a space in which a liquid is phase-changed into ice;
a first heater (33) configured to provide heat to the tray, and disposed outside the cell (at 30);
a second heater (32) configured to supply heat to the cell, and positioned outside the cell (at 30); and
a controller (45) disposed outside the tray and configured to:
turn on the second heater (32) if a turn-on condition of the second heater is satisfied (normally, when the compressor 10 is turned on, only the first ice making heater 32 in close contact with the inner surface of the heat insulating layer 30 is heater) [0021]);
turn off the second heater if a turn-off condition of the second heater is satisfied (temperature of ice making sensor 40 is equal to or lower than a predetermined temperature, then heating amount is sufficient [0023]),
wherein the controller is configured to:
control the first heater and the second heater to be turned on after the second heater is turned off (control so as to simultaneously energize the first heater and second heater as described in [0023] would imply that the second heater was turned off at some point in time).
Yamauchi fails to disclose varying a heating amount of the second heater in an ice making process.
Morishita teaches that in the art of ice makers, that it is a known method to provide a heater which forms clear ice such that the heating amount (energization rate) of the heater is varied during an ice making process (variable control of the energization rate), see underlined portion of page 8 of the English language translation and figure 10. Morishita teaches that this method prevents ice making from becoming too long. Accordingly, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was effectively filed, to modify Yamaouchi by Morishia such that, a heating amount of the second heater in an ice making process is varied, since all claimed elements were known in the art, and one having ordinary skill in the art could have modified the prior art as claimed by known methods with no changes in their respective functions and the combination would have yielded a predictable result of ensuring that the amount of time to make ice is kept to a reasonable amount.
In reference to claim 14, Yamauchi and Morishita disclose the claimed invention.
When modifying Yamauchi by Morishita such that heater (32) varies during ice making, the heating amount of the first heater would be zero, which is different from a heating amount of the second heater which would be a heat amount of more than zero.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-12 and 15-20 are allowed.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: The prior art of record, when considered as a whole, alone or in combination fails to teach nor render obvious the particular combination of the instant claims 1 and 15 including: control the first heater and the second heater to be turned on to separate the ice from the tray. Yamauchi is the closest prior art of record and teaches many of the features of claims 1 and 15 as outlined in the rejection of claim 13 supra. However, Yamauchi fails to disclose: control the first heater and the second heater to be turned on to separate the ice from the tray. Without some teaching, suggestion, or motivation, one skilled in the art would not be motivated to modify the base reference as claimed without improper hindsight reasoning.
Conclusion
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/CASSEY D BAUER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3763