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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 04/30/2024 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
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(s) 14-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Apelsmeier (US PG Pub 2021/0092882) in view of Nabilek (DE102010022562).
As to independent claim 14, Apelsmeier teaches an electrical circuit device for operating an externally excited electric machine (2), the electrical circuit device comprising: a heat sink (14), at least one power module (18) attached at a marked attachment position (inherent to locate the power modules see figures 4-6) on an outside of the heat sink (14), an exciter module (21) attached on the outside of the heat sink (14) as shown in figures 1-6,
However Apelsmeier teaches the claimed limitation as discussed above except wherein at least one heat sink-side positioning section of the heat sink is inserted into at least one exciter module-side positioning section of the exciter module or at least one exciter module-side positioning section of the exciter module is inserted into at least one heat sink-side positioning section of the heat sink.
Nabilek teaches at least one module-side positioning section (24’) of the module (2) is inserted into at least one heat sink-side positioning section (31) of the heat sink (3) as shown in figure 1, for the advantageous benefit of providing a single press-fitting process step.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made to modify Asano by using at least one heat sink-side positioning section of the heat sink is inserted into at least one exciter module-side positioning section of the exciter module or at least one exciter module-side positioning section of the exciter module is inserted into at least one heat sink-side positioning section of the heat sink, as taught by Nabilek, to provide a composite member whose residual magnetic flux density of a bonded magnet does not decrease even when being exposed in a presence of high-temperature and high-pressure water vapor.
As to claim 15/14; Apelsmeier teaches an electric machine (2) connected to the electrical circuit device (12) as shown in figure 1.
As to claim 16/15, Apelsmeier teaches a motor vehicle (1) comprising an electric drive device (12) as shown in figure 1.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-13 allowed. Note Claims 2, 3, 6, 8-9,12-3 depend claim 1 and claims 4-5 depend claim 3, claim 10 depends claim 9 , claim 11 depends claim 10
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
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in claim 1 which is not found in the prior art references mentioned above.
Conclusion
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/JOSE A GONZALEZ QUINONES/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2834 April 1, 2026
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