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 Rejections - 35 USC § 102
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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.
Claim(s) 1-11, 14-17, and 19-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Lamoureux (Patent No. 10,493,895).
Re: claim 1, Lamoureux teaches an assembly (Figs. 1-3), comprising: a rail (Fig. 2 – 2) including a slot (space between side rims (3)), wherein the slot leads to a cavity (4); and an accessory including a fixture portion (Fig. 1 – 9, 10, 11) and a clamp portion (Fig. 1 – 5, 13, 19), wherein the accessory is configurable between a locked position (Fig. 4b) and an unlocked position (Fig. 4a), wherein, in the unlocked position, the clamp portion of the accessory is insertable into and removable from the cavity via the slot (Col. 5 – lines 36-43) by movement in a direction transverse to a longitudinal axis of the rail (Col. 3 – lines 53-58 – “The attachment device 1 of the invention may be inserted in the rail 2 and attached thereto at any location along the rail. The attachment device 1 may also be removed from the rail or even, after it has been attached, it may be reused at another location of the rail without it being necessary to extract it from the rail for that purpose.”) (See Also Figs. 2 & 4a and Col. 5 – lines 36-43), and wherein, when the clamp portion is within the cavity and the accessory is in the locked position, the clamp portion is not removable from the cavity via the slot (See Fig. 3).
Re: claim 2, Lamoureux teaches wherein the accessory is configurable between the locked and unlocked positions by rotation of the fixture portion (See Figs. 4a & 4b and 6b & 6c).
Re: claim 3, Lamoureux teaches wherein: the clamp portion (Fig. 1 – 5, 13, 19) includes a cam (5), and the cam is configured to rotate with the fixture portion (See Figs. 5a, 5b, 5c).
Re: claim 4, Lamoureux teaches wherein: the accessory further comprises a housing (Fig. 1 – 6, 15), the housing includes a through-bore (17), and the cam is arranged at least partially in the through-bore (See Fig. 4a).
Re: claim 5, Lamoureux teaches wherein the fixture portion (9, 10, 11) is rotatably mounted (12) to the housing (6, 15).
Re: claim 6, Lamoureux teaches wherein: a pin (Fig. 4b – 18) projects from an opposite side of the housing (6, 15) as the fixture portion (9, 10, 11), the rail (Fig, 2 – 2) includes at least one hole (16) on an opposite side of the rail as the slot (Space between side rims (3)), the pin is configured to project into the at least one hole (See Fig. 3).
Re: claim 7, Lamoureux teaches wherein: the cam (5) includes a first dimension (Annotated Fig. 1 – first side) and a second dimension (Annotated Fig. 1 – second side) greater than the first dimension, when the accessory is in the unlocked position (Fig. 4a), the first dimension is oriented substantially parallel to a central axis of the through-bore (17) (See Fig. 4a); when the accessory is in the locked position (Fig. 4b), the second dimension is oriented substantially parallel to the central axis of the through-bore (17) (See Fig. 4b).
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Re: claim 8, Lamoureux teaches wherein: the rail (2) includes a first surface (Annotated Fig. 3 – first surface) defining the cavity, the rail includes a second surface (Annotated Fig. 3 – second surface) defining the cavity on an opposite side of the cavity as the first surface (See Annotated Fig. 3), and when the accessory is in the locked position (See Fig. 3), the clamp portion (Fig. 1 – 5, 13, 19) of the accessory is configured to directly contact the first and second surfaces of the rail (See Annotated Fig. 3).
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Re: claim 9, Lamoureux teaches wherein, when the accessory is in the locked position (Fig. 3 & 4b), the cam (5) is configured to directly contact the first and second surfaces of the rail (See Annotated Fig. 3 – the cam is part of the latch (13), which is directly contacting the first and second surfaces of the rail).
Re: claim 10, Lamoureux teaches wherein: the clamp portion (5, 13, 19) includes a first slider (Annotated Fig. 5a – first slider) and a second slider (Annotated Fig. 5a – second slider) moveable within the through-bore (Fig. 1 – 17) in response to movement (Figs. 5a, 5b, 5c) of the cam (5), and when the accessory is in the locked position (Fig. 4b), the cam (5) is positioned such that the first slider and the second slider are in direct contact with the first and second surfaces of the rail (See Fig. 3), respectively.
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Re: claim 11, Lamoureux teaches wherein the accessory is configured to hold the fixture in the locked position (14, 19) (See Also Col. 4 – lines 28-37 and Col. 5 – lines 19-23).
Re: claim 14, Lamoureux teaches wherein: the accessory further comprises a fastener (Fig. 1 – 7), the accessory further comprises a housing (6, 15), the fixture portion (9, 10, 11) and the fastener (7) are rotatably mounted (12) to the housing (6, 15), the fixture portion (9, 10, 11) is attached to a plate (14b) including a notch (Annotated Fig. 6a – notch), the fastener (7) is biased toward (By 19) the plate and the notch, a portion of the fastener is configured to be received in the notch when the accessory is in the locked position (See Fig. 6a, 6b, 6c).
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Re: claim 15, Lamoureux teaches wherein the portion of the fastener (7) is configured to abut the plate (14b) when the accessory is in the unlocked position (See Fig. 5a).
Re: claim 16, Lamoureux teaches wherein the fixture portion (9, 10, 11) includes one of a tie-down (9), a cleat, a handle, a portion of a cross-bar, and a closed-loop.
Re: claim 19, Lamoureux teaches a method, comprising: inserting an accessory (Fig. 2 – 1) into a slot (space between side rims (3)) of a rail (2) by moving a clamp portion of the accessory in a direction transverse to a longitudinal axis of the rail (Col. 3 – lines 53-58) (See Also Figs. 2 & 4a and Col. 5 – lines 36-43) such that the clamp portion (Fig. 1 – 5, 13, 19) of the accessory is within a cavity (Fig. 2 – 4) of the rail (2) when the accessory (1) is in an unlocked position (Fig. 4a); and following inserting of the accessory into the slot, configuring the accessory (1) in a locked position (Fig. 4b) in which the clamp portion (5, 13, 19) is not removable from the cavity via the slot (Fig. 3).
Re: claim 20, Lamoureux teaches further comprising: following the step of configuring the accessory (1) in the locked position (Fig. 4b), configuring the accessory in the unlocked position (Fig. 4a) and removing the clamp portion (Fig. 1 - 5, 13, 19) from the cavity (Fig. 2 - 4) via the slot (space between side rims (3)) (See Figs. 5c, 5b, 5a) by moving the clamp portion in another direction transverse to the longitudinal axis of the rail opposite the direction (Col. 3 – lines 53-58) (See Also Figs. 2 & 4a and Col. 5 – lines 36-43) (Col. 5 – lines 60-64).
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) 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lamoureux (Patent No. 10,493,895).
Re: claim 18, Lamoureux teaches wherein the rail (2) extends along a side wall of a cargo area of a motor vehicle (Col. 1 – lines 26-31). Lamoureux is silent on wherein the slot is an opening in a side of the rails facing a centerline of the motor vehicle.
It would be obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to understand that the opening on the slot is facing toward a centerline of the motor vehicle. Lamoureux discloses that such devices are used in particular in airplane holds or in the trailers of transport vehicles; by way of example, the rails are arranged along the walls of the vehicle, which would have the opening facing toward the centerline of the vehicle as the side walls of a vehicle face each other and the centerline would be present between these side walls.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 12 & 13 allowed.
Claim 21 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Re: claim 12, the previously identified allowable subject matter of claim 12 has been made into an independent claim. Claim 13 depends on claim 12.
Re: claim 21, the cited prior art whether in full or in combination fails to teach or reasonably suggest at the very least wherein an entirety of the clamp portion is insertable into and removable from the cavity via the slot. The cited prior art teaches insertion of the clamp portion into the cavity via the slot, but not the entirety. It would destroy the purpose of the art to have it so the clamp portion in its entirety was insertable into the cavity via the slot as a portion of the clamp portion extends outward of the cavity to make a direct connection with the fixture portion.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 06/09/2026 have been fully considered but are not persuasive.
The Applicant argues that the prior art cited fails to teach the clamp portion of the accessory is insertable into and removable from the cavity via the slot by movement in a direction transverse to a longitudinal axis of the rail. The examiner disagrees in that the art discloses in Col. 3 – lines 53-58 that “The attachment device 1 of the invention may be inserted in the rail 2 and attached thereto at any location along the rail. The attachment device 1 may also be removed from the rail or even, after it has been attached, it may be reused at another location of the rail without it being necessary to extract it from the rail for that purpose.” The bolded portion discloses that the device may be inserted at any location along the rail and attached at any portion along the rail with the following underlined portions supporting the removal from the rail and that extraction is possible but not necessary if the device is to be used at another portion along the rail. It can be seen in Figure 4a that the clamp portion (13) is in parallel with the housing (15) such that it is flush and not protruding out from the housing in the lateral direction. As seen in Figure 2 and 3, the profile of the housing (15) is smaller than the gap between the side rims (3) of the rail, and in support with the Col. 3 citing, further supports that the insertion in the disclosure is a direction transverse to the longitudinal direction of the rail and not an insertion at the ends of the rail. The combination of the configuration of the device in Fig. 4a and the profiled view of Figures 2 and 3 show the argued limitation.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PHILIP C ADAMS whose telephone number is (571)272-3421. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Thursday 7:30 - 4:00 CT.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Amy R Weisberg can be reached at 5712705500. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/PHILIP C ADAMS/Examiner, Art Unit 3612
/AMY R WEISBERG/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3612
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