DETAILED ACTION
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 9 objected to because of the following informalities: The word “is” should be after “battery” in line 2. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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.
Claims 1, 3 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bentley (GB 2448318 A).
Re claim 1, Bentley teaches a method for releasing electromechanical brakes by means of respectively assigned electromechanical brake actuators, the method comprising the steps: connecting the brake actuators to a mobile energy storage device (6) supplying electrical energy for releasing the brakes; and releasing the brakes by actuating the brake actuators using the energy from the mobile energy storage device. (Page 8, line 31 – Page 9, line 35)
Bentley does not teach wherein the brake actuators are successively connected. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to successively connect the actuators as needed by each unit requiring moving. Additionally, providing a connection to each unit would allow for rearrangement of the units in the vehicle.
Re claim 3, Bentley teaches wherein the brake actuators are grouped into a plurality of several brake actuator groups (actuators “grouped” in each unit), and the brake actuator groups are successively, individually supplied with energy by the mobile energy storage device.
Re claim 15, Bentley as modified teaches a non-transitory computer program product having a program code, stored thereon on a machine readable carrier (22), for performing the method as claimed in claim 1. (See Bentley - Fig. 1, 8, Page 12, lines 15-19).
Claims 4, 7-9, 12 and 13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bentley (GB 2448318 A) in view of Lang (WO 2006058825 A1).
Re claims 4 and 7, Bentley teaches wherein the power supply could be provided from batteries and/or other means. (Page 21, Lines 27-32) Bentley does not teach charging a first energy storage component of the energy storage device by means of energy stored in a second energy storage component of the energy storage device; and supplying the brake actuators with energy stored in the first energy storage component.
Lang teaches charging a first energy storage component (30) of the energy storage device by means of energy stored in a second energy storage component (20) of the energy storage device; and supplying the brake actuators (10) with energy stored in the first energy storage component. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to provide a second energy storage component to provide sufficient power in case of a storage component failure.
Re claim 8, Bentley as modified teaches, wherein the first energy storage component (20) is a capacitor, and the second energy storage component (20) is a battery. (Lang – Fig. 2)
Re claim 9, Bentley as modified teaches wherein the battery is an accumulator. (Translation – Page 4, 8th Par.) Bentley does not teach wherein the battery is one of a Lithium-ion accumulator, a NIMH accumulator and a lead acid accumulator. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to provide one of a Lithium-ion accumulator, a NIMH accumulator and a lead acid accumulator for the accumulator of Bentley since they are well known types of accumulators used for batteries and energy storage.
Re claim 12, Bentley as modified teaches wherein the mobile energy storage device (6) is configured to be portable.
Re claim 13, Bentley as modified teaches a system comprising: a mobile energy storage device of claim 7; and a train brake system including a plurality of electromechanical brakes provided with brake actuators grouped into several brake actuator groups, wherein the brake actuator groups are configured such that brake actuators of one of the brake actuator groups are connectable to the energy storage device by one connector device (19). (Fig. 1) See Paragraph 5 above re claims 1 and 3.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2, 5, 6, 10, 11 and 14 are 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.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Kim, Kang and Nilsson et al. teach similar methods for releasing electromechanical brakes using energy storage devices.
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/MELANIE TORRES WILLIAMS/
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3616
MTWAugust 3, 2026
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