DETAILED ACTION
Claim Rejections - and 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103(a) which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
(a) A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1-5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over Harner et al. US 4455058 (“Harner”).
Regarding claim 1, Harner discloses an insulation piercing connector 100 is adapted to pierce a cable 11 positioned therein, wherein the insulation piercing connector comprises:
a base 12 having a cable slot 14 for positioning and accommodating the cable and a pivoting groove (formed by hooks 16) located at a side of the least one cable slot (figure 4); and
a cover 13 pivotally connected to the base, wherein the cover comprises a
conductive piercing member 23 disposed corresponding to the cable slot and a shaft 28 disposed corresponding to pivoting groove,
the shaft is inserted into the pivoting groove to form a hinge connection between the cover and the base, and the conductive piercing member is aligned to the cable,
during the process that the cover rotates along a first rotating direction to cover the base, the conductive piercing member moves toward the cable to pierce the cable.
Harner does not explicitly state that the cover and base are detachable. Note that the plastic material of the base and cover is inherently resilient because the latches (37, 38) are flexible. It would have been obvious, if not inherent, to make the cover and base detachable as a matter of engineering design choice, to simplify assembly and disassembly of the connector by allowing the shaft 28 and hooks 16 to be attached and detached. See In re Dulberg, 289 F.2d 522, 523, 129 USPQ 348, 349 (CCPA 1961) (The claimed structure, a lipstick holder with a removable cap, was fully met by the prior art except that in the prior art the cap is "press fitted" and therefore not manually removable. The court held that "if it were considered desirable for any reason to obtain access to the end of [the prior art’s] holder to which the cap is applied, it would be obvious to make the cap removable for that purpose.").
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Per claim 2 the base comprises a base snap 17 opposite to the pivoting groove and the cover further comprises a cover snap (37, 38) opposite to the shaft, the cover snap is aligned to the base snap, during the process that the cover rotates along the first rotating direction to cover the base, the cover snap move toward the base snap to be engaged with the base snap.
Per claim 3 the conductive piercing member is located between the cover snap and the shaft.
Per claim 4 a distance between the conductive piercing member and the cover snap is greater than a distance between the conductive piercing member and the shaft.
Per claim 5 the base further has an upper side (labeled US above) facing the cover, a first lateral side (labeled LS1), and a second lateral side (labeled LS2), and the first lateral side
and the second lateral side are connected to two opposite ends of the upper side, the cable slot 14 extends from the first lateral side to the second lateral side and is recessed (in particular at slots 15) from the upper side.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 6-10 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
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ROSS GUSHI whose telephone number is (571)272-2005. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Thursday, 8:30 - 5:00.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Christopher Koehler can be reached on 571-272-3560. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ROSS N GUSHI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2834
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