DETAILED ACTION
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
This rejection is withdrawn due to the amendments made to the claims.
Drawings
The drawings are objected to under 37 CFR 1.83(a) because they fail to show sufficient detail so that one who is familiar with the specification would understand what is being depicted without referencing the specification as described in the specification. Any structural detail that is essential for a proper understanding of the disclosed invention should be shown in the drawing. MPEP § 608.02(d). Corrected drawing sheets in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d) are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. Any amended replacement drawing sheet should include all of the figures appearing on the immediate prior version of the sheet, even if only one figure is being amended. The figure or figure number of an amended drawing should not be labeled as “amended.” If a drawing figure is to be canceled, the appropriate figure must be removed from the replacement sheet, and where necessary, the remaining figures must be renumbered and appropriate changes made to the brief description of the several views of the drawings for consistency. Additional replacement sheets may be necessary to show the renumbering of the remaining figures. Each drawing sheet submitted after the filing date of an application must be labeled in the top margin as either “Replacement Sheet” or “New Sheet” pursuant to 37 CFR 1.121(d). If the changes are not accepted by the examiner, the applicant will be notified and informed of any required corrective action in the next Office action. The objection to the drawings will not be held in abeyance.
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) 1 and 11-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Chen (U.S. Pat. No. 10,204,461) as applied to claims 1 and 15 above, and in view of Sawada (U.S. Pat. No. 8,132,867).
Regarding claim 1, 14, 15, Pagni discloses a method of operating a motor vehicle having a vehicle body, multiple road wheels attached to the vehicle body, and a decentralized brake system with multiple brake actuators each operable to decelerate a respective one of the road wheels (¶55 discloses that each wheels brake is independent) the multiple brake actuators includes front-left (FL), front-right (FR), rear-left (RL), and rear-right (RR) brake actuators (¶55 discloses a four wheel braking vehicle), the method comprising:
receiving, from each of multiple sensors operatively attached to the brake actuators, sensor data indicative of a measured actuator output of a respective one of the brake actuators, the sensor data including a respective force feedback value (420a) and a respective pressure feedback value (420b) for each of the FL, FR, RL and RR brake actuators;
calculating, via a vehicle controller for each of the brake actuators, a normalized corner output using the measured actuator output and a respective commanded target actuator output for the brake actuator, the normalized corner outputs including FL, FR, RL and RR normalized corner outputs for the FL, FR, RL and RR brake actuators, respectively (¶32), and the commanded target actuator outputs including a respective target force value and a respective target pressure value for each of the FL, FR, RL and RR brake actuators (955);
commanding, via the vehicle controller responsive to determining the actuator error percentage is greater than the vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold, operation of the decentralized brake system, a vehicle steering system, and/or a vehicle powertrain system to execute a vehicle-calibrated action to remediate the actuator fault (¶47 discloses using the data results to control braking but not a fault).
Pagni does not disclose calculating, via the vehicle controller for each of the brake actuators, a weighted average using the normalized corner output of the brake actuator and a vehicle-calibrated weight value determined from a current vehicle speed and/or a current vehicle steering angle; calculating, via the vehicle controller, an actuator error percentage as an absolute value of a mathematical difference between the weighted averages of the brake actuators; detecting, via the vehicle controller, an actuator fault when the actuator error percentage is greater than a vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold determined from the current vehicle speed and/or the current vehicle steering angle.
Chen, which deals in braking, teaches calculating, via the vehicle controller for each of the brake actuators, a weighted average using the normalized corner output of the brake actuator and a vehicle-calibrated weight value determined from a current vehicle speed and/or a current vehicle steering angle (weighted value is disclosed in col. 7, lines 20-25 which are based on “driving conditions” which includes vehicle speed col. 1, line 16-19); calculating, via the vehicle controller, an actuator error percentage as an absolute value of a mathematical difference between the weighted averages of the brake actuators (col. 7, lines 39-40 discloses calculating this error); detecting, via the vehicle controller, an actuator fault when the actuator error percentage is greater than a vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold determined from the current vehicle speed and/or the current vehicle steering angle (col. 8, line 20- col. 9, line 35 uses the results from the col. 7 equation to determine fault); and commanding, via the vehicle controller responsive to determining the actuator error percentage is greater than the vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold, operation of the decentralized brake system, a vehicle steering system, and/or a vehicle powertrain system to execute a vehicle-calibrated action to remediate the actuator fault (col. 5, lines 11-16).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to have modified Pagni with the fault detection and remediation of Chen because faults lead to unpredictable results in the control system (col. 1, lines 19-21).
Note: This claim only requires the normalized corner output, weight value and vehicle speed to determine an error which is used to create some operation in the machine in an attempt to remediate the fault. All the rest of the steps are data gathering which is deemed as extrasolution activity. The claim needs a clear recitation of these values cause the operation to change.
Regarding claim 11 which depends from claim 1, Chen discloses further comprising determining, via the vehicle controller responsive to the detected actuator fault, which of the brake actuators is a worst offending actuator based on the calculated normalized corner outputs and the calculated weighted averages (the values calculated would indicate the worse offender).
Regarding claim 12 which depends from claim 1, Chen discloses further comprising: retrieving, via the vehicle controller from a first calibration lookup table, the vehicle-calibrated weight value; retrieving, via the vehicle controller from a second calibration lookup table, the vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold; and updating a weight and threshold data set to include the vehicle-calibrated weight value and the vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold (the data stored in the computer can be construed as being in look up tables).
Regarding claim 13 which depends from claim 1, Chen discloses further comprising: receiving, via the vehicle controller, the current vehicle speed, the current vehicle steering angle, and the commanded target actuator outputs for the brake actuators; and updating a signal data set within a defined time domain to include the current vehicle speed, the current vehicle steering angle, the commanded target actuator outputs, and the measured actuator outputs (col. 5, lines 46-54).
Regarding claim 21, 22 which depends from claim 1 and 14 respectively, Pagni discloses further comprising: receiving, via the vehicle controller prior to receipt of the sensor data, a break request to activate the decentralized brake system; and activating, via the vehicle controller responsive to receipt of the brake request, the brake actuators of the decentralized brake system to decelerate the road wheels of the motor vehicle (fig. 9).
Regarding claim 23 which depends from claim 15, Chen discloses wherein the vehicle controller is further programmed to determine which of the brake actuators is a worst offending actuator based on the calculated normalized corner outputs and the calculated weighted averages (understood to be determined by the values of the calculations).
Regarding claim 24 which depends from claim 15, Chen discloses wherein the vehicle controller is further programmed to: retrieve, from a first calibration lookup table, the vehicle-calibrated weight value; retrieve, from a second calibration lookup table, the vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold; and update a weight and threshold data set to include the vehicle-calibrated weight value and the vehicle-calibrated fault deviation threshold (all data in a controller can be said to be a lookup table whether that table is full of values or full of formula for the values to be plugged into).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-10 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 and being implemented in a non-abstract way.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: The claims require a specific combination of data gathering and calculation that is not found in the claims but until they are tied to a non-abstract operation relevant to the system claimed in the independent claims they will be objected to.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 01/22/26 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. Applicant argues for the amendments made to the claims which have been addressed above. It is noted that claim 3 was incorporated into claim 1 which was noted as a way to move the case into allowance. The independent claims now require a calculation of target values for force and pressure be calculated but when the “commanding…operation” step occurs it does not state to use these target values, it only states that the operation will be to remediate fault detection. I would wonder what good target values calculated before a fault is detected will do when trying to remediate the fault, please address in the response to this action. This amendment can be submitted in after final to move forward with allowance and an interview can be done in order to review the amendment if desired.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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.
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GONZALO LAGUARDA
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3747 email: gonzalo.laguarda@uspto.gov
/GONZALO LAGUARDA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3747