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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election without traverse of Group I, claims 1 and 3-12 in the reply filed on 15 May 2026 is acknowledged.
Claim 2 is withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected invention, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 15 May 2026.
Claim 3 is directed to an allowable product. Pursuant to the procedures set forth in MPEP § 821.04(b), claim 12, directed to the process of making or using the allowable product, previously withdrawn from consideration as a result of a restriction requirement, is hereby rejoined and fully examined for patentability under 37 CFR 1.104. Claim 2 does not require all the limitations of an allowable product and thus has NOT been rejoined.
Because a claimed invention previously withdrawn from consideration under 37 CFR 1.142 has been rejoined, the restriction requirement for claim 12 as set forth in the Office action mailed on 16 March 2026 is hereby withdrawn. In view of the withdrawal of the restriction requirement as to the rejoined inventions, applicant(s) are advised that if any claim presented in a divisional application is anticipated by, or includes all the limitations of, a claim that is allowable in the present application, such claim may be subject to provisional statutory and/or nonstatutory double patenting rejections over the claims of the instant application.
Once the restriction requirement is withdrawn, the provisions of 35 U.S.C. 121 are no longer applicable. See In re Ziegler, 443 F.2d 1211, 1215, 170 USPQ 129, 131-32 (CCPA 1971). See also MPEP § 804.01.
Drawings
The drawings are objected to under 37 CFR 1.83(a). The drawings must show every feature of the invention specified in the claims. Therefore, the “edge…has a longitudinal mark” of claims 3, 5 and 7 must be shown or the feature(s) canceled from the claim(s). No new matter should be entered. The drawings show the marks as being located on surfaces not edges as an edge is defined as a line or segment that is the intersection of two faces.
The drawings are objected to because the character of the lines, numbers, and letters are not sufficiently dense and dark, uniformly thick and well-defined as required by MPEP §608.02(V)(l). Figure 5 is of poor line quality.
The examiner points out that the USPTO website has guidelines on how to submit drawing images for the best results. See https://www.uspto.gov/patents-application-process/applying-online/efs-web-pdf-guidelines. Specifically, see the section which states:
It is recommended to use images saved in a lossless format (e.g., TIFF, PNG, GIF, BMP). It is strongly recommended that the PDF creation software does not downsample images during the PDF creation process, as this could degrade the quality of the image.
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 § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claims 1, 6-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 1 recites “the first bearing ring”. There is a lack of antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. The claim previously recited “an outer bearing ring” and “an inner bearing ring”. It is unclear which “the first” is referencing.
Claim 6 recites “twin rings having the same design”. It is unclear what “the same design” means, for example, must the rings be identical or merely similar?
Claim 6 recites “a first mark at the level of one of the through holes” and “a second mark at the level of the other of the through holes”. As written, it is unclear what geometrical constraint “at the level” is intended to impart. For example, does “at the level” mean it must be at the same radial location or does it simply mean that the elements are aligned with each other?
Claims 7 and 9 recites “a longitudinal plane”. Claim 3 previously recited “a same longitudinal plane”. It is unclear of the plane of claim 7 is the same as that of claim 3 or if they are different planes.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-5 and 12 are allowed.
Claim 1 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action.
Claims 6-11 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The closest prior art references are Yamazuki JP 2014-047863 and Tako JP 2011-106493.
Regarding claim 1, neither reference discloses the cylindrical inner surface of the inner bearing ring includes a longitudinal mark. There would be no reason to modify either reference to provide a longitudinal mark on the outside of the outer ring and on the inside of the inner ring. Such an orientation would destroy the references since there would be no way to align the marks.
Regarding claim 3, neither reference discloses the longitudinal hole of the outer ring being on a first external face with a longitudinal hole of the inner ring being on the opposite external face such that the external faces delimit the axial length of the bearing together with the particular orientations of the marks and the longitudinal holes.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ALAN B WAITS whose telephone number is (571)270-3664. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Thursday from 6-4 EST.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, John R Olszewski can be reached at 571-272-2706. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ALAN B WAITS/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3617
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