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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The Information Disclosure Statement filed on 7/25/2024 has been considered. An initialed copy of form 1449 is enclosed herewith.
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.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1- 15 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 pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention.
Claims 1 recites the limitation “carrier frequency adjustment unit adjusts the carrier frequency so that the carrier frequency in a case where the motor is in a state of co-rotation drive becomes higher than the carrier frequency in a case where the motor is not in the state of co-rotation drive.” Claim 12 recites the limitation “an absolute value of the torque instruction is equal to or smaller than a given threshold, the motor control device generates a PWM pulse signal for controlling operation of the inverter so that harmonic pulsation of a gap magnetic flux density between a stator and a rotor of the motor is suppressed.” It’s not clear how the carrier frequency adjustment unit adjusts the carrier frequency to new value in claim 1 and how the PWM pulse signal generate a new pulse in claim 12; the claims only recites the function and result of the apparatus operation “so that the carrier frequency…” in claim 1 and “so that harmonic pulsation…” in claim 12. The structure which goes to make up the device must be clearly and positively specified. The structure must be organized and correlated in such a manner as to present a complete operative device. The limitation “so that the carrier frequency…” in claim 1 and “so that harmonic pulsation…” recited in claims 1 and 11 renders the claims indefinite, because the claims includes elements and functions not actually disclosed (those encompassed by how the carrier frequency is adjusted in claim 1 and by how the PWM pulse signal generate a new pulse in claim 12), thereby rendering the claims confusing, vague, and indefinite.
Claims 2- 11 are rejected by virtue of its dependency on claim 1, thereby containing all the limitations of the claim on which they depend.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
Claims 1- 9 and 12- 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Saha et al. (US 20090115362 A1).
Re. claim 1, Saha discloses a motor control device (30m) connected to an inverter (19) that converts DC power (18) into AC power and that outputs the AC power to a motor (10), the motor control device (30m) controlling operation of the inverter (19) according to a torque instruction (motor target torque TM*m), thereby controlling drive of the motor (10), using the inverter (19), the motor control device comprising:
a carrier wave generation unit that generates a carrier wave;
a carrier frequency adjustment unit (carrier frequency unit 44) that adjusts a carrier frequency that is a frequency of the carrier wave (¶. [0053]); and
a PWM control unit (50) that performs pulse width modulation of a voltage instruction (Vu*, Vv*, Vw*), using the carrier wave (Frf), to generate a PWM pulse signal (Mu,Mv,Mw) for controlling operation of the inverter (19), wherein
the carrier frequency adjustment unit adjusts the carrier frequency so that the carrier frequency in a case where the motor is in a state of co-rotation drive becomes higher than the carrier frequency in a case where the motor is not in the state of co-rotation drive (¶. [0060]- [0070] and Figs. 5- 10).
Re. Claim 12, Saha discloses a motor control device (30m) connected to an inverter (19) that converts DC power (18) into AC power and that outputs the AC power to a motor (10), the motor control device (30m) controlling operation of the inverter (19) according to a torque instruction (motor target torque TM*m), thereby controlling drive of the motor (10), using the inverter (19), wherein
when an absolute value of the torque instruction is equal to or smaller than a given threshold, the motor control device generates a PWM pulse signal for controlling operation of the inverter so that harmonic pulsation of a gap magnetic flux density between a stator and a rotor of the motor is suppressed (¶. [0060]- [0070] and Figs. 5- 10).
Re. claim 2, Saha discloses wherein the carrier frequency adjustment unit compares an absolute value of the torque instruction with a given threshold (TM*mmax, FIGS. 7 to 9), and when the absolute value of the torque instruction is equal to or smaller than the threshold , determines that the motor is in a state of co-rotation drive (¶. [0060]- [0070] and Figs. 5- 10).
Re. claim 3, Saha discloses wherein the threshold is determined based on a result of an electromagnetic field analysis simulation or an experiment conducted in advance (see electromagnetic field analysis simulation or an experiment ¶. [0060]- [0070] and Figs. 5- 10).
Re. claims 4- 5, Fig. 7 shows PWM is disconnected at small value of the torque.
Re. claim 6 , Saha discloses wherein the carrier frequency in a case where the motor is in a state of co-rotation drive is determined based on at least either a process load of the motor control device or a capacity of a gate power supply that supplies power to a gate drive circuit included in the inverter (¶. [0060]- [0070] and Figs. 5- 10).
Re. claim 7 , Saha discloses wherein the motor control device controls drive of the motor so that an induced voltage generated by rotation of the motor is smaller than a withstand voltage of a switching element of the inverter (¶. [0027]).
Re. claim 8 , Saha discloses a current control unit (35) that calculates the voltage instruction (Vd* Vq*) in every given calculation cycle ,wherein the carrier frequency adjustment unit adjusts the carrier frequency in a case where the motor is in a state of co-rotation drive such that the calculation cycle is longer than half of a cycle of the carrier wave (Fig. 2).
Re. claim 9 , Saha discloses wherein the carrier frequency adjustment unit adjusts the carrier frequency so that a rate of change of the carrier frequency is equal to or smaller than a given value (Figs. 5- 10).
Re. claims 13- 15, Refer to functional structure of the motor control device 30m figs. 1 and 2.
Conclusion
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/SAID BOUZIANE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2837
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