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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after allowance or after an Office action under Ex Parte Quayle, 25 USPQ 74, 453 O.G. 213 (Comm'r Pat. 1935). Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, prosecution in this application has been reopened pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 07/30/26 has been entered.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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.
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by McCormick et al. US 5,349,337 (“McCormick”).
McCormick discloses:
A numerical control device comprising:
a processor (e.g. Fig. 1),
wherein the processor is configured to:
carry out deep hole drilling by repeatedly performing a first cutting operation of causing a cutting tool to cut into a workpiece while rotating the cutting tool and a second cutting operation of causing the cutting tool to cut into the workpiece at a feed rate lower than that of the first cutting operation while rotating the cutting tool (e.g., col. 5 lines 47-66: peck cycle); and
calculate a chip removal time in accordance with a position of the cutting tool at an end of each cutting in the first cutting operation (e.g., col. 5 lines 47-66: full retract cycles, bit is fully retracted from the drill hole to clear chips from the drill hole; thus the retraction distance is known, the retraction time can be calculated based on the retraction distance and retraction speed, col. 4 lines 9-11: the elapsed drill time which includes the time of retract cycles is programmed into the control computer, thus the retract time is calculated),
wherein the processor performs the second cutting operation for the chip removal time (e.g., col. 5 lines 47-66, retract cycle to clear chips from the drill hole).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-5 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The prior art of record fails to teach or fails suggest “where the processor calculates the chip removal time based on a rotation speed, a number of cutting edges, a radius, and a helix angle of the cutting tool, the position of the cutting tool at the end of each cutting in the first cutting operation, and a chip breaking-off capability coefficient, and calculates a variable feed rate for the cutting tool based on the chip removal time, and the processor deep-hole drilling execution unit performs the second cutting operation at the variable feed rate for the chip removal time,” as recited in claim 2, in combination with the remaining features and elements of the claimed invention.
Claims 3-5 depend from claim 2.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RYAN A JARRETT whose telephone number is (571)272-3742. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00-5:30.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Kenneth Lo can be reached at 571-272-9774. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/RYAN A JARRETT/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2116
09/08/26
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