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 .
Examiner’s note: Applicant incorrectly identifies claims 19 and 22 as Withdrawn in the claims document. In the restriction requirement mailed 5/16/2025 Examiner identified that these claims “each appear to recite a trivial feature and will be examined with whichever single invention group is elected”. Examiner has been examining these claims since then. Applicant should remove the designator identifying these claims as Withdrawn in any subsequent claims documents. Unless Applicant does in fact want these claims withdrawn, in which case Applicant should explicitly sate so in the next response in order to set the record clear on the matter.
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 final rejection. 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 6/01/2026 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's remarks filed 5/04/2026 have been fully considered.
Regarding the prior 112(b) rejections, Applicant’s amendments overcome all prior rejections.
Regarding the prior art rejection of amended claim 1, in paragraph 3 of page 7 through paragraph 2 of page 11 of Applicant’s Remarks, Applicant’s arguments are directed to that the prior art fails to disclose, teach, or suggest former claim 1 combined with former claim 23.
The arguments are not persuasive because Schreiber in view of Troeder teaches a chamber as required by the claims, as identified in the previous office action: The radially outward portion of Schreiber’s tooth tip region engages a corresponding gear profile, and this radially outward portion of Schreiber’s tooth tip region may be identified somewhat arbitrarily to be a region which exists entirely radially outward/beyond the interior chamber taught by Troeder (see e.g. the interior chamber 3 in Troeder’s Fig 2).
In response to Applicants remark in the footnote of page 8 of Applicant’s Remarks, it is noted that Examiner has (contrary to Applicant’s assertion) considered the meaning of the term “interior”. The term was explicitly considered and addressed, as discussed in for example the Response to Arguments of the previous office action.
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) 1-2, 9-10, 19-21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 10683922 B2 (hereinafter Schreiber) in view of DE 2509488 A1 (hereinafter Troeder).
Regarding claim 1, Schreiber discloses:
A transmission comprising:
a fixed gear ring (3; Fig 1);
a first drive member (11; Fig 1) rotationally supported within the fixed gear ring (Fig 1 shows this),
the first drive member defining a plurality of radially arranged apertures each of which accommodates a respective one of a plurality of tooth elements (col 6 line 46: “The teeth 7 are mounted in radially displaceable fashion in a tooth carrier 11. For this purpose, the tooth carrier 11 has radially oriented, duct-like circular or slot-shaped openings which ensure radial guidance of the teeth 7 in the tooth carrier 11”),
each of the plurality of tooth elements having a tooth tip region and a tooth base (Fig 1 shows this),
the first drive member comprising a radially outer face and a radially inner face (Fig 1 shows this),
and wherein the tooth tip region each of the plurality of tooth elements engages a corresponding gear profile (5; Fig 1) defined by the fixed gear ring,
a second drive member (20; Fig 1) which is rotationally supported such that it extends within the first drive member (Fig 1 shows this),
the second drive member defining a cam profile (22; Fig 1) which engages each of the plurality of tooth elements (Fig 1 shows this),
Despite that Schreiber does disclose lubrication groove 60 in Fig 3,
Schreiber may not explicitly disclose:
wherein at least one of the plurality of tooth elements defines an interior chamber.
However, Troeder, in the same field of endeavor, geared teeth, teaches
In Fig 1 and 2 that the gear teeth may have a hollow core 3 in order “To increase the torque transmission capacity of a gear wheel, it is necessary to control the contact pressure on the tooth face. By increasing the elasticity of the gear tooth, it deforms more easily when a load is applied. This increases the contact area between the teeth, thus reducing the specific contact pressure. By producing a gear tooth with a hollow core (3) along the tooth axis, its deformability is increased.” (abstract).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Schreiber to include Troeder’s teachings as described above, having at least one of the plurality of tooth elements define an interior chamber, in order “To increase the torque transmission capacity of a gear wheel, it is necessary to control the contact pressure on the tooth face. By increasing the elasticity of the gear tooth, it deforms more easily when a load is applied. This increases the contact area between the teeth, thus reducing the specific contact pressure. By producing a gear tooth with a hollow core (3) along the tooth axis, its deformability is increased.” (abstract).
This modification results in teaching the following limitation:
and wherein for each of the at least one of the plurality of tooth elements, no portion of the tooth tip region forms a portion of a volume of the interior chamber (the tooth tip region may be identified somewhat arbitrarily to be a region which exists entirely radially outward/beyond the interior chamber).
Regarding claim 2, Schreiber, as modified above, discloses:
the interior chamber extends along a longitudinal axis of the respective tooth element (Troeder Fig 2 clearly shows this).
Regarding claim 9, Schreiber, as modified above, discloses:
[a] maximum dimension of the interior chamber taken in a plane normal to the tooth axis is between 50% and 80% of [a] maximum dimension of the respective tooth element
(Troeder Annotated Fig 1a has been created to illustrate that arbitrary directions may be chosen to meet this requirement, regardless of the relative dimensions of the interior chamber and the tooth element) (Note that Applicant’s Figs 9 and 10 identify D2 as a maximum dimension of the tooth element, but D2 is a maximum dimension according to just one arbitrary direction of many possible arbitrary directions, because the actual largest maximum dimension of the tooth element, in both Figs 9 and 10, is in the “vertical” direction, i.e. it would be identified if the currently-shown “D2” were rotated 90° and then extended to the full limits of the tooth element).
PNG
media_image1.png
546
738
media_image1.png
Greyscale
Annotated Fig 1a
Regarding claim 10, Schreiber, as modified above, discloses:
the interior chamber has a volume that is between 5% and 70% of the volume of space occupied by the respective tooth element (Troeder Figs 1 and 2 show this).
Regarding claim 19, Schreiber, as modified above, discloses:
the shape of the cross section of the interior chamber does not match the shape of the cross section of the tooth body (Troeder Fig 2 shows this).
Regarding claim 20, Schreiber, as modified above, discloses:
the internal chamber has a volume (Troeder Fig 2 shows this)
Schreiber may not explicitly disclose:
the internal chamber has a volume which is more than 20% of the total volume of space occupied by the respective tooth element.
Courts have established that a change in size/proportion will not sustain a patent and is not inventive, rather a form of routine optimization which would be obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art. In this case, it appears that Troeder’s Fig 1 and Fig 2 are not identified as to scale and simply show a hollow core 3 sized relative to the tooth 2 while identifying, in the abstract, that the size of the hollow core 3 is a result-effective variable which affects the deformability of the tooth 2 (“By increasing the elasticity of the gear tooth, it deforms more easily when a load is applied. This increases the contact area between the teeth, thus reducing the specific contact pressure. By producing a gear tooth with a hollow core (3) along the tooth axis, its deformability is increased.”). Therefore, it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill to merely change the size of Troeder’s hollow core 3 relative to the size of Troeder’s tooth 2. In other words, it is not inventive to merely change the prior art’s size of the hollow core relative to the tooth. See MPEP 2144.04(IV).
Regarding claim 21, Schreiber, as modified above, discloses:
the internal chamber has a volume (Troeder Fig 2 shows this)
Schreiber may not explicitly disclose:
the internal chamber has a volume that is more than 50% of the total volume of space occupied by the respective tooth element.
Courts have established that a change in size/proportion will not sustain a patent and is not inventive, rather a form of routine optimization which would be obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art. In this case, it appears that Troeder’s Fig 1 and Fig 2 are not identified as to scale and simply show a hollow core 3 sized relative to the tooth 2 while identifying, in the abstract, that the size of the hollow core 3 is a result-effective variable which affects the deformability of the tooth 2 (“By increasing the elasticity of the gear tooth, it deforms more easily when a load is applied. This increases the contact area between the teeth, thus reducing the specific contact pressure. By producing a gear tooth with a hollow core (3) along the tooth axis, its deformability is increased.”). Therefore, it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill to merely change the size of Troeder’s hollow core 3 relative to the size of Troeder’s tooth 2. In other words, it is not inventive to merely change the prior art’s size of the hollow core relative to the tooth. See MPEP 2144.04(IV).
Claim(s) 22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schreiber in view of Troeder and US 20130043683 A1 (Genovese).
Regarding claim 22, Schreiber, as modified above, discloses:
a transmission in accordance with Claim 1 (see claim 1 above).
Schreiber may not disclose:
A wind turbine including a tower on which is mounted a nacelle that supports a rotatable hub, wherein the rotatable hub is coupled to the transmission.
However, Genovese, in the same field of endeavor, transmissions, teaches:
A wind turbine (Fig 1) including a tower on which is mounted a nacelle that supports a rotatable hub (Fig 1 shows all this), wherein the rotatable hub is coupled to a transmission (harmonic drive 20; Fig 1).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Schreiber to include Genovese’s teachings as described above, having a wind turbine including a tower on which is mounted a nacelle that supports a rotatable hub, wherein the rotatable hub is coupled to the transmission, in order to use the transmission of claim 1 in a wind turbine.
These claim limitations are essentially directed to the environment of use, wherein the transmission is used within a wind turbine, and Genovese teaches a wind turbine engine that uses an analogous transmission.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Art Golik whose telephone number is (571)272-6211. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 9:00-5:30.
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, Courtney Heinle can be reached at 571-270-3508. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/Art Golik/Examiner, Art Unit 3745
/COURTNEY D HEINLE/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3745
Prosecution Insights