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 .
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 “heat pipe” (claim 8), “elastic bellows” (claim 9), and “tolerance-compensating material arranged between the first thermal component and the second thermal component” (claim 12) must be shown or the feature(s) canceled from the claim(s). No new matter should be entered.
Furthermore, the drawings are objected to because Figs. 2-11 use solid gray shading which reduces legibility and does not adequately contrast with the rest of the drawings. See 37 CFR 1.84(m).
Additionally, the drawings will not reproduce well due to the shading and the character of
the lines. All drawings must be made by a process which will give them satisfactory reproduction
characteristics. See 37 CFR 1.84(1).
(1) Character of lines, numbers, and letters. All drawings must be made by a process
which will give them satisfactory reproduction characteristics. Every line, number, and letter
must be durable, clean, black (except for color drawings), sufficiently dense and dark, and
uniformly thick and well-defined. The weight of all lines and letters must be heavy enough to
permit adequate reproduction. This requirement applies to all lines however fine, to shading, and
to lines representing cut surfaces in sectional views. Lines and strokes of different thicknesses
may be used in the same drawing where different thicknesses have a different meaning.
(m) Shading. The use of shading in views is encouraged if it aids in understanding the
invention and if it does not reduce legibility. Shading is used to indicate the surface or shape of
spherical, cylindrical, and conical elements of an object. Flat parts may also be lightly shaded.
Such shading is preferred in the case of parts shown in perspective, but not for cross sections.
See paragraph (h)(3) of this section. Spaced lines for shading are preferred. These lines must be
thin, as few in number as practicable, and they must contrast with the rest of the drawings. As a substitute for shading, heavy lines on the shade side of objects can be used except where they superimpose on each other or obscure reference characters. Light should come from the upper left corner at an angle of 45°. Surface delineations should preferably be shown by proper shading. Solid black shading areas are not permitted, except when used to represent bar graphs or color.
Furthermore, the Figs. 2-5h, 7-9, and 11, are objected because of the use of the solid black shadings. Solid black shading areas are not permitted. See 37 CFR 1.84(m). In order to avoid abandonment of the application, Applicant must make these above drawing changes. No new matter should be entered.
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.
Specification
The specification is objected. 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, requires the specification to be written in "full, clear, concise, and exact terms." The specification contains terms which are not clear, concise and exact. The specification should be revised carefully in order to comply with 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph. Examples of some unclear, inexact or verbose terms and cumbersome clauses used in the specification are: “On the surface or at least on, e.g., one side of the housing, there is now the challenge, associated with a high power loss, of conducting the heat away as well as possible so that the parts located in the housing are protected against overheating” (par. [0004]); “The heatsink can expediently have a handle” (par. [0015]), etc.
The Office would like to emphasize that aforementioned problems are only the examples. The lengthy specification has not been checked to the extent necessary to determine the presence of all possible minor errors. Applicant’s cooperation is requested in correcting any errors of which applicant may become aware in the specification. Applicant must carefully review the entire disclosure and to amend the specification and the abstract in proper English, without any artifacts of the incorrect translation from foreign documents. Verbose passages should be streamlined, and sentences with non-standard sentence construction or grammar should be editorially improved. No new matter should be introduced (37 CFR 1.125(a)).
Claim Objections
Claims 8 and 11, are objected to because of the following informalities:
Regarding claim 8, cumbersome and unclear clause present: “the second thermal component comprises […] fluid cooling […] or “air cooling”. The terms “fluid cooling” and “air cooling” are not structural limitations, but describes cooling processes or functions. The terms do not grammatically identify system components following “comprises”. Amendment to identify system components is required, e.g., “a fluid cooling system”, “an air cooling system”, etc.
Regarding claim 11, cumbersome and unclear clause present: “the second thermal component is filled with a cooling medium or is flowed through by a cooling medium and a fluid
Appropriate corrections are required. The Office requests Applicant’s cooperation with reviewing the claims and correcting all remaining informalities present in the claims, but not made of record above.
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.
Claim 12 is 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 12 recites the limitation “tolerance-compensating material” (ll. 2-3) which lacks proper antecedent basis. Furter, the parent independent claim 1 already positively sets forth the “tolerance-compensating material” (l. 7). Does claim 12 refer to the same tolerance-compensating material or to a diffident one ? If it’s a different one, then claims must be amended accordingly in order to clearly differentiate between different “tolerance-compensations material(s)” by assigning distinct limitations to them (e.g., “first (second) tolerance-compensations material”, etc.)
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.
Claims 1-6, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by US 2014/0284040 to Colgan et al. (hereafter “Colgan”).
Regarding claim 1, Colgan discloses cooling arrangement (Figs. 7-10), comprising a housing (114b); a component to be cooled (112) arranged in the housing; and a first thermal component (114a) arranged on the component to be cooled; and a tolerance-compensating material (136) provided between the first thermal component and the housing, wherein the housing comprises a recess (can be clearly seen formed in the top surface of the housing) into which the first thermal component is inserted in such a way that the first thermal component is mechanically aligned with the component to be cooled and is thermally coupled thereto.
Regarding claim 2, Colgan discloses that the tolerance-compensating material (136) is a hardening material (see “epoxy based adhesive” in par. [0024]).
Regarding claim 3, Colgan discloses a second thermal component (140) arranged on at least one of the housing (114b) and the first thermal component (114a), (Figs. 3, 7-10; par. [0036]).
Regarding claim 4, Colgan discloses a thermal interface material (132) arranged between the first thermal component and the second thermal component or between the first thermal component (114a) and the component to be cooled (112).
Regarding claims 5 and 6, Colgan discloses that the first thermal component (114a) comprises a heatsink having a trapezoidal or rhombohedral cross-section (Figs. 7-9), wherein the heatsink comprises a collar (not numbered, but can be clearly seen on Figs. 7, 8, 10), and wherein the tolerance-compensating material (136) is arranged on the collar (Figs. 7, 8, 10).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102/103
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 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.
Claims 7-12, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as anticipated by or, in the alternative, under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Colgan.
Regarding claim 7, Colgan discloses that the heat sink comprises cooling fins or studs (fins are not numbered, but can be clearly seen on Fig. 3).
Alternatively, it would have been obvious to a person of the ordinary skill in cooling art to provide cooling fins or studs on any heat dissipating component/surface in Colgan, in order to enhance heat dissipation and cooling efficiency, since all claimed elements were known in the prior art and one skilled in the art could have combined / modified the elements as claimed by known methods with no change in their respective functions, and the combination / modification would have yielded predictable results to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention. See KSR International Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S.___, 82 USPQ2d 1385 (2007).
Regarding claim 8, Colgan discloses that the second thermal component (140) comprises an air cooling with cooling fins (fins are not numbered, but can be clearly seen on Fig. 3).
Regarding claims 9 and 10, Colgan discloses that the second thermal component is a cooling pad (140) which is at least partially manufactured from flexible material, so that a flexible layer/film part (134) of the second thermal component nestles against the first thermal component (114a), (Fig. 3).
Alternatively, it would have been obvious to a person of the ordinary skill in the cooling art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to select any suitable known materials for making of the second thermal component/flexible part in Colgan, including as claimed, in order to achieve desired mechanical and thermal characteristics of the cooling arrangement, since it has been held to be within the general skill of a worker in the art to select a known material on the basis of its suitability for the intended use as a matter of obvious design choice. See In re Leshin, 125 USPQ 416. Also, all claimed elements were known in the prior art and one skilled in the art could have combined / modified the elements as claimed by known methods with no change in their respective functions, and the combination / modification would have yielded predictable results to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention. See KSR International Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S.___, 82 USPQ2d 1385 (2007).
Regarding claim 11, Colgan discloses that the second thermal component (140) is flowed through by a cooling medium and a fluid comprising air as the cooling medium (see Fig. 3, wherein the cooling medium (air) flows between fins).
Regarding claim 12, as best understood, Colgan discloses (Figs. 3, 7-10) the tolerance-compensating material (132, 134, 136) arranged between the first thermal component (114a) and the second thermal component (140) and/or the component to be cooled (112).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to Applicant's disclosure, because of the teachings of various cooling arrangements for electronic devices, employing heat sinks and cold plates and with heat transfer through the component housing.
Furthermore, the Office would like to direct the Applicant’s attention to US 2005/ 0255646 (Fig. 2A), US 2014/0264821 (Fig. 2), and DE 102020203879 (Fig. 1, cited on IDS) which could have been also used for statutory rejection of the at least independent claim 1.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Anatoly Vortman whose telephone number is (571)272-2047. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Thursday, between 10 am and 8:30 pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jayprakash N. Gandhi can be reached at 571-272-3740. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Anatoly Vortman/
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2841
Prosecution Insights