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 .
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 and 2 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lansing et al. (U.S. 10,801,876, hereafter referred to as Lansing) in view of Mayle et al. (DE 10 2017 004 038, hereafter referred to as Mayle).
Regarding claim 1, Lansing teaches an ultrasonic flow rate measurement device for a tube portion, the ultrasonic flow rate measurement device comprising: an ultrasonic wave emission unit 12 that is installed on one side surface of the tube portion and emits an ultrasonic pulse 16 toward a measurement target fluid in the tube portion; an ultrasonic wave reception unit 14 that receives the ultrasonic pulse 16 having passed through the measurement target fluid in the tube portion; an ultrasonic processing unit 42 that executes processing of emitting the ultrasonic pulse in the ultrasonic wave emission unit and processing of receiving the ultrasonic pulse in the ultrasonic wave reception unit; and a flow rate calculation unit that calculates an average flow velocity of the measurement target fluid flowing in the tube portion based on a reception result of the ultrasonic pulse received by the ultrasonic wave reception unit, and calculates an intra-tube flow rate by multiplying the average flow velocity by a cross-sectional area of the tube portion (see column 6, lines 30-43, ‘the operation of determining the first fluid flow rate may include further operations including determining, for each measurement path, a path velocity, and determining, for each measurement path, a first weighted path velocity as a mathematical product of the path velocity for the measurement path and a first weighting factor that is assigned to the measurement path for use in determining the first fluid flow rate. The further operations may also include determining a first mean fluid flow velocity through the conduit as a sum of the first weighted path velocities for each measurement path, and determining the first fluid flow rate as a mathematical product of the first mean fluid flow velocity and a cross-sectional area of the conduit. Accordingly, the first fluid flow rate is a volumetric flow rate’), wherein a plurality of the ultrasonic wave emission units are arranged on a same straight line orthogonal to a flow direction on the one side surface and installed at a same angle with respect to the one side surface (see figure 3, 1A-6A), a plurality of the ultrasonic wave reception units (see figure 3, 1B-6B) are installed at positions respectively facing the plurality of ultrasonic wave emission units on an opposing side surface facing the one side surface, the ultrasonic processing unit 42 causes each of the ultrasonic wave emission units to emit ultrasonic pulses having different frequencies from each other, determines whether or not the ultrasonic pulse received by the ultrasonic wave reception unit is an ultrasonic pulse emitted from the opposing ultrasonic wave emission unit on the basis of the frequency of the ultrasonic pulse (see column 7, lines 64-66; see claim 19), and transmits a reception result to the flow rate calculation unit 50 when the ultrasonic pulse is the ultrasonic pulse emitted from the opposing ultrasonic wave emission unit, and the flow rate calculation unit calculates a local average flow velocity for each of the ultrasonic wave emission units on the basis of the reception result of the ultrasonic pulse transmitted from the ultrasonic processing unit for each of the ultrasonic wave reception units, and calculates the intra-tube flow rate by a sum of local flow rates obtained by multiplying the local average flow velocity by a local area for each of the ultrasonic wave emission units (see claim 14, ‘wherein the operation of determining the first fluid flow rate includes further operations comprising: determining, for each measurement path in the set of the measurement paths, a path velocity; determining, for each measurement path in the set of the measurement paths, a first weighted path velocity as a mathematical product of the path velocity for the measurement path and a first weighting factor that is assigned to the measurement path for use in determining the first fluid flow rate; determining a first mean fluid flow velocity through the conduit as a sum of the first weighted path velocities for each measurement path; and determining the first fluid flow rate as a mathematical product of the first mean fluid flow velocity and a cross-sectional area of the conduit’).
However, Lansing does not explicitly teach a rectangular tube portion.
Mayle teaches an ultrasonic device for calculating flowrate comprising a rectangular tube 3 having the rectangular tube portion formed in a rectangular shape (see figure 2), wherein the rectangular tube portion in the rectangular tube and each of the ultrasonic wave emission units (5, 6) are integrally installed (see figure 9).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the device of Lansing with the teaching of Mayle since a change in the shape of a prior art device is a design consideration within the skill of the art. In re Dailey, 357 F.2d 669, 149 USPQ 47 (CCPA 1966).
Regarding claim 2, Lansing further teaches wherein the one side surface on which the plurality of ultrasonic wave emission units is installed is defined as a first side surface, the opposing side surface on which the plurality of ultrasonic wave reception units are installed is defined as a first opposing side surface, a side surface different from the first side surface by 90 degrees is defined as a second side surface, and a side surface facing the second side surface is defined as a second opposing side surface, the plurality of other ultrasonic wave emission units are arranged on a same straight line orthogonal to the flow direction on the second side surface and are installed at a same angle with respect to the second side surface, the plurality of other ultrasonic wave reception units are installed at positions facing the plurality of other ultrasonic wave emission units on the second opposing side surface, respectively, and the flow rate calculation unit calculates, as the intra-tube flow rate, an average value of a first intra-tube flow rate calculated based on a local average flow velocity of each of the plurality of ultrasonic wave emission units on the first side surface and a second intra-tube flow rate calculated based on a local average flow velocity of each of the plurality of other ultrasonic wave emission units on the second side surface.
However, Lansing does not explicitly teach a rectangular tube portion.
Mayle teaches an ultrasonic device for calculating flowrate comprising a rectangular tube 3 having the rectangular tube portion formed in a rectangular shape (see figure 2), wherein the rectangular tube portion in the rectangular tube and each of the ultrasonic wave emission units (5, 6) are integrally installed (see figure 9).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the device of Lansing with the teaching of Mayle since a change in the shape of a prior art device is a design consideration within the skill of the art. In re Dailey, 357 F.2d 669, 149 USPQ 47 (CCPA 1966).
Claim(s) 3 and 4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lansing in view of Mayle, and further in view of Mogi et al. (JP H05223608, hereafter referred to as Mogi).
Regarding claims 3 and 4, Lansing teaches connecting portions (see figure 1) for connecting with other tubes; however, the shape of the tube is not rectangular.
Mayle teaches an ultrasonic device for calculating flowrate comprising a rectangular tube 3 having the rectangular tube portion formed in a rectangular shape (see figure 2), wherein the rectangular tube portion in the rectangular tube and each of the ultrasonic wave emission units (5, 6) are integrally installed (see figure 9).
However Mayle does not explicitly teach a plurality of ultrasonic wave emission/reception units.
Mogi teaches an ultrasonic flowmeter wherein a rectangular measuring tube section 15 has transducers 20 mounted on a sidewall opposite transducers 21 (see figure 1).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the teachings of Lansing and Mogi with the teaching of Mayle in since a change in the shape of a prior art device is a design consideration within the skill of the art. In re Dailey, 357 F.2d 669, 149 USPQ 47 (CCPA 1966).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JAMEL E WILLIAMS whose telephone number is (571)270-7027. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Thursday, 10am-4pm.
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/JAMEL E WILLIAMS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2855
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