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 § 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 1-3 and 12-14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Miyake (JP 2018-71955; see English translation included with IDS filed 12/16/2024).
As to claims 1 and 12, Miyake discloses a refrigerant us system comprising a refrigeration cycle apparatus (Fig. 7) and a refrigerant amount measurement system that comprises:
a connection portion (refrigerant lines connected to valves 27-28) connected to a first refrigerant circuit of a first refrigeration cycle apparatus (Fig. 7);
a reservoir 26 that keeps a refrigerant in the first circuit via the connecting portion and returns the refrigerant via the connecting portion;
a sensor 29 that measures an amount of refrigerant in the reservoir; and
a control device 50 with a CPU having a memory that stores measurement results.
As to claims 2 and 13, the connection portion of Miyake includes first and second pipes each with an on-off valve 27-28.
As to claims 3 and 14, Miyake discloses control unit 50 configured to control the valves 27-28 to transfer refrigerant to the reservoir 26, cause the sensor 29 to measure the amount of refrigerant, and control the reservoir 26 to return the refrigerant (paragraph 48).
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.
Claims 4-8 and 15-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miyake as applied above, and further in view of Song (US 2022/0090832).
As to claims 4-5 and 15-16, Miyake does not explicitly teach using the reservoir 26 with an additional refrigerant circuit as claimed. However, Song teaches that it is known to use one reservoir 310 with at least four connecting portion pies and multiple refrigeration circuits (Figs. 3 and 10-11). Therefore it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date, to modify Miyake to be configured in the manner as claimed in order to provide service for multiple indoor units.
As to claims 6 and 17, the modified apparatus can perform multiple test operations and thus is configured in a manner capable of performing the tests at different times.
As to claims 7 and 18, there is nothing limiting when a refrigerant measurement can be performed and thus the modified system is capable of performing the measurements in a time zone when the refrigeration cycle apparatuses are stopped.
As to claims 8 and 19, the modified apparatus includes transferring refrigerant to the reservoir when refrigerant leaks from the circuit (Song, see abstract).
Claims 9-11 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miyake as applied above.
As to claims 9-11 and 20, Miyake is silent in regards to a specific sensor type of level sensor 29. However, it would have been an obvious design choice to modify the reference by having any one of the claimed sensor types, since applicant has not disclosed that having a particular sensor type solves any stated problem or provides any unexpected result, and it appears that the system would perform equally well with any readily available type of sensor suitable to make the measurement.
Conclusion
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/JONATHAN BRADFORD/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3763
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