DETAILED ACTION
This is the First Office Action in response to the above identified patent
application filed on January 9, 2025.
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) 1-3, 5-9 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Osterman (USP 4,410,071) in view of Aoki (EP 1 491 764).
Osterman teaches a method of operating a motorized vehicle including an engine (24), a transmission (12), and a reverse drive assembly (90,94), the method comprising; moving the reverse drive assembly (gear 94) from a disengaged position to an engaged position (to mesh ring gear 82); operating a starter motor (90) to rotate a motor shaft; driving a reverse drive gear train (such as 82 and gears in transmission 12) using the motor shaft, including driving an output gear (94) mounted on the motor shaft to rotate; and driving the transmission in reverse via the rotation of the output gear.
Osterman teaches the output gear (94) configured to move axially into and out of engagement with the ring gear (82). Osterman does not teach the output gear of the reverse drive assembly being mounted on a pivot carrier. It was known in the art to configure a starter motor with an output gear mounted on a pivot carrier to move into and out of engagement with a ring gear. For example, Aoki teaches a start motor (11) with an output gear (17) mounted on a pivot carrier (20), the pivot carrier having an actuator (12) configured to move the output gear (17) into and out of engagement with a ring gear (5). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing of the claimed device to configure the starter motor arrangement of Osterman with an output gear supported by a pivot carrier, as taught by Aoki, motivation being reduce tooth collision when moving the output gear into engagement with the ring gear.
Alternatively, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing of the claimed device to configure the starter motor arrangement of Osterman with an output gear supported by a pivot carrier, as taught by Aoki, since it has been held that substituting a known gear engaging arrangement with a second known gear engaging arrangement would have been obvious to one in the art.
Claim 2: Osterman modified with Aoki teaches the transmission includes a plurality of gear pairs (48,54,60) coupled between a main shaft (14) of the transmission and a counter shaft (such as 18, or the shafts supporting planet gears) of the transmission, and wherein moving the pivot carrier (of Aoki) of the reverse drive assembly from the disengaged position to the engaged position includes moving the output gear into engagement with a main shaft gear (82).
Claim 3: Osterman modified with Aoki teaches moving the pivot carrier (of Aoki) to the disengaged position to disengage the output gear from the main shaft gear when reverse driving of the transmission is completed, and subsequently driving the transmission forward in first gear using a gear pair (48,54,60) including the main shaft gear.
Claim 5: Osterman modified with Aoki teaches moving the pivot carrier of the reverse drive assembly from the disengaged position to the engaged position includes pivoting the pivot carrier (20 of Aoki) and the output gear (17 of Aoki) about a pivot axis that forms a fixed rotation axis of an intermediate gear (16 of Aoki) of the reverse drive gear train.
Claim 6: Osterman modified with Aoki teaches maintaining engagement between the intermediate gear (16) and the output gear (17) of the reverse drive gear train during movement of the pivot carrier to the engaged position and to the disengaged position.
Claim 7: Osterman modified with Aoki teaches the pivot carrier is biased to the disengaged position by a biasing element ([0046] of Aoki describes a spring to bias the swing arm in the direction W in Fig 6), and moving the pivot carrier of the reverse drive assembly from the disengaged position to the engaged position includes pulling (direction U in Fig. 3) the pivot carrier with a control assembly.
Claim 8: Osterman modified with Aoki teaches the pivot carrier is biased to the disengaged position by a biasing element ([0046] of Aoki describes a spring to bias the swing arm in the direction W in Fig 6), and moving the pivot carrier of the reverse drive assembly from the disengaged position to the engaged position includes pulling (not pushing) the pivot carrier with a control assembly (12). However, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of effective filing of the claimed device to configure the actuator of Aoki to push the pivot carrier of Osterman, since the simple rearranging of parts is considered an obvious modification to a known device.
Claim 9: Osterman modified with Aoki teaches moving the pivot carrier of the reverse drive assembly from the disengaged position to the engaged position includes driving an actuator (12) to rotate a control arm, which in response, drives the pivot carrier through a control rod.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4 and 10-13 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.
Claims 14-20 are allowed.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: The prior art does not teach a method of operating a motorized vehicle including an engine, a transmission, and a reverse drive assembly, as defined in claim 1 including: operating the starter motor to drive an engine gear with a first pinion on the motor shaft and start the engine while an input gear of the reverse drive gear train remains engaged with a second pinion on the motor shaft (claim 4), the actuator is driven manually by a rider of a motorized vehicle (claims 10-11), or wherein prior to moving the pivot carrier from the disengaged position to the engaged position, the actuator is released from a first latched position, and wherein after moving the pivot carrier from the disengaged position to the engaged position, the actuator is secured in a second latched position (claims 12-13).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to WILLIAM C JOYCE whose telephone number is (571)272-7107. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:30-5:00.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Minnah Seoh can be reached at 571-270-7778. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/WILLIAM C JOYCE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3618