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.
Claims 1-3 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Maeshima (US PG Pub 2013/0094888) in view of Itoh (US PG Pub 2020/0369483).
For claim 1: Maeshima teaches a sheet conveying device (see Fig. 1, sheet conveyance apparatus) that sequentially conveys a plurality of sheets P, comprising: a first conveying roller 311 that is driven to rotate by receiving driving force from a first drive unit 202 to convey a sheet P (see Fig. 2); a second conveying roller 312 that is provided downstream of the first conveying roller 311 in a sheet conveying direction (see Fig. 1) to convey the sheet P; a sheet sensor 313 that is provided between the first conveying roller 311 and the second conveying roller 312 and detects a leading edge and a rear edge of the sheet (see paragraph 33, detecting the recording material P when the recording material passes through the position); and a speed control unit 401 (see paragraph 41) that controls a conveying speed of the sheet by each of the first conveying roller and the second conveying roller, the speed control unit being configured to change, the conveying speed of the sheet by the first conveying roller from an initial speed to a high speed faster than the initial speed (see paragraph 38 and paragraph 58, Fig. 3 and Fig. 8, in particular in Fig. 8, the speed is increased when the leading edge is detected later to accelerate the sheet), determine, on a basis of a second elapsed amount from the reference time point to a second time point at which the leading edge of the second sheet is detected (see paragraphs 59 and 60), return timing at which the conveying speed of the sheet by the first conveying roller is returned from the high speed to the initial speed (see Fig. 8, Tacc), and return the conveying speed of the sheet by the first conveying roller from the high speed to the initial speed at the determined return timing (see Fig. 8, after the acceleration deceleration period, a return to the initial speed Vp during the transfer preparation period in advance of the transfer position). Maeshima does not teach and that the second conveying roller is driven to rotate by receiving driving force from a second drive unit, detecting where a leading edge of a following second sheet has not been detected at a reference time point at which a first elapsed amount from a first time point at which a rear edge of a first sheet that is fed previously is detected reaches a reference amount corresponding to predetermined sheet spacing nor does it teach to maintain the conveying speed of the sheet by the second conveying roller at the initial speed. However, Itoh teaches controlling the second conveying roller with driving force from a second drive unit (paragraph 124, providing the motor for the registration roller separately) and controlling the feeding speed when there is a delay in detection of feeding a subsequent sheet (see paragraph 65). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing date of the invention to modify the invention of Maeshima to provide a separate motor for the registration roller as taught by Itoh for the purpose of more readily separately controlling its speed and control the feed speed when there is a delay in detection of a subsequent speed as taught by Itoh for the purpose of registering printed images onto sheets even when sheets are delayed.
In combination, since the sheet is returned to its initial feeding speed by the time it arrives at the registration roller position in Maeshima (see Fig. 8), the speed of the separately controlled registration roller would not change.
For claim 2: The combination of Maeshima and Itoh teaches all of the limitations of claim 1 and Maeshima further teaches the speed control unit is further configured to calculate an estimated continuation amount Z from the reference time point using the following calculation formula and determine, as the return timing, a time point obtained by adding the estimated continuation amount Z to the reference time point, Z = V2-Tb / (V2 - V1) (see Figs. 3 and Fig. 8, the estimated continuation amount Z is determined as Tacc, since the amount returns the sheet to the desired position seen in Fig. 3 based on the higher speed V2 being the increased speed in Fig. 8 above speed Vp constituting speed V1).
For claim 3: The combination of Maeshima and Itoh teaches all of the limitations of claim 1 and Maeshima further teaches the image forming device (see Fig. 1) with a toner image being transferred to a sheet conveyed by the sheet conveyance device to an image transfer position (see Fig. 1).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DAVID H BANH whose telephone number is (571)270-3851. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 12-8PM.
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/DAVID H BANH/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2853