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 Interpretation
The Claim limitation "and/or" is hereby interpreted as “or” in the instant rejection.
Claim Objections
Claim 11 is objected to because of the following informalities: “at least one heat exchanger, wherein each of these heat exchangers” in ll. 2 should be rewritten to be -- at least one heat exchanger, wherein each of the at least one heat exchangers --, and will be interpreted accordingly. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claims 8-9 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor, or for pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention.
Regarding Claim 8, the limitation “monitoring a future state of the at least one heat exchanger” in ll. 5 is indefinite, in context, since it cannot be discerned in what manner the future state of the heat exchanger is being actively monitored. For Examination purposes and in accordance with the specification and drawings, “monitoring a future state of the at least one heat exchange” will be interpreted as –predicting a future state of the at least one heat exchange--.
Regarding Claim 8, the limitation “monitoring a past state of the at least one heat exchanger” in ll. 6 is indefinite, in context, since it cannot be discerned in what manner the past state of the heat exchanger is being actively monitored. For Examination purposes and in accordance with the specification and drawings, “monitoring a future state of the at least one heat exchange” will be interpreted as – predicting a past state of the at least one heat exchange --.
Regarding Claim 9, the limitation “controlling the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of these received inputs” ll. 3 is indefinite, in context, since it cannot be discerned in what manner the heat exchanger is being controlled. Are working mediums passing through the heat exchanger being altered or are the structural components of the heat exchanger being altered?. For Examination purposes and in accordance with the specification and drawings, “controlling the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of these received inputs” will be interpreted as – controlling any parameter or component that interacts with the heat exchanger either directly or indirectly --.
Regarding Claim 12, the limitation “the graphical user interface is configured to control the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of these received inputs” ll. 4 is indefinite, in context, since it cannot be discerned in what manner the heat exchanger is being controlled. Are working mediums passing through the heat exchanger being altered or are the structural components of the heat exchanger being altered?. For Examination purposes and in accordance with the specification and drawings, “the graphical user interface is configured to control the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of these received inputs” will be interpreted as – the graphical user interface is configured to control any parameter or component that interacts with the heat exchanger either directly or indirectly on the basis of these received inputs --.
Regarding Claim 15, is appears as the method steps of Claim 15 are recited twice, once in Claim 1 where the limitations are referenced and another time directly stated within the Claim body. For Examination purposes and in accordance with the specification and drawings, “A computer program that causes a computing system, in particular the computing system according to claim 13 to perform” will be interpreted as – A computer program that causes a computing system to perform --.
A broad range or limitation together with a narrow range or limitation that falls within the broad range or limitation (in the same claim) may be considered indefinite if the resulting claim does not clearly set forth the metes and bounds of the patent protection desired. See MPEP § 2173.05(c). In the present instance, claim 15 recites the broad recitation “a computing system”, and the claim also recites “in particular, the computing system of Claim 13” which is the narrower statement of the range/limitation. The claim(s) are considered indefinite because there is a question or doubt as to whether the feature introduced by such narrower language is (a) merely exemplary of the remainder of the claim, and therefore not required, or (b) a required feature of the claims.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 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 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 of this title, 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 1-6 and 8-16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Steinbauer et al. (US PG Pub. 2021/0341402A1 utilized as a Translation of EP3623737A1) in view of Svensson (EP2951653B1), hereinafter referred to as Steinbauer and Svensson, respectively.
Regarding Claim 1, Steinbauer discloses a method for managing a process engineering facility (“The apparatus can expediently be designed as a component of a process plant and can be connected to further system components, for example to further heat exchangers, columns or containers for phase separation” (¶11)) having at least one heat exchanger (1), wherein each of these heat exchangers (1) is designed as a plate heat exchanger (“The process apparatus through which a fluid flows can be designed in particular as a heat exchanger, in particular as a plate heat exchanger” (¶11)) and each comprises a plurality of heat exchanger blocks (being two adjacent separating plates with fins therebetween, “The central body 8 is essentially an arrangement of separating plates, heat exchange profiles (so-called fins) and distributor profiles. Separating plates and layers with profiles alternate. A layer having a heat exchange profile and distributor profiles is called a passage” ¶51), comprising:
receiving sensor values from sensors (“The temperature sensors 10 are coupled in a data-transmitting manner to a computing unit 20, which may be designed, for example, as a control device of the heat exchanger 1”, (¶56)) which are arranged on or in the at least one heat exchanger (shown in figure 1);
determining parameters wherein an operation of the at least one heat exchanger, on the basis of the received sensor values, wherein a temperature difference between heat exchanger blocks (shown in figure 1, wherein the sensors are positioned along the width of the heat exchanger (1) and perform measurements at various blocks) of the at least one heat exchanger is determined as a parameter (“a method for continuously determining the service life consumption of process apparatuses such as the heat exchanger 1 which are subjected to thermal stress, on the basis of sufficiently many temperature measurements or sufficiently precise determination of the temperature field” (¶70));
processing the sensor values and/or the parameters (20, see ¶56), wherein a service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined as the state on the basis of the determined temperature difference between the heat exchanger blocks (“In step 205, a remaining service life of the heat exchanger 1 is determined in the remote computing unit 30 as a function of this determined mechanical stress” (¶62)) of the at least one heat exchanger (shown in figure 2);
outputting the processed sensor values and/or parameters (“temperature profiles or temperature fields of the heat exchanger 1 are captured as temperature measurement values by means of the fiber Bragg grating sensors 10 and transmitted from the sensors 10 to the computing unit 20” (¶58)) in a computing unit (20);
wherein the service life of the at least one heat exchanger (100, 210) is monitored (“it is preferably possible to determine in real time or on-line the mechanical stresses in the material of the process apparatuses through which a fluid flows and therefrom to continuously estimate the remaining service life”, (¶38)). Steinbauer fails to disclose a graphical display of a state of the at least one heat exchanger, a graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined, wherein the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is output in the graphical user interface and managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of the output, processed sensor values and/or parameters in the graphical user interface.
Svensson, also drawn to determining a service life for a heat exchanger (“However, larger and more complex machine parts such as heat exchangers, tanks, homogenizers, etc. also form part of the entire processing system”), teaches a graphical display (shown in figure 7) of a state of the at least one heat exchanger (see previous annotation, wherein a heat exchanger is contemplated as a machine part), a graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined (shown in figure 7), wherein the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is output in the graphical user interface (shown in figure 7) and managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger (“The method comprises the steps of selecting at least one machine part of said liquid processing system; calculating an expected remaining usable time based on a predictive life time of said machine part; determining at least one real-time operating condition of said at least one machine part; and providing said expected time for maintenance and said at least one operating condition as data for enabling a decision whether to perform maintenance of said machine part or not”) on the basis of the output, processed sensor values “(in step 206, the method fetches information of certain conditions of the machine part…it may also be possible to retrieve the actual condition from sensors or meters arranged only for this particular purpose, i.e. to provide information on specific machine parts”) and/or parameters (“In step 204, the predictive life time data is used to calculate an expected remaining usable life time depending on various parameters such as actual operating time, type of liquid product being processed, etc…”) in the graphical user interface (shown in figure 7).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to provide Steinbauer with a graphical display of a state of the at least one heat exchanger, a graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined, wherein the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is output in the graphical user interface and managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of the output, processed sensor values and/or parameters in the graphical user interface, as taught by Svensson, the motivation being to make “it possible for a processing plant owner to improve the maintenance process in a very convenient manner. By determining the expected remaining usable life time for a specific machine part, by using history data and actual process parameters, as well as determining the actual condition for the same machine part, maintenance may be planned and scheduled in a much improved way” and to “provide real time condition monitoring that “will allow the system operator or the service provider to perform operator driven checks only when it is required, i.e. when the machine part condition is alerting such task. Further, the method allows a machine part supplier to access the condition data to perform more detailed analysis of the current condition, thus assisting the system operator or service provider to decide on the necessary maintenance tasks.”
Regarding Claim 2, a modified Steinbauer further teaches a change in the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined (“Within the framework of the present method, it is preferably possible to determine in real time or on-line the mechanical stresses in the material of the process apparatuses through which a fluid flows and therefrom to continuously estimate the remaining service life” (¶38)) as the state of the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of the determined temperature difference between the heat exchanger blocks of the at least one heat exchanger (“The temperature calculation values are preferably location- and/or time-dependent temperature differences, i.e. temporal or local temperature gradients. This is because it has been found that a service life consumption depends essentially on temperature gradients in the material” ¶16 of Steinbauer), wherein a graphical display of the change in the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined (see ¶38 of Steinbauer, wherein the change in service life is continuously determined), and wherein the graphical display of the change in the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is output in the graphical user interface (the graphical user interface displaying the service life is previously taught by Svensson in the rejection of Claim 1).
Regarding Claim 3, a modified Steinbauer further teaches wherein managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger further comprises one or more of the following steps:
determining a maintenance interval of the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of the graphical display of the service life (shown in figure 7 of Svensson) of the at least one heat exchanger output in the graphical user interface (“The method and system described above makes it possible for a processing plant owner to improve the maintenance process in a very convenient manner. By determining the expected remaining usable life time for a specific machine part, by using history data and actual process parameters, as well as determining the actual condition for the same machine part, maintenance may be planned and scheduled in a much improved way compared to what has previous been known”).
Regarding Claim 4, a modified Steinbauer further teaches the performance of the at least one heat exchanger and/or a history of the at least one heat exchanger (“If a current temperature measurement or a temperature distribution or temperature gradient distribution defined by currently measured temperature measurement values is sufficiently similar to a temperature or temperature gradient distribution already measured in the past and deviates from this at most by a predetermined maximum permissible deviation or uncertainty, it will be possible to use the corresponding result relating to the service life influence already determined in the past” (¶73)) is determined as the state of the at least one heat exchanger (see ¶73).
Regarding Claim 5, a modified Steinbauer further teaches the sensors (10 of Steinbauer) arranged on or in the at least one heat exchanger (shown in figure 1) are each designed as a temperature sensor (see ¶55).
Regarding Claim 6, a modified Steinbauer further teaches one or more of the following variables is determined as parameters:
a mechanical stress level of the at least one heat exchanger (“the temperature measurement values are used as constraints in a finite element method (203) in order to determine mechanical stresses existing at a plurality of different points in the material of the apparatus as stress values (204)”, see abstract).
Regarding Claim 8, a modified Steinbauer further teaches managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger (100, 210) further comprises one or more of the following steps:
monitoring a current state of the at least one heat exchanger (“Within the framework of the present method, it is preferably possible to determine in real time or on-line the mechanical stresses in the material of the process apparatuses through which a fluid flows and therefrom to continuously estimate the remaining service life”, ¶38).
Regarding Claim 9, a modified Steinbauer further teaches receiving input in the user interface (“the controller 160 is preferably connected to a graphical user interface accessed by a system operator or service provider locally or remotely, e.g. via internet, whereby the predictive time for maintenance as well as the current conditions of the machine parts is presented to the system operator”); controlling the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of the inputs received (see previous annotation, wherein the heat exchanger is controlled via a maintenance schedule derived by the computations provided by the controller).
Regarding Claim 10, a modified Steinbauer further teaches each heat exchanger block comprises separating sheets (“The central body 8 is essentially an arrangement of separating plates, heat exchange profiles (so-called fins) and distributor profiles. Separating plates and layers with profiles alternate. A layer having a heat exchange profile and distributor profiles is called a passage” ¶51)) interconnected (see ¶51).
Regarding Claim 11, Steinbauer discloses managing a process engineering facility (“The apparatus can expediently be designed as a component of a process plant and can be connected to further system components, for example to further heat exchangers, columns or containers for phase separation” (¶11)) having at least one heat exchanger (1), wherein each of these heat exchangers is designed as a plate heat exchanger (“The process apparatus through which a fluid flows can be designed in particular as a heat exchanger, in particular as a plate heat exchanger” (¶11)) and each comprises a plurality of heat exchanger blocks (being two adjacent separating plates with fins therebetween, “The central body 8 is essentially an arrangement of separating plates, heat exchange profiles (so-called fins) and distributor profiles. Separating plates and layers with profiles alternate. A layer having a heat exchange profile and distributor profiles is called a passage” ¶51). Steinbauer fails to disclose a graphical user interface, wherein the display surface is configured to output the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger.
Svensson, also drawn to determining a service life for a heat exchanger (“However, larger and more complex machine parts such as heat exchangers, tanks, homogenizers, etc. also form part of the entire processing system”), teaches a graphical user interface, wherein the display surface is configured to output the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger (shown in figure 7).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to provide Steinbauer with a graphical user interface, wherein the display surface is configured to output the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger, as taught by Svensson, the motivation being to make “it possible for a processing plant owner to improve the maintenance process in a very convenient manner. By determining the expected remaining usable life time for a specific machine part, by using history data and actual process parameters, as well as determining the actual condition for the same machine part, maintenance may be planned and scheduled in a much improved way” and to “provide real time condition monitoring that “will allow the system operator or the service provider to perform operator driven checks only when it is required, i.e. when the machine part condition is alerting such task. Further, the method allows a machine part supplier to access the condition data to perform more detailed analysis of the current condition, thus assisting the system operator or service provider to decide on the necessary maintenance tasks.”
A modified Steinbauer teaches the graphical user interface comprises at least one display surface which is configured to output sensor values received and processed, and/or parameters determined and processed according to claim 1 (see rejection of claim 1, wherein Svensson teaches the processed values for determining the service life of the heat exchanger being displayed in the user interface).
Regarding Claim 12, a modified Steinbauer further teaches at least one control surface which is configured to receive inputs (“the controller 160 is preferably connected to a graphical user interface accessed by a system operator or service provider locally or remotely, e.g. via internet, whereby the predictive time for maintenance as well as the current conditions of the machine parts is presented to the system operator” of Svensson), wherein the graphical user interface is configured to control the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of these received inputs (see previous annotation, wherein the heat exchanger is controlled via a maintenance schedule derived by the computations provided by the controller).
Regarding Claim 13, a modified Steinbauer further teaches computing system that is configured to perform all method steps of a method according to claim 1 (see rejection of Claim 1 above).
Regarding Claim 14, a modified Steinbauer further teaches comprising a graphical user interface (as taught by Svensson in the rejection of Claims 13 and 1).
Regarding Claim 15, as best understood, Steinbauer discloses a computer program that causes a computing system (20), in particular the computing system according to claim 13, to perform all the steps of the method for managing the process engineering facility (“The apparatus can expediently be designed as a component of a process plant and can be connected to further system components, for example to further heat exchangers, columns or containers for phase separation” (¶11)) having at least one heat exchanger (1), wherein each of these heat exchangers (1) is designed as a plate heat exchanger (“The process apparatus through which a fluid flows can be designed in particular as a heat exchanger, in particular as a plate heat exchanger” (¶11)) and each comprises a plurality of heat exchanger blocks (being two adjacent separating plates with fins therebetween, “The central body 8 is essentially an arrangement of separating plates, heat exchange profiles (so-called fins) and distributor profiles. Separating plates and layers with profiles alternate. A layer having a heat exchange profile and distributor profiles is called a passage” ¶51), comprising:
receiving sensor values from sensors (“The temperature sensors 10 are coupled in a data-transmitting manner to a computing unit 20, which may be designed, for example, as a control device of the heat exchanger 1”, (¶56)) which are arranged on or in the at least one heat exchanger (shown in figure 1);
determining parameters wherein an operation of the at least one heat exchanger, on the basis of the received sensor values, wherein a temperature difference between heat exchanger blocks (shown in figure 1, wherein the sensors are positioned along the width of the heat exchanger (1) and perform measurements at various blocks) of the at least one heat exchanger is determined as a parameter (“a method for continuously determining the service life consumption of process apparatuses such as the heat exchanger 1 which are subjected to thermal stress, on the basis of sufficiently many temperature measurements or sufficiently precise determination of the temperature field” (¶70));
processing the sensor values and/or the parameters (20, see ¶56), wherein a service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined as the state on the basis of the determined temperature difference between the heat exchanger blocks (“In step 205, a remaining service life of the heat exchanger 1 is determined in the remote computing unit 30 as a function of this determined mechanical stress” (¶62)) of the at least one heat exchanger (shown in figure 2);
outputting the processed sensor values and/or parameters (“temperature profiles or temperature fields of the heat exchanger 1 are captured as temperature measurement values by means of the fiber Bragg grating sensors 10 and transmitted from the sensors 10 to the computing unit 20” (¶58)) in a computing unit (20);
wherein the service life of the at least one heat exchanger (100, 210) is monitored (“it is preferably possible to determine in real time or on-line the mechanical stresses in the material of the process apparatuses through which a fluid flows and therefrom to continuously estimate the remaining service life”, (¶38)). Steinbauer fails to disclose a graphical display of a state of the at least one heat exchanger, a graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined, wherein the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is output in the graphical user interface and managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of the output, processed sensor values and/or parameters in the graphical user interface.
Svensson, also drawn to determining a service life for a heat exchanger (“However, larger and more complex machine parts such as heat exchangers, tanks, homogenizers, etc. also form part of the entire processing system”), teaches a graphical display (shown in figure 7) of a state of the at least one heat exchanger (see previous annotation, wherein a heat exchanger is contemplated as a machine part), a graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined (shown in figure 7), wherein the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is output in the graphical user interface (shown in figure 7) and managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger (“The method comprises the steps of selecting at least one machine part of said liquid processing system; calculating an expected remaining usable time based on a predictive life time of said machine part; determining at least one real-time operating condition of said at least one machine part; and providing said expected time for maintenance and said at least one operating condition as data for enabling a decision whether to perform maintenance of said machine part or not”) on the basis of the output, processed sensor values “(in step 206, the method fetches information of certain conditions of the machine part…it may also be possible to retrieve the actual condition from sensors or meters arranged only for this particular purpose, i.e. to provide information on specific machine parts”) and/or parameters (“In step 204, the predictive life time data is used to calculate an expected remaining usable life time depending on various parameters such as actual operating time, type of liquid product being processed, etc…”) in the graphical user interface (shown in figure 7).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to provide Steinbauer with a graphical display of a state of the at least one heat exchanger, a graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is determined, wherein the graphical display of the service life of the at least one heat exchanger is output in the graphical user interface and managing the operation of the at least one heat exchanger on the basis of the output, processed sensor values and/or parameters in the graphical user interface, as taught by Svensson, the motivation being to make “it possible for a processing plant owner to improve the maintenance process in a very convenient manner. By determining the expected remaining usable life time for a specific machine part, by using history data and actual process parameters, as well as determining the actual condition for the same machine part, maintenance may be planned and scheduled in a much improved way” and to “provide real time condition monitoring that “will allow the system operator or the service provider to perform operator driven checks only when it is required, i.e. when the machine part condition is alerting such task. Further, the method allows a machine part supplier to access the condition data to perform more detailed analysis of the current condition, thus assisting the system operator or service provider to decide on the necessary maintenance tasks.”
Regarding Claim 16, a modified Steinbauer further teaches a machine-readable storage medium having a computer program according to claim 15 stored thereon (“A machine-readable storage medium having a computer program according to claim 11 stored on it”, Claim 12 of Steinbauer).
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Steinbauer et al. (US PG Pub. 2021/0341402A1 utilized as a Translation of EP3623737A1) in view of Svensson (EP2951653B1), as applied in Claims 1-6 and 8-16 above and in further view of Chillar et al (US PG Pub. 2012/0031106A1), hereinafter referred to as Chillar.
Regarding Claim 7, although Steinbauer discloses determining a temporal profile of individual sensor values and/or individual parameters on the basis of the points in time at which the particular sensor values were determined (“The temperature calculation values are preferably location- and/or time-dependent temperature differences, i.e. temporal or local temperature gradients” ¶16), Steinbauer fails to disclose processing of the sensor values and/or the parameters further comprises one or more of the following steps: determining a graphical display of a temporal profile of individual sensor values and/or individual parameters on the basis of the points in time at which the particular sensor values were determined.
Chillar, also drawn to a graphical display for temperature measurements, teaches processing of the sensor values (“The display 80 is configured to present a graphical representation of the temperature detected by each thermopile element as a function of time” ¶33) and/or the parameters further comprises one or more of the following steps:
determining a graphical display of a temporal profile of individual sensor values on the basis of the points in time at which the particular sensor values were determined (shown in figure 2). Chillar further states, “If an excessive temperature variation is detected, the controller 54 may activate the alarm 82 within the user interface 56. As previously discussed, the alarm 82 may be an audible alarm and/or a visual alarm configured to alert an operator of the detected condition. The operator may then take appropriate corrective action to resolve the fluid temperature variation” ¶37.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to provide Steinbauer with processing of the sensor values and/or the parameters further comprises one or more of the following steps: determining a graphical display of a temporal profile of individual sensor values and/or individual parameters on the basis of the points in time at which the particular sensor values were determined, as taught by Chillar, the motivation being to provide a visual representation of temperature variations to a user, thereby allowing for corrective action to take place that mitigates degradation or failure of system components or to allow a user to track temperature gradients over time in order to identify anomalies that may lead to the failure of system components.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PAUL ALVARE whose telephone number is (571)272-8611. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 0930-1800.
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/PAUL ALVARE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3763
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