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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election of Invention I in the reply filed on 11/28/2025 is acknowledged. Because applicant did not distinctly and specifically point out the supposed errors in the restriction requirement, the election has been treated as an election without traverse (MPEP § 818.01(a)). Claims 1-10 are pending and claims 8-10 are withdrawn from consideration.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d). The certified copy has been filed in parent Application No. DE102024115832.8, filed on 06/06/2024.
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.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claim 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 4 recites “wherein the electronics module is integrated into other parts of a protective equipment, outside of the arc flash protective head gear.” However, the claims are directed only to the arc flash protective headgear, and claim 4 is attempting to positively claim equipment that is not a part of the protective headgear and is a separate article outside the scope of the claimed device. Therefore, the scope of the claim is unclear since it is uncertain whether claim 4 is directed only to the protective headgear or additional protective equipment, outside of the protective headgear, which is inconsistent with claims 1 and 2.
Appropriate clarification and/or correction is required.
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 1-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 2020/0275724 A1 to Jefferis in view of US 2019/0175411 A1 to Awiszus and US 2022/0008763 A1 to Saleh.
For claim 1, Jefferis discloses a protective headgear (620).
Although Jefferis does not specifically disclose the protective headgear is an arc flash protective headgear, it is also noted that MPEP 2111.02 (II) provides “if the body of a claim fully and intrinsically sets forth all of the limitations of the claimed invention, and the preamble merely states, for example, the purpose or intended use of the invention, rather than any distinct definition of any of the claimed invention’s limitations, then the preamble is not considered a limitation and is of no significance to claim construction.” In this case, the preamble is not considered a structural limitation because the complete protective headgear structure is fully and intrinsically set forth in the claim body, and the preamble is only used to state a purpose or intended use for the invention. Therefore, the preamble is not considered as structurally limiting for purposes of applying prior art.
Jefferis continues to disclose the protective headgear comprising: an immobile head protection part (622); a movable visor (618) fastened in the immobile head protection part (para 0255); a monitoring module with a position sensor for monitoring a visor position (paras 0231-0232); a locking mechanism (648) for locking the movable visor with respect to the immobile head protection part in at least one position (para 0228); a sensor and electronics module (detector and controller, paras 0231, 0262) and an energy supply (4) being an energy store or an energy generator for supplying the sensor and electronics module (paras 0285, 0286, and 0293).
Jefferis does not specifically disclose: a further monitoring module with a head presence sensor and an indicator for monitoring whether the arc flash protective headgear is being worn; wherein the locking mechanism is electronically actuatable; and wherein the detector and controller automatically actuate the electrically actuatable locking mechanism.
However, attention is directed to Awiszus teaching an analogous head-mounted device (abstract of Awiszus) with a similar visor attachment assembly and visor position detector (paras 0129 and 0201 of Awiszus). Specifically, Awiszus teaches the system comprises head detection temperature sensors to detected the presence of a head in head top, or in other words, to detect whether head top of the helmet is being worn at any given point in time (para 0131 of Awiszus). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date wherein Jefferis would be further modified to comprise a head presence temperature sensor and an indicator, for purposes of providing the wearer or other systems a means to detect whether head top of the helmet is being worn at any given point in time, as taught by Awiszus (para 0131 of Awiszus).
As modified, Jefferis does not specifically disclose wherein the locking mechanism is electronically actuatable, and wherein the wherein the detector and controller automatically actuate the electrically actuatable locking mechanism.
However, attention is directed to Saleh teaching an analogous face protective device such as a part of a helmet (abstract of Saleh). Specifically, Saleh teaches a face shield unit (16) comprises a face shield operation mode module having an automatic mode with a lock/unlock mechanism (162) and a motor (164) connected to the face shield operation mode module (16) having an electromagnetic clutch for automatically locking the face shield (168) in given open/closed position made on the operation condition event generated by a similar controller (14) (paras 0101-0102 of Saleh). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date wherein the modified Jefferis would be further modified to comprise an automatically actionable electromagnetic clutch for automatically locking the face shield in given open/closed position, such as the detection of the visor face shield in a closed position, to securely lock the face shield in place during use, as taught by Saleh (paras 0101-0102 of Saleh).
For claim 2, the modified Jefferis teaches the arc flash protective headgear according to claim 1, wherein the sensor and electronics module includes two separate modules (detector module and controller module) that are integrated into the arc flash protective headgear (paras 0231-0232).
For claim 3, the modified Jefferis teaches the arc flash protective headgear according to claim 1, wherein the sensor and electronics module is integrated into a shared housing in the arc flash protective headgear (chin bar, paras 0231-0232).
For claim 4, the modified Jefferis teaches the arc flash protective headgear according to claim 2, wherein the two separate modules include an electronics module, and wherein the electronics module is integrated into other parts of a protective equipment, outside of the arc flash protective headgear (paras 0285 and 0288).
For claim 5, the modified Jefferis teaches the arc flash protective headgear according to claim 1, wherein automatic locking and unlocking is effected by the electrically actuatable locking mechanism with an electric motor, a linear motor, a magnetic switch/solenoid, a pneumatic system, or a hydraulic system (motor with electromagnetic clutch).
For claim 6, the modified Jefferis teaches the arc flash protective headgear according to claim 1, wherein the head presence sensor for ascertaining whether the arc flash protective headgear is being worn is a temperature sensor, a radar sensor, an infrared sensor, an ultrasonic sensor, a presence sensor, a gas detection sensor, a distance measuring sensor, a proximity sensor, a motion sensor, a camera system with image recognition, or a combination of two or more thereof (temperature sensor, see discussion for claim 1 above).
For claim 7, the modified Jefferis teaches the arc flash protective headgear according to claim 1, wherein the energy supply comprises replaceable batteries, rechargeable accumulators, capacitors, or solar cells (batteries, paras 0206 and 0286).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ERICK I LOPEZ whose telephone number is (571)272-3262. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday: 9:00am - 5:30pm EST.
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/ERICK I LOPEZ/Examiner, Art Unit 3732