Ex Parte Hall et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardAug 29, 201813480118 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 29, 2018) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 13/480,118 05/24/2012 139779 7590 Rankin Hill & Clark LLP 23755 Lorain Road Suite 200 North Olmsted, OH 44070 08/31/2018 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Chris Hall UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www .uspto.gov ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. HRA-35245.01 2859 EXAMINER ZALESKAS, JOHN M ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3747 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 08/31/2018 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address(es): overberger@rankinhill.com dragony@rankinhill.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte CHRIS HALL and JUNICHI KANEMARU 1 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 Technology Center 3700 Before JOHN C. KERINS, WILLIAM A. CAPP, and ANTHONY KNIGHT, Administrative Patent Judges. KERINS, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Chris Hall and Junichi Kanemaru ("Appellants") appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final rejection of claims 1, 2, 5-11, 13-26, and 28-31. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b ). We AFFIRM-IN-PART. 1 The real party in interest is Honda Motor Co., Ltd. Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 THE INVENTION Appellants' invention is directed to an idle stop control method and system. Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative: 1. An idle stop control method for a vehicle, comprising: determining whether an idle stop condition for the vehicle is satisfied; determining whether the vehicle is in a stopped condition; idle stopping an engine of the vehicle when determined that the idle stop condition is satisfied and the vehicle is in the stopped condition; after idle stopping the engine, determining whether an engine restart condition is satisfied; and restarting the engine when determined that the engine restart condition is satisfied, wherein idle stopping the engine includes operating an HVAC blower of an HV AC system to maintain a comfort level within a vehicle cabin and wherein operating the HV AC blower to maintain the comfort level includes supplying a low voltage to the HV AC blower, wherein supplying the low voltage to the HV AC blower occurs until a sensed temperature falls below a predetermined threshold whereby the HV AC blower is switched to an off condition, wherein the idle stop condition is satisfied when a coolant temperature of engine coolant of the vehicle is above a predetermined coolant temperature. 2 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 REJECTIONS The Examiner rejects: (i) claims 1, 2, 10, 18, and 22-25 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi (US 2009/0145141 Al, published June 11, 2009) in view of Ito (US 5,803,166; issued Sept. 8, 1998) and Jinno (US 2009/0198438 Al, published Aug. 6, 2009); 2 (ii) claims 9, 28, and 31 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito, Jinno, and Helms (DE 10 2009 040 877 Al, published May 27, 2009); 3 (iii) claims 5 and 6 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito, Jinno, and Kato (EP 2 098 392 Al, published Sept. 9, 2009), and, alternatively, also in view of Helms; (iv) claims 7 and 29 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito, Jinno, and Helms; (v) claims 8 and 30 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito, Jinno, Helms, and Kato; 2 The Final Action dated August 17, 2015, did not include Jinno as a reference applied in this rejection. In an Advisory Action dated November 17, 2015, a proposed amendment to claims 1 and 24, to incorporate a limitation previously presented in dependent claim 12, was entered. Claim 12 was, accordingly, canceled. The Advisory Action discusses that, because the amendment to claim 1 was entered, Jinno, which was previously employed in rejecting claim 12, is now cited in rejecting claims 1 and 24. Adv. Act. 2. Jinno is, thus, now regarded as also being relied on in the rejection of claims depending from claims 1 and 24, in instances in which it may not have previously been relied on. 3 Reference herein to Helms is to a machine-generated English-language translation of the German published application, appearing in the Image File Wrapper of the underlying application. 3 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 (vi) claims 11, 16, 17, 19, and 21 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito, Jinno, and Metzger (US 7,027,912 Bl, issued Apr. 11, 2006); (vii) claims 13-15 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito and Jinno; 4 (viii) claim 20 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito, Jinno, and Itoh (US 2004/0149246 Al, published Aug. 5, 2004); and (ix) claim 26 under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Akahoshi in view of Ito and Jinno. A rejection of claims 9, 24, 28, 30, and 31 under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, and a rejection of claims 9 and 29 under 35 U.S.C. § 112, fourth paragraph, are withdrawn. Adv. Act. 2. ANALYSIS Claims 1, 2, 10, 18, and 22-25--§ 103(a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno Claims 1, 2, 10, 18, 22, and 23 The Examiner finds that Akahoshi discloses the subject matter of claim 1, with the exception of a clear teaching of supplying a low voltage to an HVAC blower until a sensed temperature falls below a predetermined threshold, at which point the HV AC blower is switched off. Final Act. 10- 11. The Examiner finds that Ito discloses switching off an HV AC blower during a heating operation when the temperature in the passenger compartment becomes lower than a target temperature. Id. at 11, citing Ito 4 Per footnote 1, this ground of rejection is essentially the same as the ground currently applied against claim 1, from which these claims depend. 4 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 1: 18--42. The Examiner concludes that it would have been obvious to modify the idle stop control system of Akahoshi to switch off its HV AC blower once a sensed temperature falls below a target or threshold temperature, in order to prevent the blowing of cooler air into the passenger compartment during heating operation. Id. at 12. Additionally, with the amendment to claim 1 presented in the Amendment after Final Action dated October 19, 2015, and entered by the Advisory Action dated November 17, 2015, claim 1 additionally recites that the previously claimed "idle stop condition" is "satisfied when a coolant temperature of engine coolant of the vehicle is above a predetermined coolant temperature," a limitation previously set forth in dependent claim 12. 5 The Examiner relies on Jinno as disclosing this limitation, and concludes that it would have been obvious to incorporate this control aspect in Akahoshi, in that Jinno teaches that employing a threshold engine coolant temperature as an idle stop condition beneficially decreases the frequency of engine stops and restarts. Adv. Act. 2. Appellants argue, citing to an isolated portion of a flow chart appearing in Figure 7, that Akahoshi does not disclose that the engine is to be stopped not only based upon an idle stop condition, but also based on the vehicle being stopped. Appeal Br. 12-13. However, as Appellants proceed through a discussion of the various paragraphs in Akahoshi identified by the Examiner as being pertinent to the vehicle being in a stopped condition, Appellants themselves recognize that the vehicle is also stopped when 5 As disclosed in the Specification, the engine coolant temperature is indicative of whether a predetermined desired cabin temperature is saturated (i.e., attained) or not. Spec. ,r,r 27, 28. 5 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 Akahoshi is determining whether an idle stop condition is met, such that the engine is or is not to be stopped. Id. at 12-13. Appellants continue the analysis of Akahoshi, noting that Akahoshi does not disclose using an engine coolant temperature threshold as an idle stop condition. Id. at 13-14. The Examiner, however, does not rely on Akahoshi as teaching this specific limitation. Instead, as noted above, the Examiner relies on Jinno, and concludes that it would have been obvious to modify Akahoshi in view of Jinno, such that the resulting system includes the idle stop condition recited in claim 1. See Ans. 29-30. Appellants next argue that Ito teaches away from the subject matter of claim 1, stating that: Ito disables the fan in a scenario which is opposite of the scenario of claim 1 in that Ito requires a temperature of the engine cooling water to be lower than a specified temperature rather than greater than a predetermined temperature, as provided by claim 1. Appeal Br. 15 (emphasis omitted); see also, Reply Br. 4--5. This argument confuses the claimed requirement for satisfying the idle stop condition ( engine coolant temperature above a threshold) with the claimed requirement for switching off the HV AC blower ( some sensed temperature falling below a predetermined threshold). See Ans. 31-34. The portions of Ito relied on relate to switching off the blower upon a sensed temperature being below a predetermined threshold, and have nothing to do with meeting an idle stop condition. Accordingly, the argument does not apprise us of error in the rejection. Appellants additionally argue that the disclosure in Ito of requiring both a temperature in a passenger compartment and a temperature of the engine cooling water to be below predetermined thresholds prior to 6 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 switching off the HV AC blower "would result in scenarios where the fan of claim 1 would be off while the fan of Ito would be on," because claim 1 bases the decision as to whether to tum off the fan only on a threshold cooling water temperature. Reply Br. 5. The argument does not point to error, in that the rejection does not rely on incorporating all aspects of the Ito system in the Akahoshi system Appellants additionally argue that the disclosure in Ito of gradually increasing heater fan speed as the engine cooling water temperature rises somehow undermines the viability of the rejection. Reply Br. 6. Although the Examiner does reference that discussion, it does not appear to pertain to any limitation in claim 1, which recites only supplying a low voltage to the HVAC blower, but not changing the voltage to control the fan speed, until the condition for switching the blower to "off' is met. Accordingly, the argument does not apprise us of error. Appellants maintain that Jinno may not properly be combined with Akahoshi because Jinno does not require the vehicle to be in a stopped condition prior to idle stopping the engine. Appeal Br. 15-16. Notwithstanding that the Jinno system allows for, under certain circumstances, the idle stopping of an engine when a vehicle is slowed to a substantially stopped condition, Jinno also discloses conditions in which the vehicle is stopped when assessing whether an idle stop condition is met. Jinno ,r 97. Appellants fail to present any cogent technical argument as to why the idle stop condition disclosed in Jinno would not work equally as well in the Akahoshi system, which does require the vehicle to be stopped as a condition for stopping the engine. The argument does not apprise us of 7 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 error, particularly in view of the disclosure in Jinno that a "vehicle stopped" condition is appropriately used. The rejection of claim 1 as being unpatentable over Akahoshi, Ito, and Jinno is sustained. Appellants do not argue for the separate patentability of claims 2, 10, 18, 22 and 23, which depend from claim 1 and are subject to this ground of rejection. The rejection is therefore sustained as to those claims as well. Claims 24 and 25 Appellants rely on the arguments addressed above relative to claim 1, but further present an argument directed to a limitation in claim 24 not present in claim 1. Appeal Br. 16-17; Reply Br. 6-7. The additional limitation involves: the at least one electronic control unit operating the HVAC fan during the idle stop by supplying a low voltage to the HV AC fan, wherein the low voltage supplied to the HV AC fan is controlled by the at least one electronic control unit to correspond directly and be reduced in corresponding relation as a sensed temperature of a vehicle cabin decreases during the idle stop of the engine. Appeal Br. 22 (Claims Appendix) ( emphasis added). Appellants argue that this limitation is not met by the combination of Akahoshi, Ito, and Jinno. The Examiner takes the position that, in addition to an interpretation that has the electronic control unit (ECU) reduce the low voltage to a non-zero voltage, another reasonable interpretation is that the ECU could reduce the low voltage to zero voltage. Ans. 37. The Examiner further maintains that claim 24 is broader in scope than both of these interpretations, requiring only that the ECU "reduce the low voltage." Id. ( emphasis omitted). The Examiner finds that Ito discloses the reduction of a 8 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 low voltage to zero voltage (fan stoppage) upon a sensed temperature dropping below a predetermined threshold. Id. at 38. As an apparent hedge against the possibility that the proposed claim construction is found to be unreasonably broad, the Examiner takes the position that Ito discloses the concept of controlling the speed of an HV AC blower in proportion to the heating potential of the heater unit. Id., citing Ito 1: 18--42. The Examiner's proposed construction is indeed seen as being unreasonable, in that it does not fully take into account the meaning of "low voltage ... [is] reduced ... as a sensed temperature of a vehicle cabin decreases." Because claim 24 calls for the ECU to operate the HV AC fan during the idle stop, the inevitable incremental decreases in sensed temperature would, according to the claim language, require some decrease in the voltage supplied to the HV AC fan. If, as in the Examiner's construction, voltage is decreased to zero, thereby shutting off the fan, upon detecting a first decrease in temperature, further decreases in temperature could not possibly be accompanied by any further reduction in voltage supplied to the HVAC fan. See Reply Br. 8. As such, the interpretation is unreasonably broad. As for the Examiner's hedge position regarding Ito, Ito discusses increasing fan speed gradually in a heating mode, according to a rise in engine coolant temperature. Ito 1:35--41. However, this disclosure in Ito is related to a rise above a specified temperature, in order to blow warm air gradually, and not specifically or necessarily to a continued or ongoing rise in engine coolant temperature. Id. The Examiner does not adequately explain how this is seen as being applicable and rendering obvious the 9 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 decreasing of voltage and attendant HV AC fan speed as a result of decreasing engine coolant temperatures in an idle stopped engine mode. Accordingly, the rejection of claim 24 as being unpatentable over Akahoshi, Ito, and Jinno, is not sustained. For the same reasons, the rejection of claim 25, which depends from claim 24, is not sustained. Claims 9, 28, and 31--§ 103(a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno/Helms Appellants present no arguments for the separate patentability of these claims. Accordingly, the rejection is sustained as to claim 9, which depends from claim 1, and is not sustained as to claims 28 and 31, which depend from claim 24. Helms is not relied on by the Examiner in any manner that cures the deficiency in the rejection of claim 24 noted above. Claims 5 and 6--§ 103(a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno/Kato/Helms Appellants present no arguments for the separate patentability of these claims. Accordingly, the rejection is sustained as to both claims 5 and 6, which depend from claim 1. Claims 7 and 29--§ 103(a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno/Helms Appellants present no arguments for the separate patentability of these claims. Accordingly, the rejection is sustained as to claim 7, which depends from claim 1, and is not sustained as to claim 29, which depends from claim 24. Helms is not relied on by the Examiner in any manner that cures the deficiency in the rejection of claim 24 noted above. 10 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 Claims 8 and 30--§ 103(a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno/Helms/Kato Appellants present no arguments for the separate patentability of these claims. Accordingly, the rejection is sustained as to claim 8, which depends from claim 1, and is not sustained as to claim 30, which depends from claim 24. Helms and Kato are not relied on by the Examiner in any manner that cures the deficiency in the rejection of claim 24 noted above. Claims 11, 16, 17, 19, and 21--§ 103(a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno/Metzger Appellants present no arguments for the separate patentability of these claims. Accordingly, the rejection is sustained as to all of claims 11, 16, 17, 19, and 21, which depend from claim 1. Claims 13-15--§ 103(a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno Appellants present no arguments for the separate patentability of these claims. Accordingly, the rejection is sustained as to all of claims 13-15, which depend from claim 1. Claim 20--§ 103 (a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno/Itoh Appellants present no arguments for the separate patentability of this claim. Accordingly, the rejection is sustained as to claim 20, which depends from claim 1. Claim 26--§ 103 (a)--Akahoshi/Ito/Jinno. Claim 26 depends from claim 24, and the stated grounds for rejection do not cure the deficiency in the rejection of claim 24 noted above. The rejection of claim 26 is not sustained. 11 Appeal2017-001547 Application 13/480,118 DECISION We affirm the rejections of claims 1, 2, 5-11, and 13-23. We reverse the rejection of claims 24--26 and 28-31. No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). AFFIRMED-IN-PART 12 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation