Ex Parte Nieschulz et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Feb 21, 2018

11614568 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 21, 2018)

United States Patent and Trademark Office
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
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
11/614,568 12/21/2006 Daniel F. Nieschulz 707393US1 9579
24938 7590 02/23/;
FCA US LLC
CIMS 483-02-19
800 CHRYSLER DR EAST
AUBURN llll.I S. MI48326-2757
EXAMINER
TOLAN, EDWARD THOMAS
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3725
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/23/2018 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):
chris.davenport@fcagroup.com
michelle.madak@fcagroup.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte DANIEL F. NIESCHULZ, GEORGE R. BASLER,
JOSEPH P. MEYECIC JR., and MICHAEL A. MERSINO
Appeal 2017-002836
Application 11/614,56s1
Technology Center 3700
Before LINDA E. HORNER, JEFFREY A. STEPHENS, and
BRENT M. DOUGAL, Administrative Patent Judges.
HORNER, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1 and 3-20. Final Office Action
(August 27, 2008) (hereinafter “Final Act.”). We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
1 Appellants identify Chrysler Group LLC as the real party in interest.
Appeal Brief 1 (January 31, 2012) (hereinafter “Appeal Br.”).
Appeal 2017-002836
Application 11/614,568
The claims relate to a stamping system and method for forming panels
of an automobile from blank material, and for forming parts from portions of
the blank material that are not used to form the panel, so as to minimize
waste of the blank material. The system and method use chutes to transfer
the parts, via through holes in the press, to a storage receptacle. The
Examiner found a prior art patent directed to a press having similar through
holes and chutes for directing identically configured parts to subsequent
workstations. The Examiner proposed to modify this prior art system to
make differently configured parts, as taught by a second prior art patent, to
reduce waste of the raw sheet material. Appellants challenge the Examiner’s
proposed modification and reason to combine the prior art teachings. For
the reasons explained in the decision, we find that the Examiner failed to set
forth adequate reasoning to support a determination of obviousness. As
such, we REVERSE the rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
Claims 1, 9, and 19 are independent. Claim 1 is illustrative of the
subject matter on appeal and is reproduced below.
1. A stamping system comprising:
a press assembly including at least one support member;
a first forming and cutting tool supported by said support
member for stamping a panel for an automobile from a blank;
and
a second forming and cutting tool for forming a part from
a portion of said blank that does not form said panel,
wherein said support member includes at least one through
hole and said part from said blank passes through said through-
hole into a chute system in communication with said through
hole.
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Appeal 2017-002836
Application 11/614,568
Appeal Br. 13 (Claims Appendix).
REJECTIONS
The Final Office Action includes the following rejections:
1. Claims 1, 3, 5-7, 9-11, and 15-20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Sova (US 5,829,300, issued
November 3, 1998) and Dighe et al. (US 5,815,398, issued
September 29, 1998).
2. Claims 4, 8, and 12-14 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Sova, Dighe, and Meyer et al. (EP 0 319 821
A2, published June 14, 1989).
ISSUE
Claim 1 recites “a first forming and cutting tool supported by said
support member for stamping a panel for an automobile from a blank” and
“a second forming and cutting tool for forming a part from a portion of said
blank that does not form said panel.” Appeal Br. 13 (Claims Appendix).
Independent claim 9 includes similar limitations for first and second tools
for cutting a panel and a plurality of parts, respectively. Id. at 14.
Independent method claim 19 similarly recites forming a panel and a part
from a blank using a stamping assembly. Id. at 15.
In the rejection of the independent claims, the Examiner found that
Sova’s punching tool 46a cuts a workpiece WPa from a sheet 24. Final
Act. 2. The Examiner found that Sova fails to disclose “tools for forming
different shapes” and turned to Dighe “to provide parts of differing shapes
for the purpose of reducing waste and boosting production speed.” Final
Act. 2. The Examiner determined that it would have been obvious to one
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Appeal 2017-002836
Application 11/614,568
having ordinary skill in the art “to manufacture different shaped parts in the
stamping system of Sova as taught by Dighe in order to maximize available
raw sheet material.” Id. at 2-3.
Appellants contest the Examiner’s proposed combination of Sova with
Dighe. Appeal Br. 8-9. In particular, Appellants argue that the Examiner
did not provide a sufficient explanation as to why one having ordinary skill
in the art would have modified Sova to make parts of different shapes in
light of the teaching of Dighe. Id. According to Appellants, Sova teaches
“use of a matrix of like workpieces WPa in a progressive die to maximize
press throughput” and Dighe teaches a pattern nesting process to “maximize
yield when cutting multiple layers of a stock material.” Id. at 9.
The issue before us in this appeal is whether the Examiner provided
an adequate explanation as to why one having ordinary skill in the art would
have been led to modify the system of Sova as proposed, based on the
teaching of Dighe, to arrive at the claimed subject matter.
ANALYSIS
The object of Sova’s invention is to provide a parts transfer system for
transferring multiple workpieces through progressive workstations of a press
to increase the number of workpieces that can be operated upon in a single
press stroke, and thereby increase throughput. Id. at col. 1,11. 18-25. Sova
discloses, at a first elevated workstation, cutting parts from a sheet and
transferring the parts via a chute to a subsequent workstation, so that the
parts are arranged in a matrix. Sova, col. 4,11. 13-33, col. 5,11. 1-6. Sova
discloses that the punches, cavities, and resulting workpieces in each
workstation are “all identically configured.” Id. at col. 4,11. 35-40. Sova
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Appeal 2017-002836
Application 11/614,568
also discloses that the majority of the sheet material is used in forming the
workpieces. Id. at col. 5,11. 13-14, Fig. 9. Thus, because Sova teaches
forming identical workpieces from the sheet using the pattern shown in
Figure 9, there is almost no waste of sheet material in Sova. See Appeal
Br. 8 (Appellants noting that Sova’s sheet of stock material is almost entirely
consumed when forming the workpieces).
Dighe discloses an automated method to design a layout when cutting
differently shaped parts in a bounded region. Dighe, col. 1,11. 5-7, 10-13,
22-25. Dighe discloses selecting particular locations in the bounded region
for each part, based on each part’s shape, to minimize waste. Id. at col. 7,
11. 1-11. Contrary to the Examiner’s assertion, Dighe does not teach that
providing parts of differing shapes reduces waste. Final Act. 2. Rather,
Dighe teaches a technique, when one is confronted with the problem of
cutting parts of differing shapes from a bounded region, to reduce waste.
Such a problem does not exist in Sova.
As noted above, Sova discloses using parts of identical shape and
shows a layout of these parts that, almost entirely, eliminates waste. The
Examiner’s proposed modification to Sova to manufacture differently
shaped parts appears to be inconsistent with the goal of Sova, which is to
increase throughput by using the press to form identical parts. Further, the
Examiner’s stated reason for this proposed modification, “in order to
maximize available raw sheet material,” is not supported by the teaching in
Dighe. Further, we fail to see how such a modification would result in an
improvement to Sova, as Sova already discloses a layout that appears to
maximize available raw sheet material.
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Application 11/614,568
For these reasons, the Examiner has not provided an adequate
explanation as to why one having ordinary skill in the art would have been
led to combine the teachings of Sova and Dighe to arrive at the claimed
subject matter. As such, we do not sustain the rejection of independent
claims 1, 9, and 19, and their dependent claims 3, 5-7, 10, 11, 15-18, and
20, as unpatentable over Sova and Dighe.
The Examiner relies on the same proposed modification of Sova with
the teachings of Dighe, and further modification with the deflector means of
Meyer, in the rejection of dependent claims 4, 8, and 12-14. Final Act. 3.
For the same reasons discussed above, we likewise do sustain this second
ground of rejection.
DECISION
The decision of the Examiner rejecting claims 1 and 3-20 is reversed.
REVERSED
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