nullDownload PDFPatent Trials and Appeals BoardNov 29, 201914908664 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Nov. 29, 2019) Copy Citation 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. 14/908,664 01/29/2016 Wieslaw A. CHLUS 67097-2557PUS1; 62233US02 4323 54549 7590 11/29/2019 CARLSON, GASKEY & OLDS/PRATT & WHITNEY 400 West Maple Road Suite 350 Birmingham, MI 48009 EXAMINER HAGHIGHIAN, BEHNOUSH ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3745 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 11/29/2019 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): ptodocket@cgolaw.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte WIESLAW A. CHLUS and SETH J. THOMEN Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 Technology Center 3700 Before JENNIFER D. BAHR, WILLIAM A. CAPP, and LISA M. GUIJT, Administrative Patent Judges. BAHR, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1, 2, 4–6, 8–10, 12, 13, 15–19, and 21–24. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We AFFIRM. 1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant identifies the real party in interest as United Technologies Corporation. Appeal Br. 1. Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 2 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER Appellant’s invention is directed to “a gas turbine engine, and more particularly to a gas turbine engine airfoil having an internal cooling circuit capable of simultaneously cooling a trailing edge and a tip of the airfoil.” Spec. ¶ 1. Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter. 1. An airfoil, comprising: an airfoil body that includes a first wall and a second wall spaced apart and joined together at each of a leading edge and a trailing edge and extending radially between a root and a tip; an internal cooling circuit disposed at least partially inside of said airfoil body, said internal cooling circuit having: a first cooling passage disposed along a trailing edge tip portion defined by a junction between said tip and said trailing edge, wherein said first cooling passage extends to a first exit aperture, and said first cooling passage is a tip flag passage having a radial portion extending transversely from an axial portion at a bend; a fanned array of cooling holes that extend between said axial portion of said first cooling passage to at least said tip; a second cooling passage extending to a second exit aperture, said second cooling passage extending radially such that said second cooling passage spaces apart said radial portion from said trailing edge; and wherein said first exit aperture and said second exit aperture are disposed along said trailing edge. Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 3 EVIDENCE The prior art relied upon by the Examiner is: Chlus Cleveland Papple Morris US 6,824,359 B2 US 6,923,623 B2 US 7,300,250 B2 US 7,625,178 B2 Nov. 30, 2004 Aug. 2, 2005 Nov. 27, 2007 Dec. 1, 2009 Hatman Raji US 2010/0232944 A1 US 2011/0076405 A1 Sept. 16, 2010 Mar. 31, 2011 REJECTION I. Claims 1, 2, 4–6, 9, 10, 12, 17–19, and 21–23 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Morris and Chlus. II. Claim 8 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Morris, Chlus, and Raji. III. Claims 13, 15, and 16 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Morris, Hatman, and Chlus. IV. Claim 24 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Morris, Chlus, and Cleveland. V. Claims 1, 2, 4–6, 9, 10, 17–19, 21, and 22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Papple and Chlus. VI. Claim 8 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Papple, Chlus, and Raji. VII. Claims 13, 15, and 16 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Papple, Hatman, and Chlus. Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 4 OPINION Rejections I and V—Morris or Papple in view of Chlus Claim Groupings In contesting the rejection based on Morris and Chlus (i.e., Rejection I), Appellant presents arguments for claims 1 and 17, and presents a separate argument for claims 9 and 22. See Appeal Br. 3–6. Appellant does not present any separate arguments for the remaining claims subject to this rejection. Id. Thus, we select claims 1 and 9 to decide the appeal of Rejection I, with claims 2, 4–6, 10, 12, 17–19, and 21 standing or falling with claim 1, and claims 22 and 232 standing or falling with claim 9. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv) (permitting the Board to select a single claim to decide the appeal as to a single ground of rejection of a group of claims argued together). In contesting the rejection based on Papple and Chlus (i.e., Rejection V), Appellant presents arguments for claims 1 and 17, and presents a separate argument for claims 9 and 22. See Appeal Br. 6–7. Appellant does not present any separate arguments for the remaining claims subject to this rejection. Id. Thus, we select claims 1 and 9 to decide the appeal of Rejection V, with claims 2, 4–6, 10, 17–19, and 21 standing or falling with claim 1, and claim 22 standing or falling with claim 9. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv). Appellant relies on the same arguments asserted against Rejection I in contesting Rejection V. See Appeal Br. 7. Thus, we discuss these rejections together for convenience. 2 Claim 23 depends from claim 22. Appeal Br. 12 (Claims App.). Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 5 Claim 1 (and claims grouped therewith) The Examiner finds that each of Morris and Papple discloses an airfoil comprising, in pertinent part, a first cooling passage that is a tip flag passage having a radial portion extending transversely from an axial portion at a bend and a second cooling passage extending radially such that the second cooling passage spaces apart the radial portion from the trailing edge of the airfoil body. See Final Act. 6 (referring to annotated versions of Figures 3 and 5 of Morris provided on pages 7 and 8, respectively, of the Final Action); id. at 18–19 (referring to an annotated version of Figure 2B of Papple provided on page 20 of the Final Action). The Examiner finds that the only feature missing in either Morris or Papple is “a fanned array of cooling holes that extend between said axial portion of said first cooling passage to at least said tip.” Id. at 6, 19; Ans. 5, 14 (finding that Papple “discloses at least one cooling hole [(tip component 40a)] between the axial portion of the first cooling channel and the tip . . . , but does not appear to explicitly disclose a fanned array of them”). The Examiner finds that Chlus “teaches an airfoil cooling system with a fanned array of cooling holes (50A-50F and 70A-70D) that extend between a cooling passage (48) to the tip and leading edge tip section and further teaches that the fanned array of cooling holes serve to provide enhanced cooling (Col. 3; lines 11-25).” Final Act. 6, 19. The Examiner determines it would have been obvious to add Chlus’s fanned array of cooling holes “to the axial portion of the first cooling passage of the airfoil of Morris [and to the axial portion of the first cooling passage of the airfoil of Papple] (because the axial portion of Morris [and of Papple] is closer to the tip) in order to enhance the cooling.” Id. at 7, 19. Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 6 Appellant’s arguments contesting these rejections of claim 1 hinge primarily on Appellant’s contentions that Chlus does not disclose a tip flag passage, and that Chlus’s holes extend from trailing edge cavity 48, which extends radially, and not from an axial portion of a first cooling passage. See Appeal Br. 4–5, 7. These arguments are unavailing because they attack Chlus individually, rather than the combination. “Non-obviousness cannot be established by attacking references individually where the rejection is based upon the teachings of a combination of references.” In re Merck & Co., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986) (citing In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981). The Examiner does not rely on Chlus for the tip flag passage comprising a radial portion and an axial portion; the Examiner finds this feature in each of the primary references, Morris and Papple. See Ans. 4–5, 14; see also Morris 5:61–62 (describing tip flow circuit 134 as including “a flag section 216,” on which the Examiner reads the claimed “axial portion” of the “tip flag passage”); Papple 2:39–41 (describing “chord-wise extending tip passage 32b (also known as a ‘tip flag’ passage’),” on which the Examiner reads the claimed “axial portion” of the “tip flag passage”). Appellant submits that “[t]he alleged first cooling passage of Morris . . . appears to space apart the alleged second cooling passage from a top of the alleged airfoil.” Appeal Br. 4. The Examiner does not disagree with this statement and, in fact, explains that this configuration of the cooling passages in Morris (i.e., “because the axial portion of Morris is closer to the tip”) renders the axial portion of the first passage of Morris (as identified in the annotated versions of Figures 3 and 5 of Morris provided on pages 7 and 8, respectively, of the Final Action) well suited for the addition of the fanned Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 7 array of cooling holes taught by Chlus to enhance cooling. Ans. 9. The same applies to Papple’s airfoil, in which the axial portion (“‘tip flag’ passage” 32b) is closest to the tip. See Final Act. 20 (Annotated Fig. 2B); see also Papple 3:1–7 (disclosing exit aperture 40 of “tip flag’ passage” 32b having tip component 40a and trailing edge component 40b for cooling both the tip and the trailing edge, thereby suggesting that the trailing edge and tip region of the tip flag passage would have been the logical place to which to connect the fanned array of cooling holes taught by Chlus). Appellant argues that “the Examiner proposes to utilize the alleged fanned array of Chlus in a different manner than disclosed by the Chlus reference” and that, if one were to follow the teachings of Chlus, one would terminate Morris’s first cooling passage prior to trailing edge 116, extend Morris’s second cooling passage in the radial direction to the tip, and then incorporate Chlus’s array of holes along a radial portion of the second cooling passage. Appeal Br. 4. Neither of these arguments is persuasive. As for the manner in which the fanned array of holes are used, in both Chlus and in the combination, with either Morris or Papple, the fanned array of holes provide enhanced cooling to the tip and trailing edge of the airfoil. See Chlus 3:1–36. Appellant’s assertion about terminating Morris’s first cooling passage and incorporating Chlus’s array of holes along an extended second cooling passage improperly presumes a bodily incorporation of Chlus’s airfoil structure into Morris. However, the obviousness analysis does not ask “whether the references could be physically combined but whether the claimed inventions are rendered obvious by the teachings of the prior art as a whole.” In re Etter, 756 F.2d 852, 859 (Fed. Cir. 1985) (en banc); see also In re Keller, 642 F.2d at 425 (stating that “[t]he test for obviousness is not Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 8 whether the features of a secondary reference may be bodily incorporated into the structure of the primary reference”). Appellant contends that because Chlus’s holes 50A–50F and 70A– 70D are not along a tip flag passage, much less along the axial portion of a tip flag passage, “it logically follows that the only reason to modify the references with this feature is gleaned from Appellant’s disclosure in an exercise of impermissible hindsight reconstruction.” Appeal Br. 5. This line of argument is inapposite here because the Examiner provides a sufficient reason (Final Act. 6–7, 19), gleaned from the teachings of Chlus (see Chlus 3:11–25), as discussed above, to combine the references as proposed in the rejection, and Appellant does not persuasively refute the Examiner’s finding or reasoning. See In re Cree, Inc., 818 F.3d 694, 702, n.3 (Fed. Cir. 2016); In re McLaughlin, 443 F.2d 1392, 1395 (CCPA 1971) (“Any judgment on obviousness is in a sense necessarily a reconstruction based upon hindsight reasoning, but so long as it takes into account only knowledge which was within the level of ordinary skill at the time the claimed invention was made and does not include knowledge gleaned only from applicant’s disclosure, such a reconstruction is proper.”). For the above reasons, Appellant fails to apprise us of error in either the rejection of claim 1 as unpatentable over Morris and Chlus or the rejection of claim 1 as unpatentable over Papple and Chlus. Accordingly, we sustain the rejection of claim 1, as well as claims 2, 4–6, 10, 12, 17–19, and 21, which fall with claim 1, as unpatentable over Morris and Chlus. We also sustain the rejection of claim 1, as well as claims 2, 4–6, 10, 17–19, and 21, which fall with claim 1, as unpatentable over Papple and Chlus. Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 9 Claims 9, 22, and 23 Appellant groups claims 9 and 22 together in contesting the rejections of these claims, and is silent as to claim 23. Appeal Br. 5–7. We select claim 9 to decide the appeal of the rejections of claims 9, 22, and 23, and claims 22 and 23 stand or fall with claim 9. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv). Appellant’s argument for claim 9 is predicated essentially on the argument set forth for claim 1—namely, that Chlus’s fanned array of cooling holes extend between cavity 48 and the airfoil tip, and not between an axial portion of a first cooling passage and the tip. Appeal Br. 5, 7. Appellant contends that because the Examiner does not point to any objective evidence that cavity 48 of Chlus includes an axial portion, Chlus does not support the Examiner’s interpretation of Figure 2 of Chlus as teaching each of the holes disposed at a different angle relative to an axial portion of the first cooling passage. Id. This line of argument is unavailing because, as the Examiner points out (Ans. 13), the argument attacks Chlus individually rather than the combination. Each of Morris and Papple discloses a first cooling passage having an axial portion, and once Chlus’s fanned array of cooling holes are provided on the airfoil of either Morris or Papple in the orientations relative to the axial direction, tip, and trailing edge shown in Figure 2 of Chlus, they will be oriented relative to the axial portion of the first cooling passage of either Morris or Papple as called for in claim 9. For the above reasons, Appellant fails to apprise us of error in the rejections of claim 9. Accordingly, we sustain the rejection of claims 9, 22, and 23 as unpatentable over Morris and Chlus, and the rejection of claims 9 and 22 as unpatentable over Papple and Chlus. Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 10 Rejections II–IV, VI, and VII—Obviousness based on Morris or Papple in view of Chlus, further in view of one or more of Raji, Hatman, and Cleveland In contesting these rejections, Appellant relies on the aforementioned arguments asserted against the rejections of claims 1 and 9, and argues that the Examiner’s application of Raji, Hatman, and Cleveland does not cure the purported deficiencies in the combinations of Morris or Papple and Chlus. See Appeal Br. 6, 7. For the reasons discussed above, these arguments fail to apprise us of error in the rejections of claims 1 and 9 and, likewise, fail to apprise us of error in the rejections of claims 8, 13, 15, 16, and 24, each of which we sustain. CONCLUSION Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1, 2, 4–6, 9, 10, 12, 17– 19, 21–23 103 Morris, Chlus 1, 2, 4–6, 9, 10, 12, 17–19, 21– 23 8 103 Morris, Chlus, Raji 8 13, 15, 16 103 Morris, Hatman, Chlus 13, 15, 16 24 103 Morris, Chlus, Cleveland 24 1, 2, 4–6, 9, 10, 17–19, 21, 22 103 Papple, Chlus 1, 2, 4–6, 9, 10, 17– 19, 21, 22 8 103 Papple, Chlus, Raji 8 13, 15, 16 103 Papple, Hatman, Chlus 13, 15, 16 Overall Outcome 1, 2, 4–6, 8–10, 12, 13, 15–19, 21–24 Appeal 2019-003142 Application 14/908,664 11 TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv). AFFIRMED Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation