Patents that should not have been issued - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: AE7OO
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 07, 2019, 03:27:44 am
content: Greetings,I was looking for research papers, sites and books that dealt with impedance/LCR measurements. When the first patent on the list popped up.https://patents.google.com/patent/US20150028892"Digital multi-meter with LCR function"Yes the patent is for a handheld that can measure voltage, current, resistance, capacitance and inductance. Filed for in 2012 based on a priority to a Taiwanese patent and issued in 2015.The only thing I see as a disclaimer is that the LCR meter has to have a impedance measuring circuit that has a auto-zero amplifier selectively coupled; But it looks like some of the dependent clauses do not require the auto-zero amp. They then proceed to basically cover just about every know method of measuring voltage, current, and impedance.Depending on how it does it measurements for capacitance and inductance, it looks the Elenco LCM-1950 is prior art going back to at least 2006. It is a DMM that can also measure capacitance and inductance. I can see how simply adding a "auto-zero" amplifier to an impedance meter is earth shattering. I would most likely prefer a IN Amp(which may give me a bonus auto-zero for free) or Diff Amp in the chain.Next uphttps://patents.google.com/patent/US20170292988A1/en" Signal testing apparatus for printed circuit board"Filed 2015 granted 2018. This sounds like a ATE bed of nails system.Here is one from Japan,https://patents.google.com/patent/JP2008516508A/en" Impedance detector "Files 2004, granted 2011. To be truthful this sounds like a auto tuner with a fancy SWR meter for a display.And what I think takes the cake,https://patents.google.com/patent/US20100244868A1/en"Wireless Clamp-on Current Probe"Filed 2009 Published 2010 Abandoned 2019Get a DMM with current clamp probe and hook it up to a wireless bridge. I wonder if wireless telemetery would have counted as prior art? Like the status of satellite power systems?Am I being brain dead or are these things obvious to anyone in the field at the time of filing?

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 07, 2019, 03:43:19 am
content: One that was brought up in another thread:https://patents.google.com/patent/US7782002B2/en?oq=7782002It's literally the schematic and BOM of the product in question. The only thing of substance being claimed seems to be the fan speed circuit, but that's not novel, it's been around for decades.I suspect there is a general interest (from the powers-that-be) to encourage more shitty patents. What IS a patent? It's just another tool, a bludgeon to brandish in court against a legal foe. It's an abstraction of violence, it's not physical but it nonetheless costs time and money to swing, or get hit with, and its threat limits others' behaviors unfairly.Tim

author: AE7OO
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 07, 2019, 04:02:30 am
content: In a way I wish they would try to enforce one of those patents. As long as I had advance notice I could buy a carton of popcorn and sit back and watch the show...In the past I've made pocket change helping find prior art on a couple of patents. And again, in the three I got paid for, any electronics tech/eng (what was also a Ham) who had been working in the field for 10 or 20 years (I bounced all over, Navy ET, ET degrees, R&D build tech, field service tech, etc etc) would seen the equipment and read the stuff I had. Trade shows, QST, QEX, 73, PopElec, Byte, etc, etc. It was real obvious the examiner in all three was NOT a electronics type.

author: ebastler
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 07, 2019, 08:41:55 am
content: (Oops -- I had just posted a comment pointing out that all your links were to the patentapplicationsrather than the granted patents, and that the allowed claims will typically be much narrower than the ones that were originally filed. But it seems that Google Patents always shows thegrantedclaims, even when it presents you a patent application number?! Didn't know that...)