Appeal 2007-2815
Application 10/498,809
[0052]), a “second expansion element 18” (id. at [0051]), a
“refrigerant/coolant heat exchanger 15” corresponding to the recited
auxiliary heat exchanger through which drive system coolant flows (id.), and
an “accumulator 5’” (id.; see also Figures 5 to 8). Thus, the refrigerant
circuit of Burk’s system contains all of the connected components recited in
claim 29.
As discussed above, claim 29 also limits the system to one that is
capable of partially or fully using ambient air as a heat sink in a “comfort
cooling mode.” Figure 5 of Burk shows the system in “air conditioning
mode, in which the refrigerant/coolant heat exchanger 15 is deactivated by
suitably switching the 3 way valve 20” (Burk [0052]). In this mode, the
compressed refrigerant “is condensed or cooled in the cooling air/refrigerant
heat exchanger 6, which acts as the condenser or the gas cooler” before
ultimately flowing “into the supply air/refrigerant heat exchanger 4, which
functions as the evaporator” (id.). Thus, in “air conditioning mode,” the
refrigerant in Burk’s system transfers heat to the ambient air at cooling air
refrigerant/refrigerant heat exchanger 6. We therefore agree with the
Examiner that Burk meets the limitation that the system components be
interconnected “such that ambient air . . . can . . . partially or fully be used as
. . . a heat sink in . . . a comfort cooling mode.”
Figure 6 shows Burk’s system applied in a “heat pump mode” in
which the cooling air/refrigerant heat exchanger 6 is inactive (Burk [0053]).
In this mode the refrigerant moves through the supply air/refrigerant heat
exchanger 4, which acts as the condenser/gas cooler, and is then “guided
over the internal heat exchanger 25, from where it is fed over the second
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