US 6201318

I'll search for the specific patent number 6201318 across USPTO and CAFC sources.

I have strong USPTO-sourced data. Let me run one more targeted check for any CAFC/Federal Circuit 2026 litigation activity before summarizing.

Summary — U.S. Patent No. 6,201,318

Verification note: No CAFC/Federal Circuit 2026 docket activity (or any litigation) for patent 6,201,318 was found in the searches. The only search hits for the numeric string "6201318" outside the patent record itself were third-party patent-listing tables in USPTO PTAB documents, which are unrelated to litigation of this patent. I searched only for the exact number 6201318 and did not substitute similar numbers.

Bibliographic data (per Google Patents / USPTO records)

Minor discrepancies to flag (interpreted literally, not auto-corrected):

• Google Patents lists the grant/publication date as 2001-03-13; Unified Patents' portal lists the grant date as 2001-03-12 and priority date as 1999-02-01. USPTO.report agrees with 2001-03-13.
• Assignors on the assignment records were R.M. Guillory, Glenn S. Arche, and Clint E. Piland, though Guillory is the sole listed inventor on the face of the patent.

Abstract (verbatim)

"A headlight warning system incorporates an engine running sensor and a headlight sensor coupled to a control circuit for activating a warning device, such as a buzzer, when the headlights have been left on for a first period of time after the engine has stopped running, and for deactivating the warning device either after a second period of time, if the engine is started, or if the headlights are shut off. The engine running sensor inductively senses a vehicle ignition signal. The headlight sensor magnetically senses the current in one of the battery cables using a Hall effect sensor in series with a magnetic flux collector encircling the battery cable. If the battery current exceeds an adjustable threshold, the headlights are assumed to be on. Following the deactivation of the warning device after the second period of time, the headlight warning system is reset by either starting the engine or by shutting off the headlights. The headlight warning system is self-contained, requires no modification of the existing vehicle electrical system, and is easy to install for retrofit applications."

Independent claims in plain language

The patent has 33 claims total, with three independent claims — 1, 9, and 27.

Claim 1 — Apparatus (broad, means-plus-function style): A system for warning of discharge of a motor vehicle battery when the powerplant (engine) is not running, comprising:

• (a) means for detecting when the powerplant is not running;
• (b) means for sensing battery current from the magnetic field surrounding a battery cable (i.e., non-contact/inductive current sensing);
• (c) means for comparing the sensed battery current with a threshold; and
• (d) means for generating a warning when the powerplant is not running and the sensed battery current exceeds the threshold.

Claim 9 — Detailed headlight warning system (the "engine running sensor" architecture): A system for a vehicle powered by an engine with an ignition cable and having at least one headlight, comprising:

• (a) an engine running sensor: (i) a conductor proximate to the ignition cable in which a first signal is induced when the engine runs, and (ii) a detector transforming that first signal into a second signal that is active when the engine is running / inactive when it is not;
• (b) a current sensor generating a third signal responsive to headlight current;
• (c) a threshold signal;
• (d) a comparator generating a fourth signal that is active when the third signal exceeds the threshold and inactive when below it;
• (e) a warning device; and
• (f) a control circuit that activates the warning device when the second signal is inactive (engine off) and the fourth signal is active (headlight current above threshold).

Claim 27 — Method: A method of warning of battery discharge when the powerplant is not running, comprising the steps of:

• (a) detecting if the powerplant is running;
• (b) measuring the battery current;
• (c) comparing the battery-current measurement to a threshold; and
• (d) activating a warning device if the powerplant is not running and the measured battery current exceeds the threshold.

Key dependent-claim concepts (for context)

• Magnetic-flux current sensing: magnetic flux sensor in a series magnetic circuit with a flux collector proximate the battery cable (claim 3); Hall effect sensor (claim 4); magnetically permeable material selected from iron, steel, ferrite, metallic glass (claims 5–6, 14–15).
• Engine-running detection via ignition signal from the ignition cable (claims 2, 28); conductor wrapped at least once around the ignition cable (claim 20).
• Timing: warning commences after a first period (claims 7, 21, 30) and terminates after a second period (claims 8, 22, 31); deactivation responsive to engine restart (claims 23, 32) or headlight current falling below threshold (claims 24, 33).
• Adjustable threshold (claim 16), buzzer warning device (claim 17), separate power source distinct from the vehicle battery (claims 18–19), microprocessor-based control circuit (claim 25), and a setup-mode switch for calibrating sensitivity (claim 26).

Uncertainty / caveats

• I did not locate any CAFC 2026 docket entry or District Court litigation for this patent; the absence of results in my searches should not be treated as definitive proof that none exists, but I found no affirmative evidence of such activity.
• The grant-date and priority-date discrepancies noted above come directly from differing third-party databases; the authoritative Google Patents/PTO-facing data (filing 1999-02-02, issue 2001-03-13) is the source I relied on for the bibliographic table.
• The patent is long expired (lapsed 2005 for non-payment of maintenance fees), so no live exclusive rights attach as of April 2026.

Sources: Google Patents (https://patents.google.com/patent/US6201318/en), Unified Patents portal (https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/patents/patent/US-6201318-B1), USPTO.report (https://uspto.report/patent/grant/6201318).

I'll search multiple litigation databases for US patent 6201318.

Let me search litigation-specific databases and the Unified Patents portal.

Let me check the Unified Patents litigation portal and other case-specific sources directly.

Litigation Search Results — U.S. Patent No. 6,201,318

No known litigation found.

I searched litigation-focused sources (Unified Patents litigation portal, USPTO/Google Patents "Cited By" and family records, uspto.report, and general web queries for the patent number, the assignee, and the title). I found no record of any civil action, complaint, or court proceeding involving U.S. Patent No. 6,201,318 in any jurisdiction.

Strict caveat: I was unable to directly query PACER, Docket Alarm, PlainSite, or CourtListener within this session, and I did not find any Unified Patents litigation-caselist entry for this number. Notably, Unified Patents' own patent page for US-6201318-B1 returned only bibliographic/prosecution data (assignees, citations, "Referenced By") with no litigation section populated, which is consistent with there being no tracked lawsuits. There were no PTAB proceedings (IPR/PGR) either. I cannot rule out a very short-lived or state-court action, but nothing surfaced.

Why litigation is unlikely for this patent

• Owner: Clairmont (Limited Partnership); original assignee Clairmont; inventor Ron M. Guillory (with Glenn S. Arche and Clint E. Piland as assignors).
• Filing/priority date: 1999-02-02; granted: 2001-03-13.
• Termination: The patent lapsed for failure to pay maintenance fees, effective 2005-03-13 (USPTO "LAPS"/"STCH"/"FP" legal events). It was enforceable for only about four years.
• Status: Expired – Fee Related.
• The Canadian family member CA2297857A1 went Abandoned.
• The large "Cited By" lists (e.g., IBM self-driving-vehicle patents, Sno-Way snowplow lighting, Denso, Infineon) are patent citations, not litigation; do not confuse them with lawsuits. Likewise the "Similar Documents" list is unrelated art, not litigation.

Requested case table

Bottom line: As of April 26, 2026, I found no known litigation involving US 6,201,318. If you need a definitive negative or a certified check, I recommend running the number directly through PACER Case Locator, Docket Alarm, PlainSite, and the Unified Patents litigation caselist, plus a PTAB (IPR/PGR/CBM) search — tools I could not fully execute here. I'd flag this conclusion as high-confidence but not court-certified, since the patent's brief four-year enforceable life and early lapse make litigation very improbable.

I'll verify the structured "no proceedings" signal against public sources before finalizing.

Let me run two more targeted checks — one for any PTAB docket references, one for assertion/litigation history that might explain the absence of IPRs.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file: 0. The USPTO Open Data Portal structured block for US 6,201,318 reports no IPR, PGR, or CBM proceedings, and targeted web searches (PTAB petition documents, Unified Patents portal, uspto.report, Google Patents litigation/PTAB tabs) surfaced no proceeding numbers naming this patent — so the breakdown is 0 active / 0 claims invalidated / 0 claims sustained / 0 settled / 0 institution denials. The bottom line for a defendant is unusual and stronger than any IPR outcome: the patent was never tested at the PTAB because it had already been abandoned to the public four years before AIA trials existed — all 33 claims lapsed for nonpayment of the maintenance fee effective 2005-03-13, so there is no live claim to invalidate and nothing to defend.

Proceedings

No proceeding exists — and none could have existed during the patent's enforceable life

• Type: N/A — no Inter Partes Review, Post-Grant Review, or Covered Business Method review was ever filed.
• Filed: N/A
• Status: No AIA trial proceedings on file (USPTO ODP). Corroborated by web search showing zero PTAB dockets referencing US 6,201,318 as a challenged patent.
• Judge panel: None. No panel ever convened.
• Petition grounds: None.
• Institution decision: None.
• Final Written Decision: None. No claim of this patent has been canceled, confirmed, or construed by the PTAB.
• Settlement / termination: N/A.
• Appeal: None. No FWD means no Federal Circuit appeal; nothing for CourtListener to report.
• Defensive value: The absence of PTAB activity here is not the usual "patent is untested, so be careful" signal. It is a temporal impossibility: IPR/PGR/CBM became available only on 2012-09-16 (post-AIA), by which point this patent had already lapsed. A defendant today does not need an IPR-based defense.

Why the PTAB docket is empty (the real defensive facts)

These come from the patent's own prosecution and post-grant record (Google Patents legal events for US6201318B1):

• 1999-02-02 — application US 09/241,877 filed; priority date 1999-02-02.
• 2001-03-13 — patent granted (33 claims).
• 2004-09-29 — maintenance fee reminder mailed.
• 2005-03-13 — patent expired due to nonpayment of maintenance fees under 37 C.F.R. § 1.362 (LAPS/STCH/FP events). Legal status: Expired – Fee Related. Google Patents lists an "Anticipated expiration" of 2019-02-02, but the enforceable term actually ended in 2005.
• CA2297857A1 — the Canadian counterpart (priority 1999-02-02, filed 2000-01-31) is Abandoned. No foreign family members remain.
• Because the patent was permitted to lapse in 2005, all 33 claims — 1–8 (system), 9–26 (headlight warning system), and 27–33 (method) — are UNTESTED by any tribunal but also unenforceable. There is no "surviving claim set" to map.

False positives I checked and rejected

• A PTAB petition-document hit (ptacts.uspto.gov petition 1557935) lists "6201318" inside a long table of patent numbers (alongside 6326903, 6393362, 6502035, etc.). This is a citation/exhibit list in an unrelated navigation-technology IPR — not a proceeding against US 6,201,318. Do not cite it as PTAB activity.
• The four LED-headlight IPR petitions surfaced by search (Beam/Karlsson/Harbers art, claims 1–58 of a different patent) concern a different, much later patent and are not related to this one.
• The Unified Patents portal entry for US-6201318-B1 shows no PTAB proceedings and records Lifetime Renewal Fees: 0, consistent with the 2005 lapse. There is no defensive-aggregator involvement in this patent's chain.

Strategic summary

Claim status. There is no canceled/sustained/tested split to report. Claims 1–8, 9–26, and 27–33 of US 6,201,318 were never adjudicated anywhere — not at the PTAB, and (per the searches run) not in any published District Court invalidity holding either. The only terminal event in the file is administrative: the 2005-03-13 lapse for failure to pay the maintenance fee, which under 37 C.F.R. § 1.362 ended the patent's life. That lapsed status, not an FWD, is what a defendant relies on.

Estoppel landscape. Section 315(e)(2) estoppel is irrelevant because no petitioner exists. There is no IPR estoppel, no instituted-ground bar, and no need to work around a § 315(e) estoppel footprint. Symmetrically, there is also no Graham v. John Deere record at the PTAB to borrow: if you somehow needed to attack the claims, you would be building an invalidity case from scratch. You should not need to. The correct § 282 defense is the patent's own lapsed status and the 35 U.S.C. §§ 271/286 timeline — liability can only attach to activity that predates 2005-03-13, and damages are limited to the six years before filing under § 286.

Pattern signals. There is no repeat-petitioner pattern (no petitioner at all), no patent-owner appellate aggressiveness (Clairmont never appealed anything, because it never had a PTAB adverse ruling), and no defensive aggregator in the chain — Unified Patents' records show zero proceedings and zero renewal-fee payments for this patent. Combined with the abandoned CA counterpart and the absence of any assertion activity surfaced in search, the picture is of a patent that its owner stopped maintaining and stopped defending two decades ago rather than one that was "hardened" by winning IPRs.

Recommended next steps

1. If a demand letter or complaint cites US 6,201,318, treat it as facially defective. Quote the legal-events record: "2005-03-13 — PATENT EXPIRED DUE TO NONPAYMENT OF MAINTENANCE FEES UNDER 37 CFR 1.362" (Google Patents legal events; confirm against USPTO Patent Center for application 09/241,877 and the fee record in the USPTO Maintenance Fee branch). Google Patents and the Unified Patents portal both list Legal Status "Expired – Fee Related."
2. Do not spend money on an IPR. There is no claim to cancel, and the Board does not invalidate expired-lapsed patents to a defendant's practical benefit. Any AIA petition would be a pure waste of fees and would not create estoppel value against a dead patent.
3. Do not overstate. Because no FWD exists, do not represent to a court that "claims 1–5 have been canceled" — nothing has been canceled. The accurate statement is: the patent lapsed for nonpayment of maintenance fees effective 2005-03-13, its Canadian counterpart is abandoned, and its record contains no PTAB or other adjudication of any claim.
4. Preserve the timeline argument. If assertion is attempted, the dispositive framing is temporal: no pre-2005 conduct within the § 286 six-year lookback can support recoverable damages, and post-2005 conduct cannot infringe a lapsed patent. Consider a Rule 12 motion on the face of the patent's prosecution/legal-events record rather than full invalidity discovery.
5. Verification log (searches run 2026-10-01): "US 6,201,318 headlight warning system IPR PTAB" — no proceedings; "6201318" IPR/CBM lawsuit, Clairmont/Guillory — no proceedings, no maintenance fees paid, no aggregator involvement. The only PTAB-hosted documents containing the number are unrelated petitions' citation tables.

Constraint note: No proceeding number, judge panel, FWD holding, or appeal docket is stated above because none exists. I did not invent any. If the ODP ingest is stale, the residual risk is a filing made between the last ingest and today — worth one final confirmation directly in PTAB E2E's "Patent Trial" search and the PTAB Decisions archive before you rely on the number zero in a filing.

I'll research this patent's assignment chain and cross-reference the ownership history before compiling the report.

Ownership & Assignment Analysis — US 6,201,318 B1 ("Headlight warning system")

Data-access note up front: I was able to retrieve the Google Patents legal-events record (which mirrors USPTO assignment data) and the Unified Patents patent record for US 6,201,318. I was not able to retrieve the full Assignment Center "correspondent of record" field (the attorney/firm who filed each recording) from the sources reachable in this session. That field is therefore reported below as unverified, not inferred. Any statement about the correspondent must be confirmed directly at the Assignment Center by searching patent number 6201318.

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Inventors

Unusual pattern flagged: The issued patent names only Guillory as inventor, but the first recorded assignment lists three assignors — GUILLORY, R.M.; ARCHE, GLENN S.; and PILAND, CLINT E. (reel 010200/0477). Arche and Piland do not appear as inventors on the granted patent. This means either (a) they were contributors/co-applicants whose names were dropped before grant, or (b) they held an ownership/obligation-to-assign interest separate from inventorship. Either way it is a genuine discrepancy worth noting for chain-of-title diligence. There is no evidence of all inventors departing within 12 months of filing — the same three assignors re-execute the second assignment roughly a year later (signing dates 2000-01-13 to 2000-02-29), so the original inventive group stayed together through the 2000 reformation.

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Original assignee

• Entity on the issued patent: Clairmont (Limited Partners), Oregon — re-formed/renamed in the record to Clairmont (Limited Partnership), Oregon (recorded 2000-03-27).
• Primary line of business: No evidence of a public company, no SEC filer found. The invention itself is a self-contained, retrofit automotive accessory — a battery-powered headlight warning buzzer that clamps a flux collector around a battery cable and wraps a pickup wire around a spark-plug lead (see Fig. 6a/6b). The disclosure and business framing (ease of retrofit, "unsophisticated users," engine-compartment mounting) are consistent with a small automotive-accessories venture, not a large OEM.
• Did they ship a product embodying the claims? No evidence found of a commercialized product. The patent lapsed for nonpayment of maintenance fees in 2005, which is inconsistent with an operating product line that needed the patent enforced.
• Current status: Operating/acquired/dissolved status not determinable from the sources consulted. Practical indicators point to inactive: the patent expired for fee nonpayment effective 2005-03-13, and the CA counterpart (CA 2,297,857) was abandoned.

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Assignment timeline

Only two assignments are recorded, and both stay inside the original Clairmont ownership family — the patent never transferred to a third party.

• 1999-02-01 (executed / effective) / recorded 1999-08-27 — Reel 010200/0477

  • Conveyance: Assignment (Assignment of Assignors' Interest)
  • Assignor: GUILLORY, R.M.; ARCHE, GLENN S.; PILAND, CLINT E.
  • Assignee: CLAIRMONT (LIMITED PARTNERS), Oregon
  • Correspondent: Not available in the source data retrieved — verify at the Assignment Center; do not treat as known.
  • Context: Original transfer of invention rights from the three principals to the partnership at formation — i.e., the founding/initial ownership assignment, executed the day before the 1999-02-02 filing.

• 2000-01-13 to 2000-02-29 (executed/signing dates) / recorded 2000-03-27 — Reel 010699/0589

  • Conveyance: Assignment (Assignment of Assignors' Interest)
  • Assignor: GUILLORY, R.M.; ARCHE, GLENN S.; PILAND, CLINT E. (same three)
  • Assignee: CLAIRMONT (LIMITED PARTNERSHIP), Oregon
  • Correspondent: Not available in the source data retrieved — verify at the Assignment Center; do not treat as known.
  • Context: Internal reformation/re-confirmation of the same ownership — "Limited Partners" → "Limited Partnership" with the identical assignor set. This is best read as a corrective/restating assignment within the original owner, not an arm's-length sale.

No post-issuance assignment exists. After the 2000-03-27 recording, the chain is silent until the patent lapses. There is no transfer-to-asserter, no securitization, no bankruptcy sale, and no defensive-aggregator acquisition on record.

Terminal event (not an assignment): maintenance-fee lapse — reminder mailed 2004-09-29, lapse for nonpayment 2005-03-14, "patent expired due to nonpayment" 2005-04-13, effective expiration 2005-03-13.

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Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 6201318
    1999 : Filed by Clairmont Limited Partners
         : Assignment recorded reel 010200 frame 0477
    2000 : Assigned to Clairmont Limited Partnership
         : Recorded at reel 010699 frame 0589
    2001 : Patent granted
    2005 : Expired for unpaid maintenance fee

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NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — not present. No "IP / Patents / Licensing / Holdings / Ventures" successor appears in the chain. The only two assignees are Clairmont (Limited Partners) and Clairmont (Limited Partnership) — reel 010200/0477 and reel 010699/0589 — which are the same Oregon venture, not a licensing shell. Note: a "Limited Partnership" structure is not itself an NPE tell; here it is the operating venture's own ownership vehicle.

2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. Neither Clairmont entity appears on any of the enumerated NPE directories (Acacia, Marathon, IV, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Conversant/Mosaid, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, Document Generation Corp, Spangenberg entities), and no Unified Patents / RPX high-frequency-plaintiff match was found for this patent. The Unified Patents record lists Clairmont (Limited Partnership) as parent and shows 0 lifetime renewal fees, with no litigation/assertion activity.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — unclear. Two recordings by the same assignor family would be the expected place for a recurring correspondent, but the correspondent-of-record field was not retrievable in this session. This cannot be scored present or absent; verify at the Assignment Center. (Unrelated tip for follow-up: the application bears the internal docket "GUL-001-US" in the Canadian family document — a lead for identifying the prosecuting firm, which is often the same firm that filed the assignments.)

4. Cascading transfers — not present. Exactly two assignments, both in 1999–2000, both involving the identical three assignors and effectively the same assignee. There is no chain of LLCs, no shared registered-agent address across nominally distinct buyers, and no <24-month cascade.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — not present. No infringement suit naming this patent was found. There is no litigation date to measure a transfer against, so this signal fails for want of a suit.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. No Chapter 7/11 proceeding involving Clairmont was found, and no patent-sale record (Kodak/Nortel/Polaroid-type) references this patent.

7. Privateering — not present. No operating-company-to-NPE transfer and no SEC/Patent-Progress/EFF coverage of such a move was found.

8. Defensive aggregator — not present. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT, Unified Patents, or OIN. It terminates by fee lapse (expired 2005-03-13), which neutralizes the patent by abandonment rather than by defensive acquisition.

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Verdict

Insufficient data — more precisely, no NPE pattern; the patent never left its original owner.

Justification: The record contains only the original ownership paperwork — reel 010200/0477 (1999-08-27) and reel 010699/0589 (2000-03-27), both from the same three assignors (Guillory, Arche, Piland) into the same Oregon Clairmont venture. There is no third-party sale, no known asserter (reels above; Unified Patents shows zero lifetime renewal fees and no assertion history), no litigation, and no defensive-aggregator acquisition; the patent simply expired for nonpayment of maintenance fees effective 2005-03-13. Absent evidence of any post-2000 transfer or assertion, no NPE signal can be supported, and I explicitly decline to infer shell-entity status from the "Limited Partnership" name alone.

Verify at: USPTO Assignment Center — search patent number 6201318 at https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (legacy mirror: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html). Prioritize pulling the correspondent-of-record on reel 010200/0477 and reel 010699/0589, which is the one datum this analysis could not confirm.

I'll research the cited prior art for US 6,201,318. Let me start with the patent itself and the key references.

Let me research the remaining cited references.

Prior-Art Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 6,201,318 B1 ("Headlight warning system")

Methodological note / limitation first, per the strict rule: I searched for the exact number 6201318 and for each cited reference individually. I was able to retrieve and verify the full text, claims, and abstracts for the magnetic‑sensor references (US 5,041,761; US 4,539,520; US 4,283,643) and US 4,493,001. For the remaining cited patents I rely on (a) the '318 patent's own characterizations of them (authoritative, quoted below), and/or (b) the Google Patents/USPTO citation table (numbers, assignees, dates, titles). I was not able to pull the full text of US 3,905,013; US 4,151,505; and US 4,994,728 before the search budget was exhausted. Where I am relying on the patent's own summary or on title-level data only, I flag it. I did not substitute any similar patent numbers.

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0. The legal frame for this analysis

• The '318 patent has a filing/priority date of 1999‑02‑02 and issued 2001‑03‑13. It is a pre‑AIA patent (AIA first‑inventor‑to‑file applies only to applications filed on/after 2013‑03‑16), so pre‑AIA 35 U.S.C. § 102(a)/(b)/(e) governs.
• Every one of the 14 cited references published before 1998, i.e., more than one year before the 1999‑02‑02 U.S. filing. Each therefore independently qualifies as a § 102(b) statutory bar reference (and as § 102(a)/(e) art). Dating is not a contested issue for any of them.
• Anticipation standard (§ 102): a single reference must disclose every limitation of the claim, arranged as in the claim. Obviousness (§ 103): the reference may be combined with another.

Governing claim elements (from the earlier summary) that drive the anticipation analysis:

• Claim 1: (a) means detecting powerplant not running; (b) means sensing battery current from the magnetic field surrounding a battery cable; (c) means comparing sensed current to a threshold; (d) warning when not running and current > threshold.
• Claim 9: ignition‑cable‑induced engine‑running sensor + detector; current sensor → third signal; threshold; comparator → fourth signal; warning device; control circuit.
• Claim 27: method steps mirroring claim 1.

The cited art splits cleanly into two disjoint families that the '318 patent combines:

• Family A — vehicle light/battery warnings (relay, resistor, or voltage sensing): US 2,756,408; US 2,780,797; US 2,942,235; US 3,467,831; US 3,898,612; US 3,905,013; US 4,058,793; US 4,104,613; US 4,151,505; US 4,493,001.
• Family B — non‑contact magnetic/Hall current sensing: US 4,283,643; US 4,539,520; US 5,041,761.

No single reference bridges the two families; that gap is the source of the '318 patent's allowance.

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1. Master table — all 14 cited references

The five marked "Yes" are the ones flagged with an asterisk ("cited by examiner") in the Google Patents citation table (US 3,905,013; US 4,151,505; US 4,283,643; US 4,493,001; US 4,994,728) — i.e., art the examiner affirmatively located rather than art listed on the face by the applicant.

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2. Per-reference analysis

(B/B1) The magnetic-sensing references — most technically relevant

#14 — US 5,041,761 A (United Technologies Automotive; Wright et al.)

• Citation: US 5,041,761 A, "Magnetic automotive lamp current sensor," filed 1990‑09‑14, issued 1991‑08‑20. Foreign sibling EP 0 475 880 A2.
• Description (verified from full text): A coil 12 in series with an automotive lamp 14 is wound on a rectangular core 15 (SAE 1010 steel), which has a channel and an opening 18 in which a Hall-effect transducer 20 is inserted. Lamp current sets up a magnetic field in the core, concentrated in the opening; the Hall sensor "generates an output when said magnetic field exceeds a threshold level," which drives an open‑collector transistor that in turn drives "an automotive circuit 53 that monitors the operation of the lamp." It is expressly directed to detecting lamp outage, and it dissipates little heat versus resistor sensing.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): The '318 patent itself characterizes this reference as "a coil in series with a lamp circuit and wound around a magnetically permeable core which has a gap within which is placed a magnetic flux sensor… switches an open collector transistor that drives an automotive circuit," and notes the decisive difference: the lamp circuit "must be interrupted to insert the current sensor," it is "not responsive to whether or not the engine is running," and it has "no override or time‑out features."
  • It does not anticipate claims 1, 9, or 27 because it lacks (i) sensing of a battery cable by the field surrounding the cable (its coil is in series with the load), (ii) any engine‑not‑running detection, and (iii) any battery‑discharge warning.
  • It is the single most relevant reference to the magnetic-sensing dependent claims — claims 3, 4, 5, 6 and 12, 13, 14, 15 — disclosing a Hall sensor in a series magnetic circuit with a magnetically permeable (steel) flux collector. Even there it does not fully anticipate, because those dependent claims incorporate claim 1/9's battery‑cable and engine‑off limitations.
  • Realistic role: lead § 103 reference for the magnetic‑sensing sub‑combination.

#11 — US 4,539,520 A (Bridges Electric; McBride)

• Citation: US 4,539,520 A, "Remote current detector," filed 1981‑03‑02, issued 1985‑09‑03.
• Description (verified): A Hall-effect transducer 10 positioned between tapered low‑hysteresis ferromagnetic pole pieces 14/16 (a flux collector/concentrator) senses the magnetic field surrounding a conductor of an electrical power transmission system; the focused field is "proportional to the magnetic field in the air." The transducer output is fed to a fault detector that compares the signal to set points (a "high signal selector"/"low signal selector" against first/second set points) and, when a set point is exceeded, actuates a relay to give a fault indication, with a time‑delay circuit to prevent false actuation.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): The '318 patent explicitly cites this as teaching "the use of a Hall effect sensor in combination with a magnetic flux collector to sense the current in an existing current carrying conductor."
  • It discloses the elements of claim 1(b) (sensing current from the magnetic field surrounding a conductor), claim 3/13 (Hall sensor in series magnetic circuit with a flux collector), claim 4/12 (Hall effect), and claim 5/6/14/15 (magnetically permeable material).
  • It does not anticipate claims 1, 9, or 27: the conductor is a transmission line, not a vehicle battery cable; there is no engine‑running/powerplant detection; and there is no vehicle‑light warning.
  • Most relevant to: claim 1(b) and dependent claims 3–6, 11–15; also arguably relevant to the "comparator vs. threshold" limitation and to the time‑delay concepts in claims 7/8/21/22.

#10 — US 4,283,643 A (Electric Power Research Institute; Levin)

• Citation: US 4,283,643 A, "Hall sensing apparatus," filed 1979‑05‑25 (priority 1979‑05‑24), issued 1981‑08‑11, examiner‑cited.
• Description (verified): A Hall sensor element 14 sits in the concentrated field of a magnetic‑field concentrator assembly (concentrator rods 16/18 of low‑reluctance soft iron + pick‑up plates) positioned around a distribution conductor 12. A Hall current circuit and detection circuit produce a current signal. Notably, a microprocessor 54 controls a device that intermittently enables the Hall current only during periods when an output is wanted — expressly to save energy and to minimize Hall‑element heating/temperature drift.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102):
  • Discloses elements of claims 3, 4, 5, 6 / 11–15 (Hall element + concentrator + permeable material).
  • The intermittent, microprocessor‑controlled enabling of the sensor is meaningfully relevant to claim 25 (microprocessor control circuit) and to the '318 patent's own power‑saving step (switching the Hall sensor off, step 308). But it is again not a vehicle battery‑cable/engine‑off warning system, so it does not anticipate an independent claim.

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(A) The vehicle warning / battery references

#12 — US 4,493,001 A (General Motors; Sheldrake)

• Citation: US 4,493,001 A, "Motor vehicle battery rundown protection system," filed 1983‑11‑10, issued 1985‑01‑08, examiner‑cited.
• Description (verified): Responsive to battery voltage (not current) when the engine is not running, it compares the sensed voltage to a threshold/reference (PUT 54 + zener 70), applies an RC time delay, and disconnects the battery from the electrical loads before the battery is too discharged to restart; an override circuit suppresses the disconnect on an entry‑incident voltage drop. It senses engine state via the ignition switch 14 and crank switch 16.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): This is the closest Family‑A reference to the logic of claim 1/claim 27:
  • Discloses claim 1(a) (detecting powerplant not running via ignition switch), claim 1(c) (comparing to a threshold), and the conditional response (engine off + threshold exceeded), plus time‑delay concepts (claims 7/8/21/22; method 30/31).
  • It does not anticipate claims 1, 9, 27 because the detection variable is battery voltage, not battery current sensed from the magnetic field surrounding a battery cable, and the output is a disconnect, not a warning device.
  • Realistic role: strong § 103 partner for the "engine‑off + threshold + delay" half of the invention.

#13 — US 4,994,728 A (Mitsubishi Denki)

• Citation: US 4,994,728 A, "Apparatus for diagnosing vehicle-mounted battery," filed 1988‑02‑24, issued 1991‑02‑19, examiner‑cited.
• Description: Title/assignee/date verified from the citation table only; full text not retrieved in this session. By title and field it concerns apparatus for diagnosing the condition of a vehicle‑mounted battery (battery diagnostics), which places it in the same general problem space as the '318 patent's stated alternative use ("diagnostic mode to detect any appreciable current discharge… to assist in locating such a fault").
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Provisionally relevant to the battery‑status/threshold and diagnostic aspects (claim 1(a)/(c) concepts, and the specification's diagnostic alternative embodiment). I cannot assert it discloses magnetic field sensing of a battery cable or engine‑off warning. Given the limited data, I would not treat it as anticipatory of any claim without full‑text verification. Flagged: unverified.

#9 — US 4,104,613 A (The Raymond Lee Organization)

• Citation: US 4,104,613 A, "Vehicle headlight alarm," filed 1977‑01‑28, issued 1978‑08‑01.
• Description (patent's own characterization): "a vehicle headlight alarm comprising a relay coil in series with the current to the headlights and taillights, and a normally open associated relay switch in series with the current provided by the vehicle battery through the vehicle ignition switch—when in the OFF position—to an audible alarm." The patent notes it requires modifying the existing wiring, inserts a relay coil in the lamp circuit, needs a special ignition switch, consumes excess power, and has no override or time‑out.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Discloses the idea of claim 1(a) (ignition OFF detection), of comparing headlight draw against a sensing element, and of claim 1(d)/17 (audible alarm). It does not anticipate claims 1/9/27 because sensing is by a series relay coil, not by the magnetic field surrounding a battery cable, and there is no threshold comparator or time‑out. Most relevant to claims 1(a), 1(d), 17.

#7 — US 4,058,793 A (Copeland)

• Citation: US 4,058,793 A, "Vehicle headlight warning circuit," filed 1976‑05‑24, issued 1977‑11‑15.
• Description (patent's own characterization): "connects between the non‑battery terminals of the vehicle headlight switch and the vehicle ignition switch [and] generates an audible warning if the headlights are turned on when the vehicle ignition switch is off." The patent criticizes it for passing current through the ignition circuit when off and for no time‑out.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Discloses the headlight‑on + ignition‑off warning concept (claim 1(a)/(d)); not anticipatory of the independent claims (no magnetic cable sensing, no threshold comparator, no time‑out). Most relevant to claims 1(a), 1(d).

#5 — US 3,898,612 A (Lee Maw Huei)

• Citation: US 3,898,612 A, "Headlight buzzer system," filed 1973‑04‑27, issued 1975‑08‑05.
• Description (patent's own characterization): "a buzzer unit having a relay coil that is activated by either the ignition switch, or by the headlight switch through the associated normally closed relay coil contacts. If the ignition switch is turned off while the headlights are on, the relay coil is alternately activated and deactivated, causing the relay contacts to emit an audible warning signal." Criticized for requiring harness modification, continuous relay‑coil current (waste), and no override/time‑out.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Relevant to claims 1(a), 1(d), and 17 (buzzer); not anticipatory of the independent claims. Its alternating‑relay chatter is the type of "annoying continuous warning" the '318 patent's time‑outs were designed to avoid (relevant to claims 7/8/21/22 as a distinguishing feature).

#6 — US 3,905,013 A (Lee Maw Huei) — examiner‑cited

• Citation: US 3,905,013 A, "Headlight warning system," filed 1973‑04‑27, issued 1975‑09‑09, examiner‑cited. (Same inventor, same filing date, and same family as US 3,898,612.)
• Description: Title/assignee/date verified from the citation table; full text not retrieved. By title it is a headlight warning system of the same genre as #5.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Provisionally relevant to claims 1(a)/(d) (warning when headlights left on). Because it was examiner‑cited but is not discussed anywhere in the '318 specification, the examiner presumably considered it but found it non‑anticipatory (consistent with the relay‑based, non‑magnetic nature of the family). Flagged: full‑text verification not completed; no anticipation asserted.

#8 — US 4,151,505 A (Swinny) — examiner‑cited

• Citation: US 4,151,505 A, "Buzzer warning circuit for automobile lights," filed 1976‑10‑14, issued 1979‑04‑24, examiner‑cited.
• Description: Title/assignee/date verified from the citation table; full text not retrieved. A buzzer warning circuit for automobile lights.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Relevant at the concept level to claim 17 (buzzer warning device) and claim 1(d). Not anticipatory of the independent claims (no magnetic battery‑cable sensing; no engine‑running detection architecture of claim 9). Flagged: full‑text verification not completed.

#4 — US 3,467,831 A (Wilson)

• Citation: US 3,467,831 A, "Circuit breaker for vehicle lights," filed 1968‑02‑13, issued 1969‑09‑16.
• Description (patent's own characterization): "incorporating at least one relay circuit in the vehicle electrical system for automatically shutting off the vehicle lights when a vehicle door is opened after the ignition has been turned off with the lights left on." Criticized as overriding the driver's wish and hard to retrofit.
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Relevant only to claim 1(a) (ignition‑off detection) and to the general objective; it shuts lights off rather than warns, and uses relays, so it is not anticipatory of any claim.

#3 — US 2,942,235 A (Warhurst); #2 — US 2,780,797 A (Gooding); #1 — US 2,756,408 A (Mckaig Electronics)

• Citations: US 2,942,235 A (filed 1957‑09‑13, issued 1960‑06‑21); US 2,780,797 A (filed 1954‑06‑14, issued 1957‑02‑05); US 2,756,408 A (filed 1954‑06‑01, issued 1956‑07‑24).
• Description (patent's own characterization): These "teach other arrangements for systems to warn drivers when the headlights have been left on after the ignition has been turned off," and "each of these systems incorporate relays integrated into the vehicle electrical system," with the shared drawback that they "require modification of the existing electrical system."
• Anticipation assessment (§ 102): Collectively they establish the old and well‑known objective and the relay‑based implementation of engine‑off/headlight‑on warning — relevant to claim 1(a)/(d) and the preamble/field, and useful as background/§ 103 art showing the long‑felt need. They are not anticipatory of claims 1/9/27 (no magnetic battery‑cable current sensing; no engine‑running sensor of claim 9; no microprocessor timing).

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3. Bottom line — anticipation vs. obviousness

No single one of the 14 cited references anticipates any of claims 1–33 under § 102. The reason is structural: the independent claims require the concurrence of two things that appear only in different references —

1. non‑contact, magnetic‑field sensing of current in a battery cable with a threshold comparison (found in Family B: US 5,041,761; US 4,539,520; US 4,283,643), and
2. detection that the engine is not running, plus a warning device (found in Family A: US 4,104,613; US 4,058,793; US 3,898,612; US 4,493,001; and the relay references).

The '318 patent's contribution is the combination of (1) and (2) in a self‑contained, retrofit package. That is why the examiner allowed it over these references.

Where the references do map onto specific claims (all as dependent claims that incorporate the independent‑claim limitations):

Practical takeaway: all 14 references are best deployed as § 103 art, not § 102 art. The strongest obviousness case would pair a magnetic‑current‑sensing reference (US 5,041,761 for automotive context, or US 4,539,520 for Hall‑plus‑flux‑collector‑around‑a‑conductor) with an engine‑off warning/battery‑protection reference (US 4,493,001 for the threshold‑plus‑time‑delay logic, or US 4,104,613/US 4,058,793 for the ignition‑off alarm). The elements the cited art does not appear to disclose — and which would therefore resist a § 103 challenge — are: claim 2/20's inductive ignition‑signal engine sensor (conductor wrapped on an ignition cable), and claim 26's setup‑mode switch for threshold calibration.

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4. Caveats

• Unverified full text: US 3,905,013; US 4,151,505; and US 4,994,728 are assessed from the Google Patents/USPTO citation table (assignee, dates, title) and the '318 patent's field, not from their claims/specifications. I make no anticipation assertion for these three; that would require reading their full text.
• Authoritative characterizations: For US 2,756,408; US 2,780,797; US 2,942,235; US 3,467,831; US 3,898,612; US 4,058,793; US 4,104,613; US 4,539,520; and US 5,041,761, I quote the '318 patent's own summary of each; those summaries are the patentee's characterizations and should be checked against the references' actual text before relying on them in a validity opinion.
• Date convention: "Published" in the table = issue date, consistent with the earlier bibliographic table (filing 1999‑02‑02, issue 2001‑03‑13). The known database discrepancies (Unified Patents lists priority 1999‑02‑01 / grant 2001‑03‑12) are not material here because no anticipation analysis turns on the one‑day delta.
• No new prior art asserted: I limited this analysis to the 14 references cited on the face of US 6,201,318, as requested. I did not add the "Cited By," "Similar Documents," or foreign‑family references, since those are not citations to which the patent's validity is measured.

I'll ground this obviousness analysis in the actual disclosures of the cited prior art. Let me pull the key references.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 6,201,318 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

Date-of-analysis note: The task specifies April 26, 2026; this session's system clock reads 2026-10-01. I flag the discrepancy but conduct the analysis as of April 26, 2026, consistent with the previously generated sections. Nothing in the intervening period changes the analysis, since the patent lapsed in 2005 and I found no litigation (per the litigation summary above).

Building on prior sections: The bibliographic table, abstract, and claim breakdown are not repeated here. This section assumes the claim-1/9/27 mapping from the "Patent summary" and focuses exclusively on the prior-art references cited on the face of the patent and the combinations they support.

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1. Legal framework and level of ordinary skill

Under Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1 (1966), and KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007), the analysis turns on: (a) the scope and content of the prior art; (b) the differences between the prior art and the claims; (c) the level of ordinary skill; and (d) objective indicia. Under KSR, a combination is obvious where it is "the product of . . . ordinary creativity," where the elements were "known" and combined "according to known methods" to yield "predictable results," or where there was a "design incentive," "market pressure," or a "finite number of identified, predictable solutions."

PHOSITA (as of the 1999-02-02 priority date): An automotive electrical engineer or technician with 2–4 years of experience (or a B.S. in electrical engineering) designing aftermarket and OEM 12 V vehicle accessory electronics, conversant with (i) automotive lighting/ignition wiring, (ii) Hall-effect and flux-collector current sensors, and (iii) simple microcontroller/analog timing control circuits. The USPC classifications on the face of the patent (307/10.7 "Battery Protection"; 340/457.2 "Of Headlight Energization"; 340/636; 323/368 "Hall Effect Device or Magnetoresistor") confirm this is the relevant art.

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2. The cited prior art forms three families

Family A — "lights-left-on" warning logic (ignition-vs.-headlight state).

• US 2,756,408 (McKaig, 1956); US 2,780,797 (Gooding, 1957); US 2,942,235 (Warhurst, 1960) — relay-based light-disconnect/reminder alarms.
• US 3,467,831 (Wilson, 1969) — relay circuit breaker auto-extinguishing lights.
• US 3,898,612 / US 3,905,013 (Lee, 1975) — headlight buzzer systems (audible warning when ignition off with lights on).
• US 4,058,793 (Copeland, 1977) — I retrieved the full text: a "headlight warning circuit" that sounds an audible alarm when the headlight switch is closed and the ignition switch is open, and that re-arms when "either the headlight switch 2 is opened or the ignition switch 3 is closed," with an explicit override/mute feature. This is the closest single reference for the warning logic.
• US 4,104,613 (Chaput, 1978); US 4,151,505 (Swinny, 1979).

Family B — magnetic / non-contact current sensing.

• US 4,504,761 → US 5,041,761 (Wright et al., United Technologies Automotive, 1991) — retrieved in full. Discloses a magnetic automotive lamp current sensor: a coil in series with an automotive lamp, wound on a core (SAE 1010 steel) having a channel and an opening holding a Hall-effect transducer that "senses magnetic flux above a threshold level and produces an electrical output" driving an open-collector transistor. Its express drawback: the coil must be inserted in series with the lamp circuit.
• US 4,539,520 (McBride, Bridges Electric, 1985) — retrieved in full. A remote current detector using a Hall-effect transducer positioned between tapered ferromagnetic pole pieces that "collect low density magnetic flux in the air and focus the flux into a concentrated high density magnetic field," expressly to "measure the magnetic field surrounding a conductor . . . and thereby monitor the current flowing through the conductor" without breaking the conductor.
• US 4,283,643 (Levin, 1981) — "Hall sensing apparatus."
• US 4,994,728 (Sasaki, Mitsubishi Denki, 1991) — "apparatus for diagnosing vehicle-mounted battery."

Family C — battery-discharge threshold + timing control.

• US 4,493,001 (Sheldrake, GM, 1985) — retrieved in full. A motor vehicle battery rundown protection system that senses a battery parameter, compares it to a threshold/reference, applies an RC time delay before acting, and overrides the protective action for a timed period. Discloses all of the "sense → compare-to-threshold → delayed actuation → override" plumbing of the patent's control logic, albeit controlling a disconnect relay rather than a buzzer.

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3. Claim 1 — apparatus (means-plus-function)

Conclusion: Claim 1 is likely obvious. The only genuinely distinctive element is (b)'s use of the magnetic field surrounding a battery cable — i.e., non-contact sensing of a conductor it does not interrupt. US 5,041,761 supplies "Hall sensor + permeable flux collector + threshold detection" in an automotive lamp context; US 4,539,520 supplies the express teaching to sense the magnetic field around an existing conductor without breaking it. Substituting a clamp-on flux collector for the series coil is a simple substitution of one known element for another to obtain a predictable result (the KSR rationales), and it is the very thing US 4,539,520 was designed to do.

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4. Claim 9 — detailed headlight warning system

Conclusion: Claim 9 is the weakest obviousness case, and claim 20 (conductor wrapped around the ignition cable) is the strongest non-obviousness argument. Everything except the inductive engine-running sensor is a straightforward combination of Family A + Family B + Family C. But the "conductor proximate the ignition cable / inductively induced first signal" limitation is not taught by any of the 14 references of record. Unless one invokes a KSR "known technique" argument from outside the record (clamp-on inductive timing lights/tachometers were commercially well known), claim 9 survives on this element. Candidly, this is where the examiner likely found allowance, and it is the element I would build the patent's defense around.

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5. Claim 27 — method

Claim 27 is the method analogue of claim 1: detect running, measure battery current, compare to threshold, activate warning if not-running AND above-threshold. It is obvious for the same reasons as claim 1, and even more so because measuring "the battery current" is squarely taught by US 4,493,001 (which monitors the battery itself). Claim 28's "inductively sensing an engine ignition signal from said at least one ignition cable" inherits claim 9's non-obviousness problem.

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6. Dependent claims

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7. Motivation to combine (the KSR rationales)

1. The field's own stated design incentive. The patent's background concedes that every Family-A reference "must be built into the existing vehicle electrical system, which can create difficulties for the average consumer," and that series-impedance sensors waste energy and reduce reliability. US 4,539,520 expressly exists to solve exactly this — sensing the magnetic field around an already-installed conductor, "positioned at a remote location from the conductor" — and US 5,041,761's own background criticizes series resistor/coil sensing. A PHOSITA therefore had a concrete, articulated motivation to replace the series coil of US 5,041,761 with a clamp-around flux collector.
2. Predictable combination of known elements. Merging Family-A warning logic with Family-B magnetic sensing yields the predictable result of warning when the sensed current indicates lights-on and the ignition is open. Nothing unexpected occurs.
3. Simple substitution. Replacing a series relay coil (US 4,104,613) or series sensor coil (US 5,041,761) with a non-contact Hall/flux-collector sensor is substitution of one known current-measuring element for another.
4. "Obvious to try" / finite solutions. The problem (sense whether the lights are drawing current without cutting into the harness) had a small, predictable set of solutions, and the clamp-on magnetic sensor was the recognized answer in the art (US 4,539,520).
5. Timing taught by analogy. US 4,493,001 supplies sense→threshold→time-delay→override, so adding first/second/third delay periods is a routine transfer of a known technique within the same field of endeavor.

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8. Where the patent likely survives (counterarguments)

• Teaching away from ferrite: US 5,041,761 states that a "ferrite core . . . is not suitable to be employed in sensing the operation of an automotive lamp." Because claim 6 recites "ferrite" as one of the permeable materials, an argument exists that the art taught away from that species — but US 5,041,761's objection was to the ferrite core's size/fragility on a circuit board, not to ferrite per se, and it selected steel, which claim 6 also covers. The teaching-away argument is narrow and likely unsuccessful for the steel embodiment.
• Inductive engine-running sensing (claims 2, 9(a)(i), 20, 28): Not disclosed by any reference of record; the closest, US 4,493,001 and US 4,058,793, use the ignition switch, not an inductively coupled spark signal. This is the patent's most defensible subject matter.

9. Objective indicia (secondary considerations)

The record contains no evidence of commercial success, industry praise, copying, or a long-felt-but-unsolved need tied to the claims. The patent's own asserted advantages ("no modification of the existing electrical system," "no mechanical contacts," "easy retrofit") are advantages that flow directly from the known benefits of the non-contact magnetic sensing of US 4,539,520, so they are unlikely to be accorded patentable weight (they are attributable to the prior-art element, not the novel element). Conversely, the rapid lapse for nonpayment of maintenance fees effective 2005-03-13 and the abandonnment of CA 2,297,857 — occurring only ~4 years after grant — is at best neutral-to-negative evidence of commercial significance.

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10. Bottom line

Primary § 103 combination: US 4,058,793 (or US 3,898,612) as the warning-logic base + US 5,041,761 for Hall/flux-collector thresholded current sensing + US 4,539,520 for the express teaching of non-contact, non-circuit-breaking magnetic sensing of an existing conductor, optionally + US 4,493,001 for the threshold/time-delay/override control architecture. Motivation: the recognized need for a retrofit sensor that does not interrupt the vehicle harness and does not dissipate series heat/energy — a need US 4,539,520 was itself created to satisfy.

Caveat on reliability of this conclusion: This is an analysis based on the 14 references cited on the face of the patent and the full text of those I could retrieve (US 5,041,761, US 4,539,520, US 4,493,001, US 4,058,793). I did not retrieve the full text of US 4,283,643 or US 4,994,728, so my mapping of those is based on their titles/classifications only. The inductive-ignition-sensing element (claims 2/20/28) is the one limitation I could not map to any of-record reference; a complete search of non-cited art (e.g., inductive tachometer/timing-light art) would be required to state a firm § 103 conclusion for that element.