Appeal No. 96-4136
Application 08/157,688
the fork (Fig. 3), we conclude that one of ordinary skill in the
art would not interpret the claimed "means for allowing" as
including apparatus such as that disclosed by Schneider in which
the fork tube is not modified for the purpose of allowing any
expansion, and the only expansion of the fork tube would be
extremely small. We do not regard the examiner's interpretation
of claim 1 as a reasonable one, under the circumstances.
Accordingly, the rejection of claim 1, and of claim 3
dependent thereon, will not be sustained.
Rejection(2)
The basis of this rejection is stated on pages 5 and 6 of
the examiner's answer. In essence, the examiner takes the
position that in view of Edwards' disclosure that wedge nuts and
core nuts are equivalent structures known in the art for attach-
ing together the stem and fork tube of a bicycle, it would have
been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to substitute
the wedge nut 36 fixing means of Edwards (Fig. 3) for the wedge-
shaped expansion member 7 of Leaycraft, which, upon tightening of
nut 11, moves upwardly within the slotted upper end of fork tube
3 to expand the tube outward into engagement with the inner wall
of handlebar stem 5 (page 1, lines 38 to 46).
6
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007