Appeal No. 97-0996
Application 08/287,432
and thereafter, the annular disc “reshaped” into a finished ring
element. According to the specification, page 2,
the reshaping operation results in the ready-to-fit
ring element having sections of varying material
strength along its axial extent, the lowest material
strengths occurring, depending upon the particular
manufacturing method employed, in the area of the
lateral edges of the ring element, where the elastic
spring element and the bearing support are affixed.
This weakening of the material is caused by the plastic
stretching it undergoes during reshaping and the
resultant loss of thickness in these regions.
It is the examiner’s foundation position that the thickness
of the Ingersoll ring element, or the ring element of AAPA made
in accordance with the teachings of Ingersoll, “is uniform in
thickness around the circumference at either terminal end, or at
any point along the length thereof, thus the limitation of the
ring ‘having a uniform thickness’ or ‘of a uniform thickness’ as
required by the claims is met by Ingersoll” (answer, page 3).
In responding to appellant’s argument, the examiner further
explains his position as follows:
Appellant’s threshold argument is that Ingersoll fails
to teach a ring element having a uniform thickness. In
fact, according to Appellant, Ingersoll teaches a
tapered thickness, which teaches away from the present
invention. The Examiner agrees with Appellant’s
interpretation of Ingersoll in that the element formed
by the process disclosed in Ingersoll does indeed have
a tapered form, when viewed along the longitudinal axis
of the element as seen in, for instance, figure 12 of
Ingersoll. The tapered ring element in Ingersoll is
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Last modified: November 3, 2007