Appeal No. 97-4155
Application No. 08/309,403
except that it teaches supporting the truck equipment on an
inclined portion of a pit, instead of by the leg means
required by the claim. However, the examiner points out that
“Tarrant shows a similar system . . . which has a mechanical
support” in the form of legs, and concludes that it therefore
would have been obvious to modify the Filipoff system by
utilizing legs instead of the inclined wall of the pit, in
view of the teaching of Tarrant (Answer, page 3). We do not
agree.
The mere fact that the prior art structure could be
modified does not make such a modification obvious unless the
prior art suggests the desirability of doing so. See In re
Gordon, 733 F.2d 900, 902, 221 USPQ 1125, 1127 (Fed. Cir.
1984). Filipoff discloses a truck body that is placed in a
pit so that debris can easily be loaded into it (column 1).
To facilitate removal of the truck body from the pit, one side
of the pit is formed into an inclined ramp (119a), and the
truck upon which the body is to be loaded is equipped with a
tiltable bed (T), and has ramp rails (94) extending from the
rear. As shown in Figure 1, the bed and the extending rails
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