Appeal No. 1997-1064
Application No. 08/391,096
The examiner’s conclusion that the claimed friction
material would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill
in the art is based on his implicit finding that such a person
would have been led to incorporate molybdenum trioxide in the
thermosetting binder based friction material described in the
Marzocchi reference in light of Nagahiro’s teaching that
molybdenum trioxide may be usefully incorporated into a
frictional material composite formulated with a thermoplastic
binder. Specifically, based on the examiner’s assertion that
Nagahiro teaches the “equivalence of MoO for graphite,” the
3
examiner apparently believes that it would have been obvious
to replace the graphite filler in Marzocchi’s material with
molybdenum trioxide. However, Nagahiro teaches that graphite
is a heat-conductivity improving filler while molybdenum
trioxide is a lubrication improving filler in the described
thermoplastic based friction materials. See Nagahiro at
column 3, lines 64 and 65 and column 3, line 68 to column 4,
line 2. Thus, as argued by appellants, there is inadequate
factual support for the assertion that graphite and molybdenum
trioxide are equivalent fillers. With respect to the
examiner’s observation that Marzocchi recites the “useful
5
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007