Appeal No. 2001-0080
Application No. 08/577,217
art to support the proposed combination of references. See,
e.g., In re Dembiczak, 175 F.3d 994, 999, 50 USPQ2d 1614, 1617
(Fed. Cir. 1999) ("[T]he best defense against the subtle but
powerful attraction of a hindsight-based obviousness analysis is
rigorous application of the requirement for a showing of the
teaching or motivation to combine prior art references."). In
the present case, the examiner has engaged in impermissible
hindsight reconstruction.
Hanson describes a rubber tire comprising a conducting
element that extends from the face of the tire tread to a bead
portion of the tire, the terminus of the element in the face of
the tread being adapted to contact the road, and the terminus of
the bead portion being adapted to contact the tire rim. (Page
1, right column, lines 33-40.) The tire is said to provide an
electrical contact between the surface of the road and the tire
rim. (Id. at lines 40-43.) Hanson further teaches that the
conducting element is made from a rubber composition containing,
e.g., about 30% of conductive carbon black and that the element
"may be of any convenient thickness, depending on the type of
tire..." (e.g., 0.04 to 0.10 inch or 1.0 to 2.5 mm). (Page 3,
right column, lines 13-42.)
GB '757 describes a tire comprising a layer of rubber
cement, which is two or three thousandths of an inch in
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