Appeal No. 2001-2361
Application No. 09/411,369
appellants by 35 U.S.C. § 121 are inapplicable. The examiner's
mere assertion that the statute does not prohibit a double
patenting rejection where the applications are claiming the same
or substantially the same invention is of little value,
especially given appellants' arguments in their brief (pages 8-
12) and reply brief (pages 2-4).
Looking next to the examiner's rejection of claim 1 under
35 U.S.C. § 102(b) based on Torii, we note that the examiner
contends, inter alia, that Torii discloses a double-chuck
mechanical pencil having a front lead chuck (15) and a back lead
chuck (7) connected to a lead tank (8). Appellants argue that
the lead holding member (15) of Torii is not a chuck and clearly
would not have been recognized as such by one of ordinary skill
in the art. We agree with appellants and incorporate herein
their arguments set forth in the brief (pages 12-18) and reply
brief (pages 4-5) as our own. In that regard, it is clear to us
that one of ordinary skill in the art would have understood that
a "lead chuck" must actually clamp the lead and hold it in a
fixed position during use of the pencil for writing, and that the
member (15) of Torii performs no such function. Accordingly, the
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