Appeal No. 2001-1209
Application No. 09/106,281
With respect to independent claim 2, the representative claim
for Appellants first suggested grouping (including claims 2-4 and
6-8)2, the Examiner, as the basis for the obviousness rejection
proposes to modify the sheet carrier apparatus disclosure of
Fukumoto. According to the Examiner, although Fukumoto expresses
a desire to maintain a constant speed of the sheet conveying
platen roller, Fukumoto is “... silent on whether or not the
variation in diameter of the platen roller 1 due to temperature
change during the printing operation has been taken into
consideration....” (Answer, page 4). To address this
deficiency, the Examiner turns to Pfeuffer which describes a
sheet carrier apparatus in which a detected sheet conveying
roller temperature signal is used to adjust the rotational speed
of the roller speed control motor to maintain an optimum constant
velocity. In the Examiner’s analysis (id.), the skilled artisan
would have been motivated and found it obvious to provide the
system of Fukumoto with the temperature dependent roller speed
2 Although Appellants’ grouping at page 3 of the Brief does not include
dependent claim 6, which is not separately argued in the Brief, as part of any
group, it is apparent that claim 6 should properly be including in this
grouping with its base claim, i.e., independent claim 2.
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