Appeal No. 2003-1514 Page 4
Application No. 09/180,038
cutting position and a non-cutting position. Hayamizu, the primary reference relied
upon by the examiner, discloses a cutter comprising a single blade (slitter knife 90)
which is mounted on a cutter arm 88 that rotates unitarily with a tubular pipe 83. The
slitter knife 90 is displaced downward with clockwise pivotal movement of the tubular
pipe 83 and cutter arm 88 into a groove 80 of a drag roller 81 to cut paper fed between
the slitter knife 90 and the drag roller 81 in the manner explained in column 8 of
Hayamizu. When the cutting of the paper is finished, the cutter arm 88 is pivotally
rotated in a counterclockwise direction by action of a spring 94 to displace the slitter
knife 90 upward away from the drag roller 81.
Hayamizu lacks a second blade and a blade holder for holding the two blades in
a fixed relationship to one another such that the blades are always in contact with each
other as called for in claim 1. The examiner’s position that the drag roller 81 is a driven
blade (answer, pages 7-8) is not well taken. Further, even if the drag roller 81 is
considered to be a driven blade, there is no pivotally rotating blade holder which holds
the two in fixed relationship to one another.
Komatsu discloses a cutter comprising two cup-shaped rotary blades 11, 12
which are held in fixed relationship and pressed into contact with one another by a plate
spring member 16. The blades and plate spring member are in turn mounted via an
arm 18a to a slider 18 which translates along guides 32, 33 as the blades rotate so as
to move longitudinally along a fixed cutting work. Komatsu does not disclose any
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