Appeal No. 2002-1488
Application No. 09/463,695
a perfect cylinder of equivalent overall dimensions” (column 2, lines 6-9); however, “it is
much less rigid in the axial direction. Thus, a means for providing additional axial
stiffness, such as an inner cylinder, is provided” (column 2, lines 16-18). Knapp
envisions “many practical applications for the instant invention” (column 2, lines 28-29),
including shells for undersea petroleum storage with undersea petroleum extraction
facilities, habitable environments for personnel operating such facilities, undersea
observatories, submarine petroleum tankers, orbiting space stations, land-based liquid
storage vessels, and undersea nuclear reactor housings (column 2, lines 30-41). A
stated objective of Knapp is to provide a pressure resisting cylindrical shell structure
“which can be manufactured with large span dimensions, such as the external
diameter and length” (column 2, lines 54-56; emphasis added).
In rejecting claims 11 and 17-20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), the examiner
concedes that Allen does not utilize a PCCP structure in making the golf club head
thereof. To account for this deficiency, the examiner turns to Knapp, contending that
the Knapp patent shows “that it is old in the art to take advantage of an undulating
polyhedral geometry for the exterior wall of a hollow cylindrical object, specifically an
object that has customarily been provided with a perfect cylinder shape” (answer, page
4). The examiner considers that Knapp is similar to Allen in that Knapp
highlights the problems recognized with prior art forgings
and castings of geometrically shaped shell structures and
briefly highlights the desirability to alter the configuration of
known . . . [shell structures] in order to increase the
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