Appeal No. 2004-1129
Application No. 09/755,513
Claim 17 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Zanco, in view of APA, and further in view of
Olson.
On page 5 of the brief, appellants state that the claims
stand or fall together. We therefore consider claim 1 in this
appeal. See 37 CFR § 1.192(c)(7) and (8)(2003).
OPINION
Beginning on page 5 of the answer, the examiner explains
the teachings set forth in Zanco. In particular, at the top of
page 6 of the answer, the examiner states that Figure 1 of Zanco
“clearly teaches that the tip and tail have a decreasing
thickness, however, this is not explicitly stated in the written
portion of the disclosure.” Upon our review of Figure 1 of
Zanco, it is difficult to draw the conclusion that the examiner
has drawn. That is, the uncertainty of whether the figure is
drawn to scale, etc., cannot support the conclusion with
certainty that the tip and tail shown in Zanco’s Figure 1 have a
decreasing thickness. Nevertheless, the examiner refers to
appellants’ admitted prior art at lines 27-29 on page 1 of
appellants’ specification and relies on this admitted prior art
for that cap-type snowboards are known to have a nose with a
core of tapered thickness and that this type of construction
results in increased flexibility from the transition, or the
contact area toward the tip of the nose. An increase
flexibility toward the nose results in increased “float” which
facilitates gliding in deep snow. Then, the examiner concludes
that therefore it would have been obvious to have modified the
board of Zanco by modifying the nose so that it tapers towards
the tip to achieve increased flexibility resulting in an
increased in “float.” (Answer, page 6).
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