Appeal No. 2004-1319
Application 09/933,329
for the shortcomings of Fuca. More specifically, appellant
contends that Parker does not disclose, teach or suggest a tool
having a body with an “outer hand-engaging surface” that has “a
uniform outside diameter from one end to the other” and that the
examiner has therefore failed to make out a prima facie case of
obviousness because Fuca and Parker fail to disclose all features
of the claimed invention. In appellant’s view the device of
Parker has three distinct sections, 1) the top part of the “T”;
2) the bottom part of the “T”; and 3) the “working end” of the
wrench (20), which appellant urges is not itself engaged manually
by the user.
We do not find appellant’s above-noted arguments persuasive
of error in the examiner’s rejection of claim 1 on appeal under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) based on Fuca in view of Parker. Like the
examiner, we observe that appellant has apparently failed to
appreciate the features of the wrench (20) shown in Figures 2A-2D
of Parker and the disclosure in Parker at column 3, lines 17-22,
concerning use of the wrench (20) “alone by gripping it
manually,” and the disclosure at column 3, lines 29-34, of
providing the cylindrical outer side surface (30) of the wrench
(20) with flutes (32) to facilitate gripping the wrench when it
6
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007