Appeal No. 2006-0651
Application 10/050,061
independent claims 5 and 10, and dependent claims 7 and 12, as
being anticipated by Griffin.
II. The 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection of claims 8 and 13 as being
unpatentable over Griffin in view of Cunningham
Acknowledging that Griffin does not respond to the
limitations in claim 8, or to the corresponding limitations in
claim 13 (which depends from claim 10), relating to the spring
with an adjustable spring constant, the examiner turns to
Cunningham.
Cunningham discloses a “vibration isolating and damping
apparatus that passively isolates vibrations between a supporting
structure and a supported structure while permitting movement of
the supported structure over six degrees of freedom with respect
to the supporting structure” (column 2, lines 22-27). In the
exemplary embodiment described, the supported structure comprises
a reaction wheel assembly mounted on a cradle 12 and the
supporting structure comprises a base 10. Six viscous isolators
14 arranged in a symmetrical pattern of three isolator pairs
spaced 120° apart link the cradle to the base. Each isolator,
whose basic construction is illustrated in Figure 3, includes
flexible joints 20 for connection to the cradle and base. These
joints may take the form of spherical bearings or two-axis
8
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