Appeal 2007-2421
Application 10/289,793
concluded that the use of a single support roll would have been
obvious as the use of a single, as opposed to double support roll, is
known and conventional in the art. (Answer, page 9). JFE disagreed.
JFE stated that Nakagawa describes the use of two submersed support
rolls and that the claimed invention was distinguished over the
teachings of Nakagawa. (Appeal Br. pages 17-18).
JFE filed a Reply Brief. The Reply Brief states that an
Amendment under 37 C.F.R. 1.116 was submitted with the Reply
Brief and that the amendment requests the cancellation of claim 19.
(Reply Br., p. 2). The Reply Brief further states that in view of the
cancellation of claim 19, the sole issue for appeal is whether or not
claims 1-18 are patentable over Kawamura alone or in combination
with the additional prior art relied upon by the Examiner.
The electronic file record does not contain an Amendment
under 37 C.F.R. 1.116. Further, the Examiner provided no substantive
comment in response to the Reply Brief. Accordingly, for purposes of
this Appeal we treat claim 19 as a pending, but finally rejected claim.
We reverse the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-18. We affirm
the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of claim 19.
ISSUE
The issue is whether JFE has shown that the Examiner erred in
rejecting the claims. Specifically, the issues are:
Have JFE demonstrated that the Examiner was incorrect
in finding that Kawamura’s conventional continuous
settling tank lacks a submersed support roll?
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