Ex Parte Kabeya et al - Page 12

                Appeal 2007-2421                                                                             
                Application 10/289,793                                                                       
                roll must be included in the tank.  Based upon the evidence presented,                       
                we credit the testimony of Mr. Kawamura and Mr. Taguchi and find                             
                that a person of ordinary skill in the art would understand that a                           
                conventional tank, such as that described in Kawamura, includes a                            
                submersed support roll.  We reverse the Examiner’s rejections of                             
                claims 1-18 as the Examiner has failed to demonstrate that the prior                         
                art teaches or renders obvious a hot-dip metal strip process that                            
                employs a tank that lacking a submersed support roll.                                        

                      ii)   The Rejection of Claim 19                                                        
                      Claim 19 is directed to a hot-dip metal strip process where the                        
                metal strip is contacted with a single submersed support roll and then                       
                taken out of the molten metal bath.                                                          
                      The Examiner found that, except for the use of a single                                
                submersed support roll, Nakagawa taught all the limitations of claim                         
                19.  The Examiner found that the use of a single, as opposed to                              
                double, submersed support roll was conventional in the hot-dip metal                         
                strip processing art.  (Answer, page 9).  The Examiner further found                         
                that one of skill in the art could implement a conventional single                           
                submersed support roll in the process of Nakagawa.  JFE identifies                           
                Nakagawa as employing two support rolls but did not contest the                              
                Examiner’s finding that the use of a single submersed support roll was                       
                conventional in the hot-dip metal strip processing art.                                      
                      We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claim 19.  Specifically,                         
                we find that claim 19 represents a combination of familiar elements of                       
                the prior art according to known methods to yield predictable results.                       
                Anderson's-Black Rock v. Pavement Co., 396 U.S. 57, 61, 163 USPQ                             

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