Appeal No. 95-3178
Application 08/055,477
The full text of the examiner's rejections and response to
the argument presented by appellant appears in the answer (Paper
No. 14), while the complete statement of appellant's argument can
be found in the brief (Paper No. 13).
In the brief (page 3), appellant points out that the
following groups of claims do not stand or fall together and are
argued separately: claims 1 through 5 and 8; claim 6; and claim
7. As to the first claim grouping, like appellant in the brief
(page 3), we focus out attention, infra, exclusively upon claims
1 and 8, with claims 2 through 5 standing or falling with claim
1.
OPINION
In reaching our conclusion on the anticipation issues raised
in this appeal, this panel of the board has carefully considered
appellant's specification and claims, the applied references,4
and the respective viewpoints of appellant and the examiner. As
4Appellant's "Background Of The Invention" section of the specification
(page 1) informs us that prior to the present invention it was a known method
of sealing an envelope to drive the envelope between a pair of rollers and
then deflect a lower edge of the envelope upwards against a resilient stop.
When the envelope is decoupled from the rollers, the resilient stop and the
force of gravity urge the upper edge of the envelope into the nip of a second
pair of rollers to fold and seal the envelope flap against the rear panel of
the envelope. As further disclosed, to avoid buckling the envelope as it is
deflected, the deflecting surface is typically curved so that the rate at
which the lower edge is deflected is limited so that thicker, stiffer
envelopes do not buckle.
3
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