Appeal No. 96-2747
Application 08/245,518
roughness extending lengthwise across the width," and at least
one bearing pad on this portion of the face having a textured
roughness on its face "comprising a plurality of triangle shaped
grooves extending lengthwise . . . having a vertex extending into
said bearing pad."
The claims have been rejected on the basis of the combined
teachings of Albrecht and Aronoff. It is the examiner's position
that Albrecht teaches everything in the independent claims except
the triangle shaped grooves on the pads, which is taught by
Aronoff, and that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary
skill in the art to modify the Albrecht device in such a manner
as to meet the terms of the appellant's claims. We disagree.
Albrecht teaches etching the flat surface of a slider in
order to produce a plurality of bearing pads the faces of which,
in the absence of evidence to the contrary, must be presumed also
to be flat (column 5, lines 14 through 31). Even if one were to
embrace the examiner's position that it would have been obvious
to texture these faces in view of the showing of Aronoff (Answer,
page 4), we agree with the appellant that the result would not
have been the required triangle shaped grooves having a vertex
extending into the bearing pad. In this regard, the extent of
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Last modified: November 3, 2007