Appeal No. 96-3555
Application No. 08/297,021
skill in the art to modify Grefe to move the stack of blades
through a pre-wash station, a wash station, a rinse station and a
final rinse station and to circulate the rinse and final rinse
water to the pre-wash and rinse stations, respectively (answer,
p. 4).
Implicit in this rejection is the examiner’s view that the
above noted modification of Grefe would result in a method which
corresponds to the method recited in claim 51 in all respects.
The test for obviousness is what the combined teachings of
the references would have suggested to one of ordinary skill in
the art. See In re Young, 927 F.2d 588, 591, 18 USPQ2d 1089,
1091 (Fed. Cir. 1991) and In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425, 208
USPQ 871, 881 (CCPA 1981). In this case, we are in agreement
with the examiner that the combined teachings of Grefe, Weihe and
Clague would have been suggestive to one of ordinary skill in the
art at the time of appellants' invention of modifying Grefe's
method of washing stacks of blades to include a pre-wash station,
a wash station, a rinse station and a final rinse station and of
circulating the rinse and final rinse water to the pre-wash and
rinse stations, respectively, thereby providing a more efficient
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