Appeal No. 96-3702
Application 08/208,688
claim 21, Applicant claims both ‘a mandrel expansion collar’ and
‘a mandrel spreader’. This is mis-leading because the mandrel
expansion collar actually corresponds to the same structural
element as the mandrel spreader as disclosed, leading to
confusion” (answer, Paper No. 17, page 5).
Reference is made to the appellant’s main and reply briefs
(Paper Nos. 16 and 18) and to the examiner’s answer (Paper
No. 17) for full statements of the respective positions of the
appellant and the examiner with regard to the propriety of these
rejections.2
The standing 35 U.S.C. § 251 rejection of claims 1 through
21, as explained in the excerpt from the answer reproduced above,
is predicated on the examiner’s determination that the
recitations of the “adjusting means” in appealed claim 14 and “a
mandrel spreader” in appealed claim 21 do not distinguish the
respective scopes of these claims from that of patent claim 14
with its recitation of a "tapered adjusting means." Thus, the
examiner concludes that there is no error which justifies the
reissue of appellant’s patent.
2The examiner has withdrawn the 35 U.S.C. § 251 rejection
of claims 1 through 21 as being based on a defective reissue
declaration and the 35 U.S.C. § 112, first paragraph, rejection
of claim 21 which were set forth in the final rejection (see the
advisory action dated November 8, 1995, Paper No. 13).
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