Appeal No. 97-0766 Page 10
Application No. 08/287,448
With regard to this difference, the examiner determined
(answer, pp. 5-6) that
[i]t would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in
the art at the time the invention was made to modify
Gebhardt by having a separate planar hub ring and annular
machine element so that the inner wall of the annular
machine element is contiguous with an outer peripheral
surface of the hub ring in view of Withers for the
purpose of ease of assembly.
We agree.
The arguments raised by the appellant (brief, pp. 6-7)
are unpersuasive for the following reasons.
First, the appellant argues (brief, p. 7) that the
flywheel of Gebhardt is not attached to an outer surface of
the belt pulley. We do not agree. The claimed belt pulley
reads on Gebhardt's support 4 and pulley unit 5 taken
together. Thus, as shown in Figure 2 of Gebhardt his fly
wheel-type ring 6 is attached to one of the outer surfaces of
the belt pulley (i.e., the outer surface of support 4 which is
readable as part of the claimed belt pulley).
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