Appeal No. 97-0986
Application 08/430,580
maintained,” as required by the claims. The “blade” 56 of Saunders is not disclosed as
“maintaining” the angular orientation of either the arrow or the nock. Instead, element 56 is
merely an alignment device. This constitutes a third reason necessitating reversal of the
examiner’s rejection of claims 2 and 12.
Remand
This application is remanded to the examiner for consideration of the following
matter.
As earlier mentioned, the Donaldson case makes it clear that appellants’ claimed
“means for maintaining” is construed to cover corresponding structure, e.g., the smaller
radius support surface 38A and the larger radius support surface 38B, described in the
specification (pages 3-4) and “equivalents thereof.”
We note that in the Eckart patent applied by the examiner against the appealed
claims, “[e]ach plate support 58 includes an arcuate shaped support surface 64 which is
radially open in an upward direction for retaining the ends of the shaft” (column 3, lines 29-
32), and that the plate support 58 is made of a suitable soft material such that it “provides
some friction with the shaft to prevent rotation of the rotor 12 when it is not being driven by
the drive means 8" (column 3, lines 39-41). In addition, upon inspection of the drawing
figures, the support 56 to which the plate support 58 is secured also appears to include an
arcuate surface radially opening in an upward direction.
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