Appeal No. 96-0936
Application 08/230,173
§ 103 as being unpatentable over Castagnos.2
Reference is made to the appellants' brief (Paper No. 11)
and to the examiner's answer (Paper No. 12) for the respective
positions of the appellants and the examiner with regard to
the merits of this rejection.
Castagnos discloses "an apparatus for rapidly separating
catalyst from vapor in the hot, high velocity reactor
discharge in a fluid catalytic cracking process" (column 1,
lines 7 through 9). As described by Castagnos,
[a] fluid catalytic cracking riser reactor 10
contains an upflow stream 15 comprising cracked
product vapor and catalyst. Deflecting means 20, in
FIG. 1 a right circular conical member [and] in FIG.
2 a four sided tapered plug, converts upflow stream
15 to deflected upflow stream 21 which is directed
toward a semi-circular centrifugal separator 25 of
radius 26 from horizontal axis of rotation 27. . .
. Separator 25 comprises a semicircular surface 30
against which the stream travels and thereby causes
the centrifugal disengagement or separation of the
stream into a downward flowing predominantly
catalyst phase 40 which is in contact with or near
2The examiner has withdrawn the 35 U.S.C. § 112, second
paragraph, rejection of claims 8 and 10 through 16 which was
set forth in the final rejection (see the advisory action
dated April 7, 1995, Paper No. 8).
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