Appeal No. 1997-0417
Application 08/265,548
the examiner. As a consequence of our review, we are in general agreement with appellants (Brief,
pages 4 to 7) that the claims on appeal would not have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at
the time the invention was made in light of the collective teachings of Adamski. We find that the
examiner has failed to make out a prima facie case of obviousness.
For the reasons which follow, we will not sustain the decision of the examiner rejecting claims 18 to 26
under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
At the outset, we note that representative claim 18 on appeal clearly requires "controlling the
flow of a plurality of different materials on respective conveyors," "a plurality of sensor stations"
corresponding to each individual material and its conveyor, and means "for controlling said conveyors"
using a "plurality of flow signals each corresponding to the flow rate of a respective one of said
materials that compensates for moisture" produced by the sensor stations (see claim 18 on appeal).
Next, we note that the examiner admits (Answer, pages 3 and 4) that Adamski "do[es] not
disclose plural conveyors and/or sensor stations" as claimed by appellant[s][sic]. The examiner also
admits (Answer, page 4) that in Adamski "no flow rate signals are said to be generated to control the
flow of material on the conveyor for moisture compensation." We, along with appellants, agree with
this characterization of Adamski. In addition, we note that Adamski also fails to control a material flow
rate using flow rate signals, but instead uses moisture content data to control a burner firing rate. Thus,
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