Appeal No. 1997-0854
Application No. 08/292,846
Considering first the examiner's rejection of claims 25-
28 under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the examiner relies upon Loren for
establishing the obviousness of the claimed step "continuously
cooling the plurality of reciprocatable tools with a stream of
forced cooling air urged through the plenum by the fan." Both
the examiner and appellants offer a different interpretation
of the portion of Loren that refers to cooling, i.e., column
5, lines 21-32, which is reproduced below:
In practicing the staking steps shown by FIGS.
4, 5 and 6, the die tip 76 and clamp pads 64 are
kept cooler than the solidification temperature of
the projection 60, and preferably cooler than the
creep temperature of the plastic. However, if the
staking were to be performed by spin staking or hot
tip tool staking, the clamp pads 64 could be chilled
to permit solidification of the formed heads when
the tool tip 76 is retracted from the work site,
i.e.[,] in the relative positions shown in FIG. 4.
As those having skill in the art will appreciate,
the present invention can also be adapted to spin
staking or other forms of staking.
Although it is not unreasonable to conclude that Loren's
disclosure of keeping die tip 76 cooler than the
solidification temperature of the projection 60 is a teaching,
or at least a suggestion, of continuously cooling the
reciprocatable tool, we find that Loren falls short of
rendering obvious the presently claimed cooling "with a stream
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