Appeal No. 1997-1162
Application 08/200,455
The Examiner concludes as to the one-piece sleeve-rotor
structure with ball-running grooves on the sleeve that it
would have been obvious to put ball-running grooves in the
one-piece sleeve-rotor of Jabbari, Stefansky, Simazu, or
MacLeod "because doing this would simplify the manufacturing
process, create less parts, and still reliably rotate the
rotor" (EA5; EA6).
Appellant argues that there is no basis for suggesting
that it would have been obvious to modify Jabbari, Stefansky,
Simazu, or MacLeod to attain the claimed structure by
eliminating an outer ring and by providing ball running
grooves in the sleeve surface of a unitary rotor and sleeve.
It is argued that Voll and Fruge fail to show a unitary
rotor-sleeve structure (Br16).
The primary references to Jabbari, Stefansky, Simazu, and
MacLeod all disclose fixed spindle disk drive units having a
one-piece integrally formed rotor and sleeve portion. The
arrangement of a stepped shaft spindle and a sleeve having a
pair of ball-running grooves where the large-diameter shaft
portion has a ball-running groove on the outer peripheral
surface and the small-diameter shaft portion has an inner
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