Appeal No. 1998-1454 Page 7
Application No. 08/422,840
member is to be gripped and cranked by an operator. From our
viewpoint, one of ordinary skill in the art would have
understood from this disclosure that "low torque" as used in
the claims refers to torque levels of an order which is
attainable manually.
As for the "substantially perpendicularly" limitation,
the term "perpendicular" has the universally recognized and
accepted meaning of "at right angles to a given plane or
line." This, we assume, is not in dispute. Further, this is3
consistent with the appellant's disclosure. Specifically, the
appellant's specification, at page 7, refers to a second
handle member (6) extending perpendicularly to a first handle
member (4). Moreover, Figures 1 and 3 depict the second
handle member (6) extending at what appears to be a right
angle from the first member (4). While it is true that
"substantially" and other similar words are sometimes
construed liberally to avoid unduly restricting a patent
claim, the imprecision of such a word cannot be allowed to
negate the meaning of the words it modifies. The use of the
3Webster's New World Dictionary, Third College Edition (Simon &
Schuster, Inc. 1988).
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