Appeal No. 1998-1783 Page 8
Application No. 08/566,681
With respect to the rejection of claim 1, the examiner
determined (answer, p. 4) that
Reed et al further teach that it is old and well known in
the art to inject a dry lime and cement into soil as an
augur is being reversed rotated to remove it from the
soil. See Col. 4, lines 55-64. While Reed et al does
not indicate the amount of chemicals or water which is
being added to the soil for forming an in-situ piling, it
is obvious that only the amount necessary for forming the
piling would be injected or else a stable or load
supporting piling would not be obtained. Therefore, it
is the examiner [sic] position that one skilled in the
art would know the proper amount of chemicals to inject
into the soil to obtain a stoichiometric mixture, i.e., a
stoichiometric mixture is defined as mixing a [sic] the
proper amount of chemicals to achieve a desired reaction.
The appellant's argue (brief, p. 6) that Reed does not
show or suggest the provision of water in amounts which will
react stoichiometrically with injected lime and cement as set
forth in claim 1. We agree. Specifically, we fail to find
any teaching or suggestion in Reed of injecting dry lime and
dry cement into the soil as recited in step c of claim 1.
Thus, it is our determination that the examiner's conclusion
that the claimed subject matter was obvious is not supported
by evidence that would have led an artisan to arrive at the
claimed invention. Accordingly, the decision of the examiner
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007