Appeal No. 98-2118
Application No. 08/459,986
require that the reference teach what the appellant is
claiming, but only that the claims on appeal "read on"
something disclosed in the reference (see Kalman v. Kimberly-
Clark Corp., 713 F.2d 760, 772, 218 USPQ 781, 789 (Fed. Cir.
1983)).
Here, the appellants' contention that the claims require
a chord which is generally constant in a radially outer region
in combination with a chord which generally decreases with
diminishing radius to a radially inner region is simply not
commensurate in scope with the claimed subject matter.
Instead, the representative claim 1 more broadly requires:
that the chord of the airfoil portion generally
increases from a first value near the root to a
second, larger value at a part span location
intermediate the root and the tip, and that the
chord is generally constant from the part span
location to the tip. [Emphasis added.]
The appellants are correct in noting that the guide vane
disclosed by the Elvekjaer is described in terms of its chord
to pitch ratio. That is, Elvekjaer states that:
The guide vanes are tapered radially inwards.
The taper is selected in such a way that the guide
vane is configured with an increasing ratio of chord
to pitch from the outer radius to approximately half
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