Appeal No. 1999-0605
Application No. 08/697,214
flexible nonresilient metal wires 10” (page 2, lines 87-89). Neither of the applied
references teaches or suggests a permanently bendable aluminum rod sized as required
in appellant’s claim 1 on appeal.
After a review of the combined teachings of Trimmer and Simon, it is our opinion that in
attempting to combine the applied patents in the manner set forth in the examiner’s
answer, the examiner has engaged in the use of impermissible hindsight derived from first
having viewed appellant’s disclosure and claims. Given the need in Trimmer for an
articulated rigid central spine that provides additional support and rigidity to the flexible
arm therein, it appears to us to be unlikely that one of ordinary skill in the art would have
been led to substitute the flexible, bendable wires of Simons for the rigid rods of the central
spine of Trimmer. Moreover, even if such a substitution were made, the resulting flexible
arm would still lack a permanently bendable aluminum rod sized as required in appellant’s
independent claim 1 on appeal.
Accordingly, since a consideration of the collective teachings of Trimmer and Simons
would not have made the subject matter as a whole of claim 1 on appeal obvious to one of
ordinary skill in the art at the time of appellant’s invention, we must
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