Appeal No. 1999-0608 Page 14
Application No. 08/571,471
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in
the art to use a sintered polyimide resin as the retainer
material in the rolling bearing of appellant's admitted prior
art in view of the teaching by Manwiller of the desirable
strength and temperature and wear resistance properties of
sintered polyimide resins and of their suitability for use in
bearings.
Further, Moriguchi discloses the impregnation of a
sintered polymer bearing holder with fluorinated oils such as
perfluoropolyether and perfluoropolyalkylether to render the
bearing holder self-lubricating. Moriguchi further teaches
that a 7 to 17 percent volume percentage of continuous pores
is desirable so as to optimize the oil retention percentage of
the retainer (translation, page 6).
In view of the teachings of Moriguchi, it would have been
obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of
appellant's invention to have further modified the sintered
polyimide retainer of appellant's admitted prior art (as
already modified in view of Manwiller, as discussed above) by
impregnating it with a fluorinated oil such as
perfluoropolyether or perfluoropolyalkylether to render the
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