Appeal No. 1997-1997
Application No. 08/263,496
seq.). Recognizing this deficiency of Watts, the examiner
reasons that "[o]ne needing a quasi-prepolymer having a NCO
content of 22 to 31% for a reaction injection molding
application would be motivated to use Watt's [sic, Watts']
process because it's a simple way of making a mixture of an
MDI prepolymer and polymeric MDI" (page 3 of Answer). In
response, appellant refutes the examiner's reasoning with the
following at page 6 of the Brief:
There is simply no motivation to increase the NCO
content of Watts et al. from the levels specifically
set forth in the reference. In this regard, there
is no reason to expect that the invention of Watts
et al. would even be operable if one were to
increase the NCO content beyond that which is
clearly described under Watts. Moreover, one
skilled in the art would recognize that the free NCO
content of the Watts prepolymer is specifically
limited to a maximum of 15% by weight because higher
free NCO contents would provide a greater number of
isocyanate groups available for reaction with water
to form insoluble polymer linkages. Higher polymer
linkages, in turn, would result in undesirable foam
collapse. Thus, one skilled in the art would, in
fact, be motivated not to increase the NCO content
of Watts et al. beyond these levels.
The examiner has not rebutted appellant's refutation with
compelling reasoning or objective evidence, and, therefore, we
concur with appellant that, although it may well be that one
skilled in the art could have modified Watts, the examiner has
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