Appeal No. 1998-2360
Application No. 08/604,976
Appellants= invention relates to a safety razor blade
unit having a row of three parallel spaced apart blades
(11, 12, 13) located between a guard (2) and a cap (3).
According to claim 1, the only independent claim on appeal,
the first blade (11) nearest the guard has a negative
exposure, the third blade (13) nearest the cap has a
positive exposure, and the second blade (12) between the
first blade and the third blade has an exposure not less
the exposure of the first blade and not greater than the
exposure of the third blade.1 The combination of exposures
for the three blades has the effect of equalizing the work
performed by the blades (see page 3 of the specification).
A copy of the appealed claims is appended to
appellants= brief.
The following references are relied upon by the
examiner as evidence of obviousness in support of his
rejection under 35 U.S.C. ' 103:
Welsh 3,660,893 May 9, 1972
Gilder, et al. (Gilder) WO92/17322 Oct. 15, 1992
1 The term Aexposure@ appears to be a term of art. It is defined in the paragraph bridging pages 2 and 3 of
appellants= specification and also in the Welsh patent (see column 4, lines 53-58) cited by the examiner in
support of his rejection of the appealed claims.
2
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