Appeal No. 1998-2442
Application No. 08/155,987
prior art. In re Warner, 379 F.2d 1011, 1017, 154 USPQ 173,
178 (CCPA 1967), quoted in In re
GPAC, Inc., 57 F.3d 1573, 1582, 35 USPQ2d 1116, 1123 (Fed.
Cir. 1995). Here, the reasons given by the examiner as the
basis of his finding of obviousness are unsupported by any
evidence, and
appear to be based on improper hindsight gleaned from
appellant's own disclosure.
Secondly, even if we were to agree with the examiner that
it would have been obvious to modify Brezosky by using a
compressible and/or flexible member as the element 82 of
Brezosky, claim 41's requirement of a spring would still not
be met. On page 6 of the brief, appellant cites a dictionary
definition of the term "spring" as "An elastic, stressed,
stored-energy machine element that, when released, will
recover its basic form or position . . . ." If Brezosky's
member 82 were made of a compressible or flexible material it
would not meet this definition of a spring, nor would the use 2
2Although a spring would normally be compressible and
flexible, not every compressible and/or flexible element is a
4
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