Appeal No. 1998-3367
Application No. 08/545,717
lateral and longitudinal edges of the belt, we believe it
would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to
likewise size and locate the patches 18 of the waist belt so
that they are spaced from the edges of the belt to gain the
same advantages discussed by Gipson with respect to the
placement of the patches 18 of the absorbent assembly, namely,
to obviate the rough edges of the patches 18 from contacting
and irritating the skin of the wearer. As to the requirement
of claim 8 that the larger dimension of the attachment strip
has a length of between 25% and 75% of the belt width, to the
extent that modifying Gipson’s patches 18 on the belt in
accordance with the above noted teachings of Gipson would not
result in the patches of the waist belt meeting the rather
broad range limitation set forth in claim 8, that range is
considered to be an obvious matter of design choice. See In re
Kuhle, 526 F.2d 553, 555, 188 USPQ 7,
8-9 (CCPA 1975). This view is bolstered by appellants’
specification, which states that the claimed range of 25% to
75% is merely “preferable” (see page 7, line 24).
For these reasons, we also will sustain the examiner’s
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