Appeal No. 1998-2742
Application No. 08/751,068
consequence of our review, we have made the determination that
the examiner’s rejection of claim 16 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b)
will not be sustained. Our reasons follow.
Like appellants, we are of the view that Weir clearly
discloses an expansion joint wherein a tapered tongue rail
section (1) is movable relative to and along a fixed stock
rail section (2, 3). Page 1, lines 45-48, of Weir make it
clear that
the tapered rails (1) are supported in such a way as to allow
those rails to "creep longitudinally within the joint as the
track-rails contract or expand under the influence of the
[sic] temperature." See also, page 1, lines 77-82 of Weir.
By contrast, appellants’ claim 16 on appeal sets forth that
the tongue-shaped first rail section is fixed and that the
second stock rail section is movable in relation to the fixed
tongue-shaped first rail section. The examiner’s attempt to
rationalize these differences on page 5 of the examiner’s
answer is unavailing.
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