Appeal No. 1999-1051 Page 5
Application No. 08/652,740
establish that there is an ignition means in close proximity to the spark gap. It also fails to
disclose a transformer that supports at least one of the electrodes, a circuit that is
susceptible to malfunction due to EMI and is located remotely with respect to the spark
gap and a transformer, or a shell encasing the transformer and a root of the electrode and
providing enhanced EMI protection.
According to the examiner, the use of transformers to provide the energy to create a
spark between electrodes to ignite a furnace in the prior art is disclosed by Phillips, and it
would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize such a device in the
Kaduki system. We note here that the Phillips transformer is not specified as being of the
high voltage step up type, but the appellant has acknowledged on page 1 of the
specification that such has been used in the prior art. Whether the Phillips transformer is in
“close proximity” to the spark gap is open to argument, but it is clear that the transformer
does not “support” an electrode, in the context in which this is disclosed in the appellant’s
invention. There is no disclosure in Phillips from which to conclude that there is a circuit
that is susceptible to malfunction due to EMI generated by the spark gap and the
transformer, much less that it is located remote from these elements. Nor does Phillips
teach encasing a transformer and a root of an electrode in a shell to provide enhanced EMI
protection. For this, the examiner looks to Morita, directed to an ignition coil for an internal
combustion engine, which teaches insulating the primary coil and the core from high
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