Appeal No. 2000-0068
Application 08/858,116
mold" is "close" to the sheet of glass. This is precisely shown
and described in Seymour's description of the vacuum platen 40
and in his description of his glass shaping process using the
auxiliary shaping blocks 120. Further because the heated sheet of
glass in Seymour is soft and capable of being shaped, when it
came in contact with Seymour's flat vacuum platen by the
attraction thereto resulting from the application of a vacuum,
the glass sheet would necessarily take the shape of Seymour's
vacuum platen, in this case a flat, planar surface. It does not
matter that Seymour's vacuum platen is also used to move the
heated sheet of glass because the vacuum platen does impart shape
to the heated glass sheet. We also note that appellants' suction
mold, like Seymour's vacuum platen, also moves the heated sheet
of glass in appellants' process (see page 9, lines 23 and 24 of
the specification). Further, appellants, like Seymour, develop a
vacuum first in the chamber corresponding to the vacuum platen 40
in Seymour and subsequently in the second shaping surface areas
corresponding to Seymour's shaping boxes 120.
While Seymour does provide for additional shaping after the
release of the vacuum in his process by dropping the partially
shaped sheet of glass on a mold for final shaping, there is still
shaping performed by the shaping boxes 120 when the glass sheet
is soft from heating and lifted from the hearth block (note
Seymour's disclosure that the shape of the glass from contact
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