Appeal No. 2000-1028
Application No. 08/950,522
OPINION
The examiner finds that Ritter teaches a method of applying
a coating to overlapped sheets, where the overlapped sheets are
conveyed through two coating rollers that simultaneously apply a
water-based coating to both surfaces of the sheets at the same
point on the surface (Answer, page 4). The examiner further
finds that Ritter teaches that both surfaces of the sheets are
dried simultaneously and then a coating of adhesive is applied to
one surface of the sheet (id.). The examiner applies Greiner as
evidence that it was conventional in this art “to apply different
coatings to both sides of individual sheets simultaneously”
(Answer, page 5). The examiner further finds that neither Ritter
nor Greiner teach consistently feeding the sheets in the machine
direction (Answer, page 6). Thus the examiner applies either
Calkin or Swanson as evidence that feeding and coating paper
sheets in the machine direction was well known and conventional
in the art (id.).
The examiner recognizes that Ritter fails to teach that the
coating material is applied to the sheets before the overlapping
step (Answer, page 5). However, it is the “examiner’s position”
that one of ordinary skill in the art “would perform these two
steps of the process in a sequence consistent with the desired
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