Appeal No. 2000-1302 Page 7
Application No. 08/766,057
Ericson would have been informed that, while rotary casting or
slush molding might be suitable for some objects, and indeed
even perhaps for the retrofit bus seat cushion, airless
spraying to deposit the skin material onto the mold surface
would be more certain to yield suitable results, in that it
overcomes disadvantages inherent in rotary casting and slush
molding and can satisfactorily produce relatively large size
as well as small
articles (column 1, lines 66-69 of Ericson). That the issue
date of the Hoskinson patent is later than that of the Ericson
patent (reply brief, page 2) does not dissuade us from this
opinion, especially since there is no indication in Hoskinson
that the disadvantages identified by Ericson have been
overcome for relatively large or complex articles.
Appellant’s argument that Hoskinson does not teach
spraying (brief, page 5) is not indicative of any error on the
examiner’s part, as the rejection in this case is not based on
Hoskinson alone but on the combined teachings of the admitted
prior art, Hoskinson and Ericson. Nonobviousness cannot be
established by attacking the references individually when the
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007