Appeal No. 2000-2020
Application No. 09/050,558
an opposite end to that of the bulb(2).” To address this
deficiency, the Examiner turns to Wakimizu which, in the
Examiner’s view (id., at 3 and 4), “... discloses an electric
lamp assembly with a positioning ring (16) that comprises elastic
pieces (46, 48) which resiliently abut an outer peripheral
surface of a base (24) of the lamp....” In the Examiner’s
analysis (id., at 4),
it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill
in the art at the time of the invention to
incorporate the resilient elastic pieces of Wakimizu
onto the positioning ring (20) of Van Heeswijk for
the purpose of easily aligning the filaments with
the main conductors by simply revolving the base
unit relative to the positioning ring.
Appellants’ arguments in response to the obviousness
rejection focus on the contention that a prima facie case of
obviousness has not been established since there is no suggestion
or motivation in the disclosures of the Van Heeswijk and Wakimizu
references for the Examiner’s proposed combination. In
particular, Appellants assert (Brief, page 5) that no motivation
exists for adding the elastic pawls of Wakimizu to the fixation
member 20 of Van Heeswijk since the bulb in Van Heeswijk is
already held in place by the welding of the tongues 21 to the
bulb clamping member 10.
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