Appeal No. 2001-1916 Page 5
Application No. 09/189,551
have been obvious. In re Gorman, 933 F.2d 982, 986, 18 USPQ2d 1885, 1888 (Fed.
Cir. 1991) (citations omitted). That is, something in the prior art as a whole must
suggest the desirability, and thus the obviousness, of making the combination. See In
re Beattie, 974 F.2d 1309, 1312, 24 USPQ2d 1040, 1042 (Fed. Cir. 1992); Lindemann
Maschinenfabrik GmbH v. American Hoist and Derrick Co., 730 F.2d 1452, 1462, 221
USPQ 481, 488 (Fed. Cir. 1984).
In our view, there is no teaching in the applied prior art of the desirability of
allowing rapid adjustability of the width of the dunnage produced by the cushioning
conversion machine of Armington. Without such a teaching, there would be no
motivation, absent impermissible hindsight, for a person of ordinary skill in the art at the
time the invention was made to have provided the cushioning conversion machine of
Armington with either (1) a device which controls the width of the strip and which is
adjustable to change the width of the strip as recited in claim 1; (2) a device for
selectively varying the cross-sectional geometry of a cushioning pad produced by the
machine as recited in claim 59; (3) a device which guides a stock material as it travels
between a forming assembly and a feed assembly, the device selectively varying the
cross-sectional geometry of a strip of cushioning produced by the machine as recited in
claim 68; or (4) a device which controls the width of the strip and which is adjustable to
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