Appeal No. 2002-0675
Application No. 09/217,876
We are in agreement with appellant that there is no
motivation or suggestion in this prior art, taken as a whole, for
the substitution of an air conveyor such as is disclosed by
Wiseman or Long for the unknown but clearly suitable conveyor
shown in the Airfil brochure. There is no disclosure of the
suitability of an air conveyor as disclosed by Long or Wiseman
for conveying a web of balloon-like material. In our view, the
combination of references is based on an impermissible hindsight
reconstruction of appellant's claimed subject matter. Thus, the
combination of references cannot support a proper prima facie
case of obviousness.
We have carefully reviewed the other applied reference, but
we find therein no teaching to ameliorate the shortcomings we
have previously discussed. Accordingly, the rejections of all
claims on appeal are reversed.
The record reflects that the examiner has considered
possible double patenting with U.S. Patent No. 5,873,215. The
record does not reflect whether the examiner has considered the
issue of obviousness double patenting with respect to companion
Application No. 09/246,257, Appeal No. 02-1878.
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