Appeal No. 1999-2003
Application No. 08/751,545
shock from carrying both during non-operation and during
operation (see column 5, lines 44-48) by using shock absorbers
made of elastic materials (see column 4, lines 47-50). Thus,
Gatti and Koyanagi do distinguish between types of external
force, and they use different types of materials to accomplish
the different types of shock absorption. Accordingly, the
skilled artisan would have found it obvious to use both types of
members to absorb the different types of external force.
In addition, although we agree that Gatti and Koyanagi do
not state that the vibration characteristics of the two types of
members should be different, we do not agree that the examiner
has provided no motivation in the references to make the
vibration characteristics different. Specifically, Gatti and
Koyanagi use different types of materials for their members. As
such, the vibration characteristics are likely to be different
with no further teachings. Nonetheless, since it is not clear
from the two references, the examiner turns to Hishinuma for an
explicit teaching. Hishinuma discloses a unitary shock absorber
with different spring constants for different portions for
different types of external forces. In particular, Hishinuma
discloses (column 7, lines 33-45) a portion with a very small
spring constant for "allowing the movement in the impact
direction without a significant resistance or constraint even in
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