Appeal No. 2002-0029 7
Application No. 09/437535
determining means and control circuit means of the type disclosed by White in the
airbag restraint system of Kaji for controlling deployment of Kaji’s side airbags based on
the position of the occupant in order to gain the benefit of optimizing protection of the
occupant as taught by White at, for example, column 3, lines 17-26.
In that the proposed modification of Kaji in view of White would result in the
subject matter of claim 1, we will sustain the standing § 103(a) rejection thereof as
being unpatentable over Kaji in view of White. We will also sustain the standing
§ 103(a) rejection of dependent claims 2, 3 and 8 since appellants state on page 4 of
the main brief that claims 1-3 and 8 stand or fall together.
In arriving at this conclusion, we have carefully considered appellants’ argument
on pages 9-10 of the main brief that it would not have been obvious to modify the side
airbag system of Kaji in the manner proposed in view of White’s front airbag restraint
system because the main objectives of a position determining system for use in
deploying front airbags and side airbags are different. Specifically, appellants assert
that the overriding concern of White’s front airbag system is to determine the rate at
which the passenger must be decelerated relative to fixed interior structures by the
restraint system to prevent injurious contact therewith, whereas in side airbag systems
like that of Kaji the most significant problem associated with deployment of the airbag is
when a passenger is leaning against the deployment door of the airbag, in which case
deployment of the airbag at high velocity can exert a large force on the passenger
LJS/
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