Appeal No. 2002-0963 Application No. 08/122,344 Sherwood discloses a method of fabricating reinforced plastic pipe or other tubular articles using a filament or tape winding apparatus. See Answer, p. 6. The apparatus includes a rotatable reel 2 on which a coil of tape 3 is mounted. The tape 3 is guided onto a mandrel 4 in a generally helical pattern by a guide mechanism 5 which serves to properly guide the tape and impart a selected twist to the tape as it moves from the coil on reel 2 to the mandrel. See col. 2, lines 30-41. The tape is formed of a reinforcing material and is impregnated or coated with a thermosetting resin (col. 3, lines 18-27): The resin is applied to the reinforcing material in any conventional manner such as dipping, spraying, roller coating, and the like. After the resin and curing agent are applied to the reinforcing material, the resin will begin to cure or polymerize and the curing of the resin is halted at a predetermined stage by refrigerating the tape so that the resin will be in the solid partially cured state and will not be full cured to the infusible state. The tape can then be wound in coiled form on reel 2 in preparation for the pipe fabricating process. During the fabrication process, the partially cured thermoset resin may be melted by passing the tape over a heated distribution roller 21 located proximate the mandrel 4 or by heating the mandrel itself. See col. 1, lines 23-26. 10Page: Previous 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 NextLast modified: November 3, 2007