Appeal No. 2002-1163
Application 09/393,374
weight, as well as height, length, and width of the putter head
elements, namely the striking face and bottom face set forth in
the claims on appeal. To address the above-noted differences,
the examiner looks to Turner (col. 2) for a teaching of putter
heads in the weight range of 10-14 ounces and a putter shaft
weight of 4.1 ounces; Richilano (col. 2) for a teaching of a
putter weighing between 10½ to 18 ounces; and Hannon (col. 3) for
disclosure of a putter head having a weight of approximately 10
ounces (308 grams) and a shaft weight typically of about 3.5
ounces. The examiner then provides the following commentary:
[c]onsidering the collective teachings of Turner, Richilano
and Hannon, it is clear that the appellant’s claimed
dimensions for the putter are not novel. Given the
secondary teachings, it is clear that any number of weight
combinations for the shaft, grip and head are available to
the skilled artisan. The claimed structure of a free-
standing putter having either a generally flat foot surface
or concave foot surface that is wide enough to stabilize the
putter in a free standing configuration is also not novel,
as shown by the primary reference to Evans. To have
modified the Evans device to simply make use of dimensions
that are convenient and well-known for putters would have
been obvious to the skilled artisan at the time of the
invention, the motivation being to simply arrange the weight
of the putter in a manner that not only satisfies the
requirement that the Evans device be self-standing, but also
enables the putter to be balanced, a feature shown many
times over again to be desirable in the art. (See answer
pages 4-5)
3
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007