Appeal No. 2002-1704
Application No. 09/240,313
additional set of teeth and loosening surfaces like those in the
central recess or socket (6) of Whittle.
For the above reasons, we will sustain the examiner's
rejection of claims 14 and 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being
anticipated by Whittle.
As is apparent from appellant's statement of the grouping of
claims on page 5 of the brief, appellant has chosen not to argue
claim 18 separately from independent claim 14, from which it
depends. Accordingly, we consider that for the § 102(b)
rejection claim 18 will fall with claim 14.
The next rejection for our review is that of claims 17 and
18 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Whittle.
While we agree with appellant that the Whittle patent does not
disclose any specific degrees of tightening or loosening angles
regarding the teeth (2) therein and clearly does not teach the
specific angles of 22.25° and 60° set forth in claim 17 on
appeal, we nonetheless agree with the examiner that the
disclosure of Whittle leaves it up to one of ordinary skill in
the art to select or determine an appropriate set of angles for
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