Appeal No. 2003-0239
Application 09/382,437
62 that is circumferential is well known in the art to reduce
radar return,” and concluding that it would have been obvious to
one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of appellants’
invention “to have curved the main wall of Lennard as taught by
Ferguson et al to reduce radar return to form a more stealthy
system” (final rejection, page 3).
Having reviewed and evaluated the applied patents to Lennard
and Ferguson, we share appellants’ assessments of the examiner’s
§ 103 rejection as set forth in the brief and rely brief. Like
appellants, we note that claim 1 on appeal is directed to an
“external-compression supersonic inlet” and that appellants’
specification at page 2 makes clear that such a supersonic inlet
accomplishes “all supersonic compression externally such that the
flow in the inlet duct is all subsonic” (emphasis added). By
contrast, the supersonic inlet of Lennard is specifically
described as being a variable geometry, external-internal
compression inlet (col. 3, lines 10-19, and col. 4, lines 42-45),
wherein part of the supersonic compression is accomplished
forward of the inlet duct aperture and supersonic compression
continues internally in the forward part of the duct, followed by
subsonic compression.
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