Appeal No. 2003-1723
Application 09/849,705
on page 3 of the answer, the examiner belatedly puts forth the
somewhat different view that Saunders is not applied in order to
provide an additional current sensor to the system of Schwecke,
but rather to replace the heater failure circuit taught in
Schwecke with a transformer current sensor arrangement like that
in Saunders.
Appellants argue, and we strongly agree, that the examiner’s
attempted combination of the disparate systems of Schwecke and
Saunders is merely an exercise in hindsight reconstruction of the
claimed invention based on appellants’ own teachings. In that
regard, we note, as our court of review indicated in In re
Fritch, 972 F.2D 1260, 1266, 23 USPQ2d 1780 (Fed. Cir. 1992),
that it is impermissible for the examiner to use the claimed
invention as an instruction manual or "template" in attempting to
piece together isolated disclosures and teachings of the prior
art so that the claimed invention is rendered obvious.
In the present case, while appellants and Schwecke are
attempting to solve the same general problem of protecting a
compressor operating in a refrigeration device/heat pump from
damage due to failure of the heater for maintaining lubricating
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