Appeal No. 2004-0455 Page 4
Application No. 09/540,592
examiner’s position that it would have been obvious to add this feature to Antanavich in
view of the teachings of Tovey “for the purpose of altering the dispensing angle with
respect to the longitudinal axis” (Paper No. 7, page 4). The appellant provides several
arguments in rebuttal to this position, the essence of them being that there is no
suggestion to combine the references in the manner proposed by the examiner.
Antanavich is directed to a device for dispensing two ingredients which are mixed
immediately prior to exiting the dispensing tip. Disclosed in Figure 9 is a dispensing tip
having a first rigid section 38 comprising a pair of lumens through which the ingredients
to be mixed are passed, a flexible section 62, and a second rigid section 24 which
includes a static mixing element 24. There is no disclosure or teaching that the flexible
section includes a “preset bend” which will “urge the first and the second rigid sections
towards a preset angle to one another.” Therefore, as conceded by the examiner, the
primary reference lacks disclosure or teaching of the preset bend recited in claim 1.
Tovey also is directed to an apparatus for dispensing multiple ingredients that
must be mixed immediately prior to application. Among the embodiments disclosed by
Tovey are, in Figures 12 and 12A, an applicator having “bellows 118 for effectuating
articulation of the applicator tip 26 for altering the dispensing angle with respect to the
body portion 16,” to which the examiner referred in the explanation of the final rejection
on page 4 of Paper No. 7 and in the response to the appellant’s arguments on page 6
of the Answer, and the embodiment shown in Figures 13 and 13A, which the examiner
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