Appeal No. 2004-0459
Serial No. 09/652,997
the rejection of claim 20 applies, i.e., claims 1, 3 and 16. See
In re Ochiai, 71 F.3d 1565, 1566 n.2, 37 USPQ2d 1127, 1129 n.2
(Fed. Cir. 1995); 37 CFR § 1.192(c)(7)(1997).
Claim 1
O’Brien discloses a tire comprising a tire tread
segment (102) with a chamber (106), and having a controlled air
inlet (110) for expanding and retracting the tread segment
relative to the tread surface (col. 3, lines 2-14).4 There is an
indentation in the tread surface at the position of the tread
segment (figure 1). O’Brien does not disclose how the chamber is
formed. Hence, for a suggestion of how to form the chamber, one
of ordinary skill in the art would have looked to other references
in the tire art which disclose methods for forming chambers
between rubber layers in tires.
Honda discloses a method for forming a bag-like chamber for
holding a puncture sealant (6) (page 9). The chamber is formed by
placing an anti-adhesive sheet, preferably a polyfluoroethylene
sheet, between a packing rubber sheet (5) and an inner liner
4 As acknowledged by the appellants (original claim 1), the
casing of steel and rubber recited in the present claim 1 is
conventional.
5
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007