Appeal No. 2004-1784
Application No. 09/685,372
(A) said elastomers comprised of
(1) about 30 to about 70 phr of cis 1, 4-polyisoprene
natural rubber and, correspondingly,
(2) about 70 to about 30 phr at least one additional
elastomer comprised of
(i) about 30 to about 70 phr of cis 1,4-
polybutadiene rubber and, correspondingly,
(ii) about zero to about 20 phr of
styrene/butadiene copolymer rubber which contains from about 10
to about 40 weight percent bound styrene;
(B) about 30 to about 70 phr of reinforcing filler selected
from rubber reinforcing carbon black and synthetic amorphous
silica comprised of about 40 to about 70 phr of said carbon black
and from zero to about 50 phr of said silica, and
(C) a coupling agent for said silica having a moiety which
is reactive with hydroxyl groups (silanol groups) contained on
the surface of said silica and another moiety interactive with
said diene based elastomer(s).
The references set forth below are relied upon by the
examiner as evidence of obviousness:
Yokohama Rubber Co. JP 11-199710 Jul. 27, 1999
Sandstrom et al. (Sandstrom ‘161) EP 0 989 161 Mar. 29, 2000
According to the examiner, “Claims 1-20 [sic, Claims 1-6, 8-
10 and 16-20] are rejected under 35 U.S.C. [§] 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Yokohama Rubber Co. in view of Sandstrom ‘161”
(answer, page 3). In the sentence bridging pages 3 and 4 of the
answer, the examiner expresses his obviousness conclusion as
follows:
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