Appeal No. 2004-2121
Application No. 08/160,835
appellants' specification, having a shaped charge penetrator
warhead mounted in front of the bomb is used against hard targets
such as hardened aircraft shelters, bridge piers, aircraft
runways, and the like. As for the examiner's assertion that it
would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at
the time of appellants' invention to employ a general purpose
bomb having a weight of not less than 300 pounds in the
projectile of either Davis or Kellner, appellants note that what
might work at one size in the field of armor piercing projectiles
would not necessarily work in the penetrator bomb field if merely
scaled up to a size like that defined in the claims on appeal.
Appellants also point out that the examiner has provided no
evidence indicating any benefit to be derived from utilizing a
shaped charge in combination with a general purpose bomb.
We agree with appellants, and for that reason will not
sustain the examiner's rejection of claims 1 through 5 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Davis or Kellner.
We have additionally reviewed the patents to Chaumeau,
Muller, Kintish and Brauer applied by the examiner in rejections
of dependent claims 6 through 10 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), but
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