Appeal No. 2005-0028
Application No. 09/489,602
From the foregoing teachings in Schmidt and Bezin, the
examiner concludes that it would have been obvious to a person of
ordinary skill in the art at the time of appellant’s invention to
1) “modify the solid crank arms of Schmidt with the hollow cross-
sectioned crank arm of Bezin in order to reduce the cost of
material and the weight of the arm so that the overall cost can
be lowered and the [sic, make] operating the vehicle easier,” and
2) “modify the one piece molded crank arm of Schmidt with the
multi-piece assembly crank arm having pieces bonded together as
taught by Bezin in order to minimize the complexity in molding a
single piece apparatus having a complex shape and form so that
producing a crank arm is easier” (final rejection, pages 3-4).
For the reasons aptly set forth by appellant in the brief,
we will not sustain the examiner’s rejection of claims 1, 4
through 18, 21 and 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) based on Schmidt
in view of Bezin. Like appellant, we are of the view that,
absent hindsight derived from appellant’s own disclosure and
claims, there is no teaching or suggestion in the prior art
relied upon which would have made it obvious to one of ordinary
skill in the art at the time of appellant’s invention to modify
the particular bicycle crank arm structure seen in Schmidt in the
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