Appeal No. 2005-1557
Application 09/954,604
to decide the appeal of the rejection based solely on the selected representative claim.”); see also
37 CFR § 41.37(c)(1)(vii) (September 2004).
We affirm.
Rather than reiterate the respective positions advanced by the examiner and appellants,
we refer to the answer and to the brief and reply brief for a complete exposition thereof.
Opinion
We have carefully reviewed the record on this appeal and based thereon find ourselves in
agreement with the supported position advanced by the examiner that, prima facie, the claimed
nestable pallet encompassed by appealed claim 14 would have been obvious over the combined
teachings of Bredal and Elder and the claimed nestable pallet encompassed by appealed claim 38
would have been obvious over the combined teachings of Bredal and Mathieu to one of ordinary
skill in this art at the time the claimed invention was made. Thus, we again consider the record
as a whole with respect to these grounds of rejection in light of appellants’ rebuttal arguments in
the brief and reply brief. See generally, In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443, 1445, 24 USPQ2d 1443,
1444 (Fed. Cir. 1992); In re Piasecki, 745 F.2d 1468, 1472, 223 USPQ 785, 788 (Fed. Cir.
1984).
With respect to the ground of rejection of claim 14, appellants point out that the pallet of
Bredal is one-quarter the size of a standard pallet as disclosed at col. 2, ll. 46-49, contending that
four of the pallets must be arranged as shown in Bredal FIG. 12 to support a load (brief, page 4).
Appellants submit that “four Bredal quarter-sized pallets used together in the manner intended
already have the same arrangement of feet as the full-size pallet of Elder,” and thus, “in Bredal,
the four feet together in the center correspond to a single center foot in Elder” (id., page 4).
Thus, appellants argue that in view of the size and use of the Bredal quarter-pallets, “there is no
motivation for adding a non-peripheral foot . . . to the Bredal pallet” (id., page 5).
The examiner responds that Bredal relates to a single pallet which can be used in an
assembly of four such pallets, and the addition of a non-peripheral foot to a single pallet “does
not prevent or destroy any of the teachings of Bredal” (answer, pages 5-6). Appellants reply that
Bredal teaches the assembly of four quarter-size pallets as an alternative to a full-sized pallet,
and thus, there is no need for an additional non-peripheral foot which would add four
unnecessary foot portions to the four quarter-sized pallet assembly (reply brief, page 2).
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