Appeal No. 2005-2192
Application No. 10/047,865
Thus, Chapman responds to all of the limitations in claims 1
and 2 except for those requiring the annular inlet ring and the
sleeve to protrude in opposite directions from the shroud. To
account for this deficiency, the examiner turns to Botros.
Botros discloses an injection molded centrifugal fan wheel
similar in many respects to the impeller disclosed by Chapman.
The Botros wheel 10 comprises a plurality of blades 14, an
annular inlet ring 16 and a hub 18. Figure 2 shows that the hub
includes a sleeve for receiving the drive shaft 34 of a motor 32,
and that this sleeve and the annular inlet ring 16 project in
opposite directions.
In combining Chapman and Botros to reject claims 1 and 2,
the examiner submits that it would have been obvious “to modify
the drive sleeve extension of Chapman to extend within the hub as
taught by Botros for the purpose of providing the impeller hub
with a smooth flow surface” (final rejection, page 4). According
to the examiner (see page 5 in the answer), one of ordinary skill
in the art would have appreciated the sleeve orientation taught
by Botros as affording less turbulent fluid flow and more
efficient impeller operation as compared to the sleeve
orientation disclosed by Chapman.
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