Appeal No. 2006-0093
Application No. 10/295,326
to the towing vehicle. In making the arguments bridging pages
13-17 of the brief, appellants seem to have lost sight of the
fact that the test for obviousness is not whether the features
of a secondary reference may be bodily incorporated into the
structure of the primary reference, nor is it that the claimed
invention must be expressly suggested in any one or all of the
references. Rather, the test is what the combined teachings of
the references would have suggested to those of ordinary skill in
the art at the time of appellants' invention. See, In re Keller,
642 F.2d 413, 425, 208 USPQ 871, 881 (CCPA 1981). Note also,
In re Sneed, 710 F.2d 1544, 1550, 218 USPQ 385, 389 (Fed. Cir.
1983), wherein the Court indicated that “[i]t is not necessary
that the inventions of the references be physically combinable
to render obvious the invention under review.”
In light of the foregoing, we have found appellants’
arguments as presented in the brief to be unpersuasive and thus
will sustain the examiner’s rejection of claims 34 through 44,
56, 58 and 62 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
Regarding the rejection of claims 45 through 55, 57 and 59
through 61 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over
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