Appeal No. 2006-1297 Page 3
Application No. 10/699,595
reasoning in support of the rejections and to the appellant's brief (filed May 19,
2005) and reply brief (filed August 31, 2005) for the appellant's arguments
thereagainst.
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration
to the appellant's specification and claims, to the applied prior art, and to the
respective positions articulated by the appellant and the examiner. As a
consequence of our review, we make the following determinations.
We turn first to the rejection of claims 1, 2, 4, 6 and 7 as being unpatentable
over Thomson in view of Gonzalez and Shorter. Thomson discloses a floating
prestressed concrete wharf unit, and a wharf made from a plurality of such units,
the unit 10 comprising one or more cores 12 of lightweight buoyant material such
as expanded polystyrene surrounded on all sides by a blanket 18 of concrete, with a
layer 20 of wire screening or mesh embedded in the concrete adjacent to and
surrounding the core for providing reinforcement to strengthen the concrete against
normal loading, temperature effects and shrinkage (col. 3, second para.). The cores
preferably are beveled along their longitudinal corners 22, 24 and further include a
cutaway portion 26 in the longitudinal sides near the ends 28, 30 of the wharf unit.
These beveled portions provide longitudinal space 32 within the concrete blanket
18 in which are located pretensioned cables 34. Where desired for extra strength
and flexibility in the upper portion of the blanket 18, transverse pretensioned wires
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