Appeal Number: 2006-1694
Application Number: 10/131,607
processing line (brief, pages 8-9). Reesor’s difference between the ripple voltage
output and the voltage corresponding to the minimum preselected ripple is an error
signal, and that error signal is used to adjust the leveler’s correcting rollers (col. 4,
lines 30-35). The leveler is used in conjunction with a strip processing line such as
a galvanizing line (col. 2, lines 18-19).
The appellants argue that Reesor’s control plate (2) prevents the leveler (12)
from being immediately or directly before the strip treating unit (reply brief, page
3). During patent prosecution, claims are to be given their broadest reasonable
interpretation consistent with the specification, as the claim language would have
been read by one of ordinary skill in the art in view of the specification. See In re
Zletz, 893 F.2d 319, 321, 13 USPQ2d 1320, 1322 (Fed. Cir. 1989); In re Sneed,
710 F.2d 1544, 1548, 218 USPQ 385, 388 (Fed. Cir. 1983). In the appellants’ only
disclosed embodiment a crossbow detection sensor is positioned between the
correcting rollers and the strip processing device (fig. 1). Hence, the broadest
reasonable interpretation, in view of the appellants’ specification, of “immediately
upstream” or “directly before” in the appellants’ claims does not exclude Reesor’s
ripple sensor reference table (2) between the leveler and a strip processing device.
We therefore are not convinced of reversible error in the rejection over
Reesor.
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