Appeal 2007-0201
Application 10/973,635
water conditions, or render it useful for different types of bait, lures and
tackle (col. 1, ll. 24-29; col. 2, ll. 45-51). That disclosure would have led
one of ordinary skill in the art, through no more than ordinary creativity, to
cut the elongated sinker down to a size as small as one metal shot if that
were the size that provided the desired reduction in the likelihood of
snagging, etc. Moreover, the Appellant’s claim 1 preamble does not limit
the claimed invention to a one-piece sinker, and the shrink wrapping step
does not require that the shrink wrap film contains only a single one-piece
sinker. That claim’s “comprising” transition term opens the claim to
forming other one-piece bismuth sinkers and including them in the shrink
wrap film. See In re Baxter, 656 F.2d 679, 686, 210 USPQ 795, 802 (CCPA
1981). Hence, the claim encompasses Biss’s multiple shot sinker where
each shot is formed of bismuth by Brown’s molding (col. 1, l. 64).
The Appellant argues that because lead is soft, malleable and ductile,
Brown’s disclosure that alloys containing about 98 wt% bismuth and about
2% tin or antimony, or about 99 wt% bismuth and about 1 wt% zinc, have
performance characteristics like those of lead (col. 2, ll. 11-22), indicates
that the alloys are not frangible (Br. 15-19). Brown’s sinker also can be
substantially pure bismuth (col. 1, ll. 65-66). As acknowledged by the
Appellant (Spec. 7:12-15), bismuth meets the requirement in the Appellant’s
independent claim 14 of a frangible metal having a specific gravity of at
least 7.0.
1 Because the arguments in the Appellant’s Reply Brief are essentially the
same as those in the Brief, we limit our discussion to the Brief.
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