Ex parte Gombos

Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences

Mar 18, 1999

08142772 (B.P.A.I. Mar. 18, 1999)

Application for patent filed October 25, 1993.1
1
THIS OPINION WAS NOT WRITTEN FOR PUBLICATION
The opinion in support of the decision being entered today (1)
was not written for publication in a law journal and (2) is
not binding precedent of the Board.
Paper No. 20
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
__________
BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS
AND INTERFERENCES
__________
Ex parte THOMAS M. GOMBOS
__________
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,7721
___________
ON BRIEF
___________
Before ABRAMS, McQUADE and CRAWFORD, Administrative Patent
Judges.
McQUADE, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Thomas M. Gombos appeals from the final rejection of
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,772
2
claims 4, 6 and 10 through 18, all of the claims pending in
the application. We reverse.
The invention relates to "a method of and apparatus for
installing filter cartridges into a dust collector or other
pollution control device" (specification, page 1). A copy of
the appealed claims appears in the appendix to the appellant's
brief (Paper No. 18).
The items relied upon by the examiner as evidence of
obviousness are:
Berglund 4,141,704 Feb. 27,
1979
Brunner 4,632,681 Dec. 30,
1986
The items relied upon by the appellant as evidence of
non-obviousness are:
The 37 CFR § 1.132 Declarations filed on August 1,
1994 and February 27, 1995 (Paper Nos. 8 and 12)
Claims 4, 6 and 10 through 18 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Brunner in view of
Berglund.
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,772
3
Reference is made to the appellant's brief (Paper No. 18)
and to the examiner's answer (Paper No. 19) for the respective
positions of the appellant and the examiner with regard to the
merits of this rejection.
Brunner, the examiner's primary reference, discloses a
dust collector in the form of a filter unit 10. The unit
includes a housing 11 divided by an apertured tube sheet 14
into a lower
dirty air chamber 15 and an upper clean air chamber 16,
flanged filter elements 22 mounted in the lower chamber in
alignment with respective apertures in the tube sheet,
elongate rails 44 for slidably supporting the filter elements
as they are inserted into and withdrawn from the unit, and
locking bars 32 pivotally mounted adjacent respective rails
for lifting the filter elements from the rails into sealing
engagement with the tube sheet. The locking bars act against
the flanges of the filter elements via springs 35 disposed on
the upper surfaces of the locking bars. The purpose of the
springs is to accommodate surface irregularities on the tube
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,772
4
sheet which might inhibit a proper seal with the filter
elements.
As conceded by the examiner (see page 5 in the answer),
Brunner does not teach, and would not have suggested, a dust
collector or filter installation method meeting the
limitations in independent claims 4 and 18 requiring locking
bars having free edges which act against filter cartridge
flange(s). The examiner's reliance on Berglund to cure this
deficiency is not well founded.
Berglund discloses an arrangement for clamping a filter
cassette within a filter housing. The clamping arrangement
includes L-shaped bars 9 within the filter housing for
slidably
supporting the filter cassette during insertion and
withdrawal, and a cam-type actuator disposed beneath the bars
(see Figures 2 and 3) for lifting them toward a connecting
frame 23 in the housing. In the upper position of the bars,
broad side surfaces thereon act against flanges on the filter
cassette to press the filter cassette into sealing engagement
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,772
5
with the connecting frame (see Figure 7).
According to the examiner, it would have been obvious to
one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was
made to "substitute the L-shaped locking bar of Bergland [sic]
for the locking bar of Brunner in the dust collector in that
mere substitution of one known alternative locking bar
arrangement for another being within the scope of one of
ordinary skill in the art" (answer, pages 5 and 6). However,
this highly selective piecing together of disparate locking
bar mechanisms finds no support in the fair teachings of
Brunner and Berglund. Indeed, the fundamental differences
between the Brunner and Berglund mechanisms clearly belie the
examiner's rationale that the proposed combination merely
involves the substitution of one known alternative locking bar
arrangement for another.
Moreover, even if Brunner and Berglund were combined in
the manner proposed, the resulting dust collector and filter
installation method still would fail to meet the limitations
in claims 4 and 18 requiring locking bars having free edges
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,772
This being so, we find it unnecessary to delve into the2
merits of the appellant's evidence of non-obviousness.
6
which act against filter cartridge flange(s). As indicated
above, Berglund's locking bars 9 act against filter cassette
flanges via broad side surfaces on the bars. The examiner's
insistence that each of these broad side surfaces constitutes
a "free edge" as recited in the appellant's claims (see page 7
in the answer) runs counter to any reasonable interpretation
of this term.
Thus, the examiner's prior art evidence fails to
establish a prima facie case of obviousness with respect to
the subject matter recited in claims 4 and 18, and in claims 6
and 10 through
17 which depend from claim 4. Accordingly, we shall not2
sustain the standing 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection of these
claims.
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,772
7
The decision of the examiner is reversed.
REVERSED
NEAL E. ABRAMS )
Administrative Patent Judge )
)
)
) BOARD OF PATENT
JOHN P. McQUADE )
Administrative Patent Judge ) APPEALS AND
)
) INTERFERENCES
)
MURRIEL E. CRAWFORD )
Administrative Patent Judge )
Appeal No. 96-4157
Application 08/142,772
8
JPM/pgg
Michael J. Kline
Thorp, Reed & Armstrong
One Riverfront Center
Pittsburgh, PA 15219