Ex Parte Curley

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Nov 26, 2014

13041785 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 26, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
13/041,785 03/07/2011 Richard Daniel Curley 6003.1050CON 5730
23280 7590 11/26/2014
Davidson, Davidson & Kappel, LLC
485 7th Avenue
14th Floor
New York, NY 10018
EXAMINER
KRAMER, DEAN J
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3652
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
11/26/2014 PAPER
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte RICHARD DANIEL CURLEY
____________

Appeal 2012-0123091
Application 13/041,7852
Technology Center 3600
____________

Before ANTON W. FETTING, MICHAEL C. ASTORINO and
JAMES A. WORTH, Administrative Patent Judges.

WORTH, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s final
rejection of claims 1–14. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. §§ 134
and 6(b).
We AFFIRM.

1 Our decision refers to the Appellant’s Appeal Brief (“App. Br.,” filed June
13, 2011) and Reply Brief (“Reply Br.,” filed Sept. 4, 2012), the Examiner’s
Answer (“Ans.,” mailed July 5, 2012), and Final Office Action (“Final
Act.,” mailed Oct. 12, 2011).
2 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Goss International
Americas, Inc., New York (App. Br. 2).
Appeal 2012-012309
Application 13/041,785

2
Introduction
Appellant’s disclosure relates to a bookbinding machine, and
specifically to a collating machine having a stitcher assembly which stitches
a group of signatures while they are moving. (Spec. ¶¶ 2–3).
Claims 1 and 12 are the independent claims on appeal. Claim 1,
reproduced below, is illustrative of the subject matter on appeal:
1. A saddle stitcher comprising:
a conveyor conveying a stream of printed products in a
first direction; and
a plurality of grippers for gripping a printed product,
each gripper including:
a rotatable first gripper arm having a first gripper
pad and a pivot;
a rotatable second gripper arm having a second
gripper pad and a pivot;
a first link rigidly connecting the first gripper arm
and second gripper arm; and
a second link having a spring, the second link
connected to the first link, the second link compensating
for different thicknesses in printed products;
the first and second gripper pads gripping a printed
product.

Appeal Br., Claims App.

Rejections on Appeal
The Examiner maintains, and the Appellant appeals, the following
rejection:
Claims 1–14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Schlough (US 2005/0225023 A1, pub. Oct. 13, 2005) in
view of Perrier (US 5,253,910, iss. Oct. 19, 1993).

Appeal 2012-012309
Application 13/041,785

3
ANALYSIS
Independent claim 1 and dependent claims 2–11
Appellant argues that Perrier fails to disclose “the second link
compensating for different thicknesses in printed products,” as recited by
claim 1 (App. Br. 6). Appellant argues that Perrier is drawn to a gripper for
gripping bottles and argues that none of the elements asserted as the second
link in Perrier compensate for different thicknesses in printed products.
Specifically, Appellant points to Perrier’s disclosure (col. 4, ll. 35–46),
which teaches that “spring 45 need not be very powerful; it is sufficient for it
to be able to bring the jaws 38 reliably into contact with the neck 2, without
necessarily exerting a clamping action on the neck of the bottle 2” (App. Br.
6). However, the Examiner does not rely on spring 45 acting alone for
clamping the object. The Examiner finds that Perrier discloses a second link
assembly 42, 43, 44 including spring 45 (Final Act. 2). The Examiner finds
that Perrier uses spring 45 to bias the arms toward a closed position (Ans. 5).
The Examiner explains that spring 45 causes the linear movement of the
linkage tenons 44 within the cam slots 46 to close the arms (Ans. 5). We
agree. We note that Perrier (col. 3, l. 61– col. 4, l. 18; col. 4, ll. 33–46)
describes the irreversible means of transmission of slide 42 based on tenons
44 and slots 46. Appellant has not shown why tenons 44 and 46 would not
grip the objects.
We are unpersuaded by Appellant’s argument (App. Br. 6) that
Perrier’s assembly would not compensate for different thicknesses. The
Examiner finds that the amount of displacement of slide 43 directly
corresponds to the spacing between pads 38 thereby resulting in a wide of
array of possible “thicknesses” of articles being gripped between the pads
Appeal 2012-012309
Application 13/041,785

4
(Final Act. 3). The Examiner explains that spring 45 would bias the arms
toward a closed position, where the closed position could accommodate the
minimum thickness or maximum thickness shown in the upper and lower
halves of Figure 6 of Perrier (Ans. 5–6). We agree with the Examiner.
Indeed, Perrier discloses that the spring moves the arms toward a closed
position until it is in contact with the object being held (see Perrier, col. 4, ll.
37–41).
Appellant further argues that the diameter and shape of Perrier’s jaw
38 accommodate a particular bottle neck size and would not compensate for
different thicknesses (App. Br. 6). However, the Examiner’s rejection was
instead based on the gripper of Schlough, and its shape, which is used for
signatures (Final Act. 2–3, Ans. 5). The Examiner merely relied on Perrier
for the mechanism to actuate the opening and closing of Schlough’s gripper
(id.).
Appellant argues that it would not have been obvious to a person of
ordinary skill to combine the teachings of Schlough and Perrier (App. Br. 7–
8). Specifically, Appellant argues that there would have been no reason to
substitute the mechanism of Perrier into the mechanism of Schlough because
Schlough already opens and closes. Schlough discloses grippers as follows:

Grippers 30 are configured to unclamp (i.e. release) the
signature when the tangential direction of the rotary movement
is in the approximately vertically upward direction, and the
signature is fed to a further process step. The clamping and
unclamping of the grippers 30 may be accomplished in any
known manner, such as by using cam followers running in
cams, which are configured to open and close the grippers at the
appropriate locations along the circular rotational path.

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Application 13/041,785

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Schlough (¶ 36). The Examiner concludes that it would have been obvious
to use the actuating mechanism of Perrier in Schlough, inter alia, in order to
automatically actuate the opening and closing motion of the resulting gripper
arms (Final Act. 3). The Examiner further concludes that the use of Perrier’s
actuating linkage would allow better control of the gripper arm movements,
which would have been especially suitable for protecting the potential
fragile nature of certain printed products (Ans. 5). We agree with the
Examiner that it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the
art to use the actuating mechanism of Perrier to actuate the grippers of
Schlough for the reasons stated by the Examiner.
In this connection, we are unpersuaded by Appellant’s argument that a
person of ordinary skill would not have adopted the mechanism of Perrier
based on Perrier’s application of gripping bottles rather than gripping paper
(App. Br. 7–8). This argument is merely an attorney argument lacking
evidence or technical reasoning, and as such, is not persuasive. We agree
with the Examiner that Perrier’s gripping mechanism is pertinent to the
particular problem with which the Appellant is concerned, i.e., gripping
objects along a conveyor belt. See also In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443, 1447
(Fed. Cir. 1992).
We, therefore, sustain the rejection of claim 1 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a).
Appellant does not argue the patentability of claims 2–11 separately
from the arguments as to claim 1. We, therefore, sustain the rejection of
claims 2–11 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), for similar reasons as for claim 1.

Appeal 2012-012309
Application 13/041,785

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Independent claim 12 dependent claims 13 and 14
Appellant’s arguments with respect to independent claim 12 are
similar to those with respect to independent claim 1. We sustain the
rejection of claim 12 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), for similar reasons, as above.
Appellant does not separately argue the patentability of claims 13 and 14
from that of claim 12. For similar reasons, we, therefore, sustain the
rejection of claims 13 and 14 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

DECISION
The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1–14 is affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

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