Stromberg Motor Devices Co. v. Zenith Carburetor Co.

254 F. 68, 165 C.C.A. 478, 1918 U.S. App. LEXIS 1284
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedSeptember 14, 1918
DocketNos. 2234, 2247
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 254 F. 68 (Stromberg Motor Devices Co. v. Zenith Carburetor Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Stromberg Motor Devices Co. v. Zenith Carburetor Co., 254 F. 68, 165 C.C.A. 478, 1918 U.S. App. LEXIS 1284 (7th Cir. 1918).

Opinion

BAKER, Circuit Judge.

Stromberg Company sued Zenith Company for alleged infringement of four patents on carburetors for internal-combustion engines.

Claims 1, 2, 4, 5, and 7 of patent No. 684,662, October 15, 1901, to Ahara, and claims 8, 10, and 11 of patent No. 791,501, June 6, 1905, to Richard, were held valid and infringed by Zenith carburetors identified as Exhibits 1 and 10, but not infringed by Exhibit 2.

Claim 1 of patent No. 1,063,148, May 27, 1913, to Anderson, and claim 1 of reissue patent No. 12,611, February 19, 1907, to Sturtevant, were held valid, but not infringed by any Zenith device.

Each company assigns error on those parts of the decree that are adverse to its contentions.

I. Ahara.

[1-3] “Feeder for explosive engines,” namely, a carburetor, is the subject-matter of the patent. No improvement of explosive engines in kind or degree was contemplated or involved. “This invention,” Ahara said, “relates particularly to a structure adapted to vary the amount of fuel mixed with air fed to such an engine”; that is, an explosive engine. He pictured and described in detail the adaptability of his carburetor to vary the amount of fuel to correlate properly with the air conditions, both as to quantity and heat, in a one-cylinder work engine in which the desired uniformity of speed is obtained within fairly close limits by the automatic action of a governor in holding the intake valve shut and the exhaust valve open during one or more of the four-cycle periods of operation. But he also declared that “changes in details of construction to adapt the device to other types of explosive engines are obvious and within ordinary mechanical skill.” Of course his saying so does not make it so. But in connection with the general statement of the nature and object of the invention it demonstrates that Ahara’s inventive concept covered a carburetor, not an improved one-cylinder work engine, and that he intended to claim, though unnecessarily, all uses to which his carburetor could be put.

In giving the operation of his carburetor when applied to a one cylinder hit-and-miss engine, he illustrated and described three styles of construction; but, as they all operate in the same way, it will suffice if we follow through one type. f

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254 F. 68, 165 C.C.A. 478, 1918 U.S. App. LEXIS 1284, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/stromberg-motor-devices-co-v-zenith-carburetor-co-ca7-1918.