Westinghouse Electric & Mfg. Co. v. Precise Mfg. Corp.

11 F.2d 209, 1926 U.S. App. LEXIS 2460
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Second Circuit
DecidedMarch 8, 1926
Docket234, 235
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 11 F.2d 209 (Westinghouse Electric & Mfg. Co. v. Precise Mfg. Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Westinghouse Electric & Mfg. Co. v. Precise Mfg. Corp., 11 F.2d 209, 1926 U.S. App. LEXIS 2460 (2d Cir. 1926).

Opinion

MANTON, Circuit Judge.

These eases will be disposed of in one opinion. Injunctions pendente lite were granted, after argument, supported by affidavits. The patents in suit are the Fessenden heterodyne, No. 1,-050,441, No. 1,050,728, and Armstrong regenerative patent, No. 1,113,149. The Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company is the owner of the patents, and the Radio ■ Corporation of America is the licensee. All the patents have been held valid by this court, and no effort is put forth at this time to have them declared invalid for any reason. See International Signal Co. v. Vreeland Apparatus Co. (C. C. A.) 278 F. 468; Armstrong and Westinghouse Co. v. De Forest Radio Tel. & Tel. Co. (D. C.) 279 F. 445, affirmed (C. C. A.) 280 F. 584.

The appellant Precise Manufacturing Corporation manufactures and sells transformers and condensers. These instrumentalities may and are used in combination with other parts to make possible the patented circuits of Fessenden and Armstrong. As so used, they infringe all patents. The Precise supermultiformer is a unit comprising four transformers for use in a superheterodyne. They are tuned and matched together, then assembled in a metal box and sealed in wax. As such unit, they are designed and constructed for use in the intermediate frequency amplifying system of the superheterodyne. Matched transformers for operation at a fixed and predetermined frequency are to be found only in superheterodyne receivers. While transformers and condensers were known and used prior to the inventions, the- patents here in suit and intermediate frequency amplifying systems were not known prior to these inventions, and therefore transformers constructed and designed for such use were unknown. Intermediate frequency transformers have no commercial utility, except in superheterodyne receivers. There is no show of construction of or use for them in other receiving sets. ■ The efficiency of the system is due to the fact that the intermediate transformers are selected to operate at a predetermined frequency. This predetermined frequency is obtained by controlling the frequency of the oscillation.

Radio waves arriving‘from a broadcast station are intercepted by the antenna and radio frequency currents of the same frequency of alternation as that of the intercepted waves, and are set up in the antenna and transferred to the circuits of the first detector. The oscillator comprises a vacuum tube system which, by means of the regenerative invention of the Armstrong patent, may be so adjusted as to produce high-frequency alternating currents of any desired frequen *210 ey. The frequency of the oscillations is so arranged that the difference between it and the frequency of the received oscillations will be a fixed or selected frequency, and it is this that gives rise to the term intermediate or beat frequency. The oscillator is so adjusted as to accommodate the intermediate frequency. The intermediate frequency amplifier system comprises three radio frequency amplifier tubes with other associate circuits. The system is designed so that it will amplify with the greatest efficiency alternating currents of a predetermined frequency. The second detector rectifies or detects the intermediate frequency currents, and separates from them the signal currents, which are termed audio currents. The audio frequency currents are then amplified in an audio frequency amplifier system, comprising one or more tubes. Such amplified audio currents then actuate a loud speaker or telephone receivers. The superheterodyne employs heterodyne amplification; that is, the weak currents produced by arriving waves are bound with stronger currents produced by the local oscillation. The resulting beat currents cause a stronger signal response than could be caused by the incoming wave currents alone.

The superheterodyne set has extremely high selectivity. In addition to the normal radio frequency tuning of the antenna circuit, by means of the variable condenser, the use of the heterodyne principle gives two supplementary means for excluding interfering signals. An undesired carrier wave of frequency differing greatly from the frequency of the oscillator will produce no effective beats. Beats can only be produced effectively by the interaction of vibrations having slightly differing frequencies. An undesired carrier wave of frequency differing slightly from the frequency of the desired wave will not produce signals, although beats may be formed. Beats produced between the currents from the undesired waves and those from the oscillator will not have the predetermined frequency. The intermediate amplifier system will pass only beat currents of a predetermined frequency value, and will exclude beat currents of ‘different frequency values. Signals can only be produced by those beat currents where the intermediate amplifier system will pass to the second detector. The oscillator tube system, the intermediate frequency amplifying system, are characteristic of the superheterodyne receivers. In other receivers there is no oscillator tube system to generate radio frequency currents, or oscillations to beat with the cúrrente set up by the received broadcast wave. There is no intermediate frequency, which is that found between the frequency of the broadcast waves and the frequency of the audio currents in other receivers.

On the carton in which the Precise supermultiformer is placed when sold, there are instructions which constitute directions or advice that it may be used in superheterodyne receivers, and in the advertising matter it is stated to be designed for perfect long-wave and superheterodyne reception, and that “Fig. 2 shows the underside of the layout and gives a clear idea of the ‘supermultiformer/ which really is the heart of the outfit, and is chiefly responsible for the sensitivity and stability of this set,” and “the ‘supermultiformer’ is a multiple transformer for superheterodynes developed by the Precise Manufacturing Corporation of Rochester, and takes the place of the four separate intermediate frequency transformers that otherwise would be used.” There is little doubt of the intention of the seller to manufacture and sell to the public, with the intent that it be used in connection with and as an intermediate frequency transformer in superheterodyne receivers.

The Precise Filtoformer comprises a condenser and a coil, employed in the circuits of the oscillator tube system. The condenser completes a circuit from the plate oscillator coil to the tube, and the coil permits direct current from the B battery to reach the plate of the oscillator tube, while preventing the high-frequency currents generated by the tube from passing through the B battery. The only radio receiver on the market employing an oscillator tube to generate local high-frequency currents which beat or heterodyne with the receiver oscillation to cause an intermediate or beat frequency, is the superheterodyne. This oscillator system is characteristic of the superheterodyne. The appellant Precise Manufacturing Corporation, in its booklet, states in detail how to construct superheterodyne receivers, using both the supermultiformer and the filtoformer. What is there described, and what could be constructed under the directions given, w'ould be a superheterodyne receiver. They show how the device called the Precise Supermultiformer and the Precise Filtoformer are to be used.

It is argued that the Precise audio frequency transformers cannot be complained of.

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Bluebook (online)
11 F.2d 209, 1926 U.S. App. LEXIS 2460, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/westinghouse-electric-mfg-co-v-precise-mfg-corp-ca2-1926.