Wilson v. Union Tool Co.

237 F. 847, 1916 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1257
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. California
DecidedJune 19, 1916
DocketNos. A-4 and B-62
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 237 F. 847 (Wilson v. Union Tool Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. California primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wilson v. Union Tool Co., 237 F. 847, 1916 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1257 (S.D. Cal. 1916).

Opinions

CUSHMAN, District Judge.

The two foregoing causes have been consolidated, and were tried and submitted at the same time as case No. 1540, this day decided. 237 Fed. 837. The consolidated cases both-involve the same underreamer patent, and the general statement in the decision in No. 1540 is applicable to these causes. The Double patent involved in that suit—No. 734,833—was granted in 1903. The application for the Wilson patent, No. 827,595, in suit in these two consolidated cases, was filed in 1905, and patent granted in 1906. [848]*848Departures by the defendant from the structure, as described in the Double patent, it is complained by the complainant, infringe the patent in suit.

Cause A-4 was first begun, the alleged infringement being limited to claims 16 and 17 of the Wilson patent. Thereafter, it appearing, as alleged by the complainant, that defendant had further departed from the structure covered by the Double patent, by which he averred other claims of the patent in suit were infringed, cause B-62 was brought, on account of the latter alleged infringements. In both A-4 and B-62 novelty and infringement are denied; anticipation pleaded, and the further averment made that another than Wilson was the real inventor of the device for which Wilson received the patent. The evidence does not support the last defense, and it was not urged upon the trial.

Defendant avers an infringement on the part of complainant of the Double invention, of which defendant is the licensee. This, issue has already been decided in cause No. 1540 and need not be further considered.

In pleading anticipation, the defendant in these two causes has, in so far as a number of the alleged anticipating patents and devices set up are concerned, necessarily taken a position inconsistent with its contention in cause No. 1540. This, of course, is permissible, but the court, having already held in the decision this day filed in No. 1540 that Wilson’s device infringed tire Double patent, and that the Double patent was not anticipated by the prior patents mentioned, it follows that, in so far as the alleged anticipating patents and devices preceded the Double invention in point of time, necessarily, none of them anticipated the Wilson invention. In so' far as tire patents issued and devices designed and used prior to the Wilson application for patent, and not shown to be prior to the Double invention, are concerned, no anticipation is found.

The O’Donnell & Willard patent, No. 762,435, and the so-called “Jones’ Round-Nosed” reamer—a device never patented—have already been considered in cause No. 1540, this day decided. No further discussion of them is required. The Jones’ so-called “Removable Bowl” reamer is the device, outside of the Double invention, chiefly relied upon in argument, by the defendant, to show anticipation of the patent in suit. It will be considered in connection with cause B-62.

Claims 16 and 17 of the patent in suit in A-4 are as follows:

“16. An underreamer cutter having two shoulders and a bearing face on the inner side of each of the two shoulders of the cutter.
“17. An underreamer cutter having a shank and a shoulder on either side of the shank of the cutter,, each of said shoulders projecting at right ’angles to the shank of the cutter and having a bearing-face on its inner side.”

These claims are to cover the structure of an article of manufacture of a particular form—that is, the cutters—and not for a machine or combination. Many of the claims made by Wilson were repeatedly rejected by the Patent Office on reference to Double’s patents. The two foregoing claims were so rejected, upon which rejection Wilson’s-patent attorney wrote the Commissioner of Patents the following letter under date of May 12, 1906:

[849]*849“It is noted that the leader from the character 43 in Fig. 9 of the drawings is too long. Please remove the end thereof, so that the leader will terminate at the right of a vertical drawn from the right edge of the shank 43. Please add the character 43 to the left of Fig. 9 and connect the same by a-leader to indicate on the left of the view the bearing corresponding to the one indicated by the character 43 at the right of the view. In Fig. 4 apply the character in at least two places above and below the view, and connect said character by a leader to indicate the bearings at the edges of the cutters 4”

The effect of this amendment to the drawings was to make plain that the inner bearings on the face of the cutters were out nearest its lateral face—entirely beyond the perpendicular side of the shanks. In this particular the letter concludes:

“It is believed that, in view of the application of the additional characters to Figs. 9 and 4, the examiner will be able to pass claims 16 and 17. The Double cutter has its bearing face entirely across the cutter, instead of on the inner side of .the shoulders at the sides of the .shank, as specified in these claims.”

Úpon this representation, the rejected claims 16 and 17 were allowed. By this action, and upon familiar principles of estoppel, the claims were clearly limited and restricted to a cutter with its inner bearings confined to its sides, and not extending across its face. In all of defendant’s alleged infringing devices, the bearings (extend all the way across the cutter.

In an underreamer made by defendant—referred to in the evidence as Type F—and more particularly on account of which complainant brought the second suit, B-62, the lower end of the body extension, instead of being integral, has a block interposed between the lower ends, extending downward on either side of the central slot. With this interposed block in position, the inner bearings on the cutter extend entirely across its face. With this block left out, the body extension becomes more nearly of a pronged or forked formation.

Complainant contends that the use of the interposed block is only a pretense; that, although furnished as a part of the machine, it is detrimental, and not intended to be used. Complainant relies upon the Weed Chain Case, 196 Fed. 213. The question so presented is one that can only be considered in connection with combination claims, and is irrelevant upon consideration of these claims upon a feature of the cutter as an article of manufacture.

No infringement of claims 16 and 17, is shown. Therefore decree will be for defendant in A-4.

Cause No. B-62.

The claims of the patent alleged to be infringed in cause B-62 are numbered 2, 4, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 19. While included in the bill, upon the trial the contention that claims 10 and 15 were infringed was withdrawn. Although it was later contended that claim 10 was infringed, yet effect will be given to such withdrawal, .and those claims are held not infringed.

Claims 2, 4, 12, 13, and 14 are all structural claims, rather than combination claims. Prongs on the lower end of the reamer body, [850]*850forming a fork, and each prong terminating in a lug, are, in substance, made features in each one of these latter claims.

The Double invention contracted, to a great extent, the unappropriated field open to invention at the time of the Wilson application, and materially narrowed the range of equivalents to which those claiming under the Wilson patent are entitled.

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Related

Cummings v. Wilson & Willard Mfg. Co.
4 F.2d 453 (Ninth Circuit, 1925)
Union Tool Co. v. Wilson
259 U.S. 107 (Supreme Court, 1922)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
237 F. 847, 1916 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1257, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wilson-v-union-tool-co-casd-1916.