Hartford-Empire Co. v. Swindell Bros.
| Decision Date | 04 October 1938 |
| Docket Number | No. 4273.,4273. |
| Citation | 99 F.2d 61 |
| Parties | HARTFORD-EMPIRE CO. v. SWINDELL BROS., Inc., (AMSLER-MORTON CO., Intervener). |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit |
Sidney F. Parham, of Hartford, Conn. (Edwin F. Samuels, of Baltimore, Md., William J. Belknap, of Detroit, Mich., and Robson D. Brown and Lloyd G. Bates, both of Hartford, Conn., on the brief), for appellant.
Lawrence C. Kingsland, of St. Louis, Mo., and William B. Jaspert, of Pittsburgh, Pa. (Cook & Markell and Edward A. Smith, all of Baltimore, Md., on the brief), for appellees.
Before PARKER, NORTHCOTT, and SOPER, Circuit Judges.
A careful consideration of the briefs and oral arguments on rehearing lead to no change in the conclusions of the Court as embodied in its opinion filed April 21, 1938. 96 F.2d 227. One statement of fact should be modified. This modification relates to the statement that the defendants' expert corrected his testimony as to the top of the tunnel of defendants' lehr being hotter than the bottom. At page 231. The correction made by the witness related to testimony as to the relative temperatures of the top and bottom of lehr of the reissue patent, not the lehr of defendants. We are satisfied, however, that, as a matter of fact, the tunnel of defendants' lehr, as well as of that of plaintiff, has a hotter bottom than top throughout the entire annealing range. When the firebox above the entrance to the tunnel is heated, the heat is maintained at a temperature 300 degrees lower than that of the bottom flue. The top firebox extends for only a very short distance, and beyond this there is no heat whatever above the tunnel, whereas the temperature of the bottom flue is very high. In this situation, it seems to us inevitable that vertical convection currents should be produced and the lehr of defendants operate on the same principle as that of plaintiff.
Defendants earnestly contend on rehearing that the function of the dampered cold air inlets of the reissue patent is to cool the flue beyond the annealing range and that the function of the dampered hot air outlets of defendants' lehr is to control the heat gradient within the annealing range. From this it is argued that the function of the inlets and outlets in the two cases is entirely different and that there is consequently no basis for a finding of equivalency. We are satisfied from the evidence, however, that the inlets of the reissue patent are used for controlling the heat gradient within the annealing range as well as for cooling the flue beyond that range. And irrespective of this, we think there is ample basis for the finding of equivalency. The gist of the patent is the application of heat to the bottom only of the heatless unit lehr of the prior art. One of the problems of the combination was to control the heat of the flue so that it would be reduced in the second annealing stage and nullified in the cooling stage. This was solved in the patent by admitting cool air to the flue through dampered inlets. The accused lehr uses the "unit" lehr of the prior art in combination with the lower heating flue, just as does the lehr of the patent. Heated air is drawn through this lower flue by suction, just as in the lehr of the patent. The only difference is that in the accused lehr the heating flue ends where the cooling stage begins so that the bottom of the tunnel comes directly in contact with the outside atmosphere, and that for controlling the heat gradient within the annealing zone dampered outlets for the heated air are provided so that, by opening those near the entrance end of the tunnel and closing those near the cooling end, a portion of the hot air will be drawn off near the entrance end and will not exert its influence in the second annealing stage. While there is thus a slight change of form in the apparatus...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Aktiebolag v. First Quality Baby Prods., LLC
...that laches might limit recovery of damages. See, e.g., Hartford–Empire Co. v. Swindell Bros., 96 F.2d 227, 233, modified on reh'g, 99 F.2d 61 (C.A.4 1938). Such dicta "settles nothing." Jama v. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, 543 U.S. 335, 351, n. 12, 125 S.Ct. 694, 160 L.Ed.2d 708 (2......
-
Waterproof Insulation Corp. v. Insulating Con. Corp.
... ... Hartford Empire Co. v. Swindell Bros., 4 Cir., 1938, 96 F.2d 227, 231; Frick Co. v. Lindsay, 4 Cir., 1928, 27 F.2d ... ...
-
Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Esso Standard Oil Co.
...Decker & Sons, 301 U.S. 168, 57 S.Ct. 675, 81 L.Ed. 983; Hartford-Empire Co. v. Swindell Bros. Inc., 4 Cir., 96 F.2d 227, on rehearing, 4 Cir., 99 F.2d 61; City of Grafton, W. Va., v. Otis Elevator Co., 4 Cir., 166 F.2d Lastly, with respect to the question of validity, since we have found t......
-
Lever Bros. Co. v. Procter & Gamble Mfg. Co.
...infringement of the method by varying the details of the apparatus by which they make use of it." See, also, Hartford Empire Co. v. Swindell Bros., 4 Cir., 99 F.2d 61, 62. Incidentally, Bodman adverted to both of these methods in his We hold, then, that Claim 5 and Claim 7 of the Bodman pat......