Senco Products, Inc. v. Fastener Corporation
| Decision Date | 13 August 1959 |
| Docket Number | No. 12548.,12548. |
| Citation | 269 F.2d 33 |
| Parties | SENCO PRODUCTS, INC., Plaintiff-Appellant, v. FASTENER CORPORATION and DuoFast Co., Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit |
William J. Stellman, Chicago, Ill., Stanley H. Foster, Cincinnati, Ohio, James R. Sweeney, Hofgren, Brady, Wegner, Allen & Stellman, Chicago, Ill., John W. Melville, Erastus S. Allen (on the brief), Allen & Allen, Cincinnati, Ohio, of counsel, for appellant.
M. Hudson Rathburn, Walther E. Wyss, Chicago, Ill., Mason, Kolehmainen, Rathburn & Wyss, Chicago, Ill., of counsel, for appellees.
Before SCHNACKENBERG, KNOCH and CASTLE, Circuit Judges.
Senco Products, Inc., plaintiff-appellant, a manufacturer of staples and staplers (hereinafter called plaintiff) brought suit in the District Court against Fastener Corporation, a manufacturer of similar devices and Duo-Fast Co., its Illinois distributor, defendants-appellees (referred to as defendants) for an injunction and damages for alleged patent infringement. The District Court entered judgment finding the patent invalid for lack of invention and dismissed the complaint. Plaintiff appealed. The main contested issue is whether the District Court erred in holding the patent invalid for lack of invention in view of certain prior art.
The stapling devices or "guns" manufactured by both parties are of a portable pneumatic type designed primarily for use in upholstering operations. The staple driving mechanism of the patent in suit features a separate driver and piston with a separate stop for the piston, so arranged that the driver and piston accelerate together and move as a unit in the staple driving operation until the piston is stopped. The driver, due to its accumulated kinetic energy, continues its movement to complete the setting of the staples without further force or energy from the piston. The driver advances slightly beyond the tip of the gun. A spring serves as a final limit stop for the driver. Advantages claimed for this mechanical arrangement are the elimination of frequent driver breakage encountered when the driver and piston are in one unit or when rigidly connected and proper staple setting without injury to the material stapled. Plaintiff contends that the two features — the separate driver and piston and the separate piston stop served to distinguish its patent from all prior art.
The defendants rely on references to prior art which they contend disclose the use of separate pistons and drivers and separate stops for each in similar tools. The references included devices for stapling, tacking, nailing, riveting and other percussion tools. It would unduly lengthen this opinion to discuss each reference in detail. We have considered each reference and the arguments of counsel bearing on its relevance.
Pneumatic stapling guns were actually designed as early as 1891 (Bradeen patent 451,995). Evidence of prior art considered by the District Court and upon which it based its conclusion included the Randall patent 1,939,632 covering a portable pneumatic stapling machine. This device utilized a piston separate from the driver, although the latter was rigidly secured to a floating auxiliary plunger. There were, however, no separate stops for the piston and driver. In a...
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