Wire Tie Machinery Co. v. Pacific Box Corp.

A rehearing was granted to appellants on the question of whether the plaintiff-appellants’ patent ’259 is a “paper patent” and hence limited to the narrowest possible construction; and whether defendants' device infringes said ’259 patent.

Upon a reconsideration of the case, we conclude that plaintiffs’ ’259 patent is entitled to a reasonable range of equivalents. We come to this conclusion because the plaintiffs’ ’260 machine, which was unquestionably manufactured and therefore not a “paper patent” utilized oscillating principles involved in the ’259 patent.

It is therefore necessary to reconsider our decision that the ’259 patent was not infringed.

Appellant here contends that our construction of the claims of the ’259 patent in fact constituted “a shrinkage, and amounted, in effect, to a rewording of the claims by the insertion of the term ‘oscillating arm’ whereas no such limitation appears in any claim in suit.” The argument seems to be that the claims of ’259 were broad enough to cover any means of encircling a tensioned binding wire about an object to be bound and tied, and means for securing the wire in a substantially flat joint.

We cannot assent to such a broad…