Opinion ID: 210094
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Gap Limitation

Text: With respect to the language of claim 18 requiring the impact portion being inwardly elastically deflectable such to establish a tight interference fit, the district court held the requirement that a `gap' exist between the impact portion and the insert to be implicit in claim 18. Summary Judgment Opinion at 15 n. 5 (citing Hillerich, 442 F.3d at 1328-29). For both this limitation and the gap limitation of claim 1, the district court adopted the claim construction articulated in Hillerich. See id. at 7, 15-16; see also DeMarini, 239 F.3d at 1330 (declining to construe these limitations). On appeal, Wilson argues that the district court read an additional limitation into the claims by holding that the separations measured in the accused bats, which the district court characterized as irregular and sporadic, were not large enough or consistent enough to be considered a gap. Wilson also contends that the district court's claim construction ignored the real invention of the '398 patent  i.e., a bat which yields a mechanical system with characteristics similar to a leaf-spring. Wilson further argues that the district court erroneously read the gap limitation of claim 1 into claim 18, in which the word gap does not appear. Miken responds by defending the district court's claim construction and by arguing that the inventor disclaimed discontinuous and variable spaces between the frame and insert during the prosecution of the '398 patent. These arguments are for the most part more germane to infringement, and thus we address them in the infringement discussion below. To the extent that they do relate to claim construction, they do not persuade us that the district court erred in adopting the claim construction of this court in Hillerich. As we held in Hillerich, [a]lthough `gap' does not appear in claim 18, the claim term `a tight interference fit' implies some sort of space between the frame and the insert. Hillerich, 442 F.3d at 1325. However, claims 1 and 18 . . . do not foreclose some contact between the insert and frame. Id. at 1328. We therefore define[ ] `gap' for the purposes of claims 1 and 18 of the '398 patent, as `a separation,' . . . [which] may be localized, so that a cross-section of the bat in the impact region need not possess circular symmetry. Id. at 1329. Specifically with respect to claim 18, in contrast to the insert of claim 1, the insert in this claim need not be perfectly circular. Rather the claim requires only space between the frame and the insert to allow for contact when the impact portion is elastically deflected. Id. Furthermore, claim 18 also does not foreclose the possibility that contact between the frame and insert occurs, before impact, at some point other than that at which impact occurs. Id. The district court adopted this same claim construction analysis, see Summary Judgment Opinion at 7, 15-16, and we herein affirm that determination.