Cedarapids, Inc. v. Nordberg, Inc.
United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
121 F.3d 726 (Fed. Cir. 1997)
A patent for increasing rock-crusher output by simultaneously increasing speed and throw provided specific increase values (up to 40% throw, up to 100% speed) only for a seven-foot crusher, without separately specifying values for crushers of other sizes; the district court granted Cedarapids (plaintiff) summary judgment that the patent was invalid for lack of enablement, reasoning by analogy to chemical-patent cases that limiting values to one machine size meant undue experimentation would be needed to apply the process to other sizes. Nordberg (defendant) appealed.
Whether a mechanical patent's specification satisfies the enablement requirement when it provides specific parameter values for only one embodiment (one machine size), given that extending those values to other sizes of the same mechanical device might require some experimentation.