The Ordinary Meaning of "Adjustable" Was Too Broad When Specification and Common Sense Required Narrower Construction

Case: Curtiss-Wright Flow Control Corp. v. Velan, Inc., No. 05-1373 (Fed Cir. 2/15/06)

The One Sentence Summary: In granting a preliminary injunction, the district court construed the term "adjustable" too broadly by relying too much on the ordinary meaning without reference to the narrower context of the term in the specification, and by misapplying the doctrine of claim differentiation - the district court's broad interpretation of "adjustable" was limitless because nearly everything is adjustable in some sense.


What They Were Fighting About: The district court granted patentee's preliminary injunction request, holding that refinery coke head valves that could be replaced were "adjustable" in the meaning of the patent.

Federal Circuit Holdings:

• In giving a broad construction to the word "adjustable," the district court improperly relied upon the ordinary meaning without reference to the context of the word in the specification. In the specification, the term "adjustable" was used to mean adjustable during operation and without removal of the coke head.
• The broad meaning of adjustable adopted by the district court is so broad as to be meaningless - every mechanical thing is adjustable in some sense.
• The district court misapplied the doctrine of claim differentiation in construing the claim.
• Claim differentiation in the most specific sense refers to the presumption that an independent claim should not be construed as requiring a limitation added by a dependent claim. Claim differentiation is also used more generally as the presumption that every claim in the patent has a different scope. In this latter sense, it is a guide, not a rigid rule. A patentee may use different language in different independent claims to define the same subject matter.