US 4737107

I'll run a few targeted searches to check for any USPTO records or 2026 CAFC activity tied specifically to this number.

The first searches returned unrelated hits (a 1968 radiolysis article, a Japanese patent number, and a French trademark record). Let me narrow in on the patent itself and its litigation history.

Summary of US Patent 4,737,107

Identification (as recorded in the patent document)

Abstract (verbatim): "The invention relates to an installation for controlling a gravitational or forced motion, notably for the simulation of a parachute jump. The installation includes removable load catching means (7) on a mobile support (6) and programmed means arranged for controlling in time the descending motion of said mobile support (6) according to a pre-established trajectory and/or law of motion."

Plain-language overview of the independent claim

The patent has one independent claim, claim 1. All other claims (2–15) are dependent, either directly on claim 1 or through intermediate claims (e.g., claim 12 via claim 11; claim 15 via claim 14).

Claim 1 — an installation for controlling a descending movement, particularly for simulating a parachute jump, comprising four elements:

1. A continuous endless rail running from a starting zone of the downward motion, through an active descent zone, then a substantially horizontal zone, then a return zone back to the start.
2. A movable load-carrying support that moves freely along that rail.
3. Programmed means that control the timing of the support's descent along the active zone.
4. Separable coupling means that engage the movable load support from the starting zone through the end of the active zone, and that are controlled by the programmed means.

Note: the granted claim text contains a garbled/repeated phrase — "separable coupling means engageable with said movable load support support from said starting zone to and the end of said active zone." I am reading this literally as it appears in the record and am not correcting it. The evident intent (consistent with the specification) is that the coupling engages the movable support at/near the start of the descent and disengages at the end of the active descent zone.

Dependent-claim coverage (plain language):

• Claims 2–8: the support is a "carrier"; alternatively coupled to the programmed means via an assisting carrier on a separate rail (with removable coupling between the two carriers), the assisting carrier moving with an alternating movement, driven by a winch under a programmed variable-speed geared motor (servo-valve or electric motor).
• Claim 9: adds loop means for returning the support along its rail (spec says e.g. a closed chain).
• Claim 10: programmed unit drives the support at programmed variable speeds over a closed trajectory.
• Claims 11–12: adds aircraft-cockpit mock-up element(s); specifically two half mock-ups face-to-face whose outlets feed the same jump line via a switch.
• Claim 13: at least one sensor detecting the start of descent to actuate the programmed means.
• Claims 14–15: acceleration means imparting an acceleration different from (specifically, greater than) gravity, i.e., a forced descent.

Technical context: The described embodiment uses a rail with a slightly sloped section, a steeply inclined "jump" section, a horizontal "under-canopy/drag" section, and a return branch; a trainee is attached by a harness (possibly with a Cardan ring) to a rolling carrier that couples to a winch-driven assisting carrier during the fall phase, then releases for the drag phase.

USPTO / CAFC 2026 docket search — findings

• USPTO record: Confirmed. The patent issued 1988-04-12 to Baudin-Chateauneuf, and its legal status is "Expired – Fee Related" (lapsed April 2000 for non-payment of maintenance fees; a 2018 status entry states "PATENT EXPIRED DUE TO NONPAYMENT OF MAINTENANCE FEES UNDER 37 CFR 1.362").
• CAFC 2026 docket: No results found connecting patent number 4737107 to any Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit docket in 2026. My searches surfaced only (a) an unrelated 1968 journal article, (b) a Japanese patent number 4737107 (a 2007 iron-based powder application), and (c) a 2021 French trademark registration numbered 4737107 — none of which relate to this US patent. I cannot confirm any litigation or appeal activity, and given the patent lapsed in 2000, sustained 2026 CAFC activity is unlikely.

Uncertainty note: I have high confidence in the bibliographic data and claim text because they are drawn from the authoritative patent document. My confidence is low regarding any 2026 litigation, because the searches returned no relevant docket records — this should be treated as "no evidence found," not as affirmative proof of absence. The claim-1 language quoted above contains an apparent reproduction error in the source; I have flagged rather than corrected it.

Primary sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4737107/en ; https://patents.justia.com/patent/4737107 ; Espacenet family record for EP0210897.

I'll search for litigation involving US patent 4737107 across the requested sources.

The initial searches returned hits for other patents that happen to end in "107" (e.g., US 8,942,107, US 10,621,228). Let me run more targeted searches on the exact number and on the patent owner, plus litigation databases.

Litigation Search Report — U.S. Patent No. 4,737,107

Patent under review: U.S. Patent No. 4,737,107 ("Installation for the control of a gravitational or forced motion, notably for the simulation of parachute jumps")

• Inventors: Jean-Louis Bories; Jean-Paul Gibert
• Original/current assignee: BAUDIN-CHATEAUNEUF (a Corp. of France), Châteauneuf-sur-Loire, France
• Priority: 1985-07-17 (FR 8510928); Filed: 1986-07-08; Granted/Published: 1988-04-12
• Status per USPTO/Google Patents records: Expired (lapsed for failure to pay maintenance fees, effective 2000-04-12; anticipated expiration 2006-07-08)

---

Bottom line

No litigation is known to involve U.S. Patent No. 4,737,107.

I searched patent-litigation-oriented sources and general web indexes for litigation referencing this exact number. I found no complaint, docket entry, judgment, or PTAB proceeding in which U.S. 4,737,107 was asserted or challenged. Its Google Patents record likewise contains no "Litigation" section (it lists only patent citations, "Cited By," and family/legal-status data — no court cases), which is consistent with the patent never having been litigated.

Because the '107 patent lapsed in 2000 and reached its full anticipated term in 2006, it has been unenforceable/unexpired for roughly two decades, which is a strong structural reason no litigation would exist today.

---

Case table

There are no rows to populate. I am reporting this as a "no known litigation" result rather than guessing at docket numbers or parties.

---

Critical caution — same-suffix false positives

Because "107" is a very common patent-number suffix, my searches returned numerous hits that are not U.S. 4,737,107. These are not litigation against your patent of interest and should be disregarded:

• U.S. Patent No. 8,942,107 ("the '107 Patent" in the Chrimar Systems litigation) — this is a completely different patent (network/Power-over-Ethernet technology, priority 1998), asserted by Chrimar Systems, Inc./Chrimar Holding Co. against ALE USA Inc. (Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise) and others, e.g., Chrimar Systems, Inc. v. Alcatel-Lucent S.A., No. 6:15-cv-00163-JDL (E.D. Tex.), and Chrimar Systems, Inc. v. ADTRAN, Inc., No. 6:15-cv-00618 (E.D. Tex.), tried and appealed to the Federal Circuit. Not your patent.
• U.S. Patent No. 8,942,107-adjacent matters including IPR2016-00569 and related Chrimar assertions against AMX and Dell — again, a different '107.
• Other "…107" references (e.g., the EagleView/Xactware " '737" and " '107" family) — unrelated technologies and numbers.

I flag these because the strict instruction is to interpret identifiers literally and not to auto-substitute. Any report that lists Chrimar v. ALE as litigation against 4,737,107 would be an error of exactly this kind.

---

What I searched (and the confidence level)

• General web/patent indexes for the exact number "4737107" / "4,737,107" paired with litigation terms (lawsuit, infringement, plaintiff, defendant, docket).
• Google Patents record for US4737107 (which normally aggregates litigation and PTAB data; none present).
• The assignee "Baudin-Chateauneuf" in a litigation context.
• Attempts to reach litigation aggregators (Unified Patents portal, CourtListener/PACER-style dockets) for this number.

Confidence: High that no litigation exists in the public record for this specific patent. Caveat: My tool access to the dedicated litigation portals (Unified Patents caselist, PACER, CourtListener) did not return a direct, verifiable docket lookup within this session — several queries hit step limits. A definitive "negative" would ideally be confirmed by a direct search of PACER's nationwide docket index, Docket Navigator, or the Unified Patents litigation caselist filtered to this patent. Based on the sources I could reach and the patent's expired status, I have no evidence of any such case and no basis to fabricate one.

---

Related proceedings that DO exist (for completeness, not litigation of the '107)

• Family/foreign counterparts were granted and are now inactive: EP 0210897 B1, DE 3670616 D1, AT E52232 T1, CA 1260978 A, FR 2584998 B1. These are prosecution/grant records, not litigation.
• The '107 patent is cited as prior art by later documents — e.g., the Russian patent RU 2832674 C2 lists "US 4737107 A1" in its search report — but citation is not litigation.

---

Recommendation

If you need a court-admissible negative clearance, I recommend confirming with a paid docket service (Docket Navigator), a nationwide PACER docket search on the exact number, and a manual check of the assignee Baoudin-Chateauneuf's litigation history. Should any such service surface a case, the identifier must be verified to correspond literally to 4,737,107 and not to the unrelated '107 patents (e.g., 8,942,107) discussed above.

Note on the number itself: I have deliberately not "corrected" or normalized any identifier. Every number above is reported exactly as found in the sources.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file for US 4,737,107: zero. The USPTO Open Data Portal returns no IPR, PGR, or CBM for this patent, and targeted web searches against PTAB public decisions, Docket Alarm, and the general web surface nothing either — no instituted trial, no denied petition, no settlement, no FWD, and no Federal Circuit appeal of any PTAB decision, because there is no PTAB decision to appeal. The breakdown is therefore: active 0 / claims invalidated 0 / claims sustained 0 / settled 0 / institution denied 0.

Bottom line for a defendant: the absence of PTAB activity is not a sign of a hardened patent. It is a sign that US 4,737,107 was never worth attacking at the Board — it lapsed for non-payment of the 12-year maintenance fee and its status on Google Patents is verbatim "Expired - Fee Related," with the USPTO Legal Events recording "FP — Lapsed due to failure to pay maintenance fee," effective 2000-04-12. The correct defensive posture is not an IPR-based invalidity story but a standing/enforceability one: the asserted right went dead twenty-six years ago, and any demand letter citing this patent is facially defective.

Proceedings

No AIA trial proceedings exist to itemize. Per the instruction not to invent proceeding numbers, I am not listing any. If counsel needs a negative check for the file, run the patent number through:

• PTAB E2E / PTAB Center search: https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/
• CourtListener docket search for the patent number: https://www.courtlistener.com/?q=%224737107%22

Both return no hits tying US 4,737,107 to a Board trial or a PTAB-originating appeal.

Strategic summary

Claim status. Because there was never a PTAB trial, no claim of US 4,737,107 has been canceled or held patentable by the Board. All 15 issued claims — claims 1–15, with independent claim 1 (continuous endless rail + freely movable load-carrying support + programmed means + separable coupling means controlled by the programmed means), independent-claim variants at claims 9–15, and dependents at 2–8 — stand as issued, never tested in an AIA trial. "Untested" here is not "strong": the entire right was extinguished on 2000-04-12 when the maintenance fee was not paid, and the Office's own status flag is "Expired - Fee Related."

Estoppel landscape. There is no § 315(e)(2) estoppel to map, because no petitioner ever reached a final written decision. Conversely, there is no IPR estoppel protecting the patent owner either. Practically, § 315 estoppel is irrelevant to a current defendant; the controlling statutes are 35 U.S.C. § 286 (six-year damages lookback — there is no infringing period within decades of the present) and § 41(c) intervening-rights principles for the post-lapse period. Anyone who made, used, or sold a gravity/parachute-descent simulation installation during the lapse has additional protection.

Pattern signals. No repeat petitioner, no defensive aggregator (no Unified Patents, no RPX, no IP Edge-type chain visible in the family record), and no PTAB-appeal aggressiveness, because there was no proceeding. The patent family shows only the foreign siblings from prosecution: EP 0210897B1, AT E52232T1, DE 3670616D1, CA 1260978A, FR 2584998B1, all likewise lapsed/expired. US 4,737,107 lives on now only as prior art — it appears in the "Cited By" lists of later amusement/zip-line and training patents (e.g., US 5,224,425 "Cable skydiving"; US 6,000,942 "Parachute flight training simulator"; the Ropes Courses zip-track family) and was cited in the Russian search report for RU 2,832,674 C2 — which is a citation footprint, not a validity challenge.

Recommended next steps

1. Lead with expiration, not invalidity. Pull the USPTO Patent Center maintenance-fee record (fee year 12 unpaid; "Lapsed due to failure to pay maintenance fee," effective 2000-04-12) and attach it to any response to a demand. The patent cannot be infringed after that date, and there is no live six-year § 286 window.
2. If a plaintiff nonetheless sues, frame the defense as (a) expiry/unenforceability and (b) no actionable pre-expiration conduct within the limitations period, and, only then, (c) § 101/§ 103 invalidity as a fallback. Do not promise the client an IPR kill — the Board route is technically available even for expired patents, but there is no economic case for it and no PTAB precedent on this patent to exploit.
3. Preserve the negative-search record. If an IPR is ever contemplated or if counsel must certify diligence, timestamp the PTAB E2E and CourtListener null results above; the fact that a 1988 patent asserted today has no AIA history is itself evidence the assertion is a low-quality demand rather than a real campaign.
4. Flag the citation to me if new activity appears. The ODP ingest can lag; anything filed against US 4,737,107 would be extraordinary given the 2000 lapse, and I would treat any such filing as a red flag worth verifying directly at PTAB E2E rather than relying on secondary sources.

Caveat on confidence: I have high confidence in the "no PTAB activity" conclusion (structured ODP data plus negative web results) and in the 2000-04-12 lapse and expired-status flag, both quoted from the official record in the source material. I did not locate any district-court litigation involving this patent; my searches were targeted rather than exhaustive, and I make no representation about state-court or foreign proceedings.

I'll verify the assignment record and ownership history before writing up. Let me run several checks in parallel.

Let me check for litigation, PEDS status, and any assignment records beyond the original.

Ownership & Assignment Analysis — US 4,737,107

Patent: US 4,737,107 A — "Installation for the control of a gravitational or forced motion, notably for the simulation of parachute jumps"
Appl. No.: 06/883,116 · Filed: 1986-07-08 · Issued: 1988-04-12 · Priority: 1985-07-17 (FR 85 10928)
Family: FR2584998B1 · EP0210897B1 · ATE52232T1 · DE3670616D1 · CA1260978A

Sourcing note (stated up front): the Assignment Center / assignment.uspto.gov detail pages for this patent could not be pulled directly in this session; the reel/frame and event data below come from the assignment record as rendered in Google Patents' Legal Events and Assignments tables, which mirror the USPTO assignment database. The correspondent of record field is not exposed in the sources available to me for this patent, and I have not invented it. Verification should be run at https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent number 4737107) and https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html.

---

Inventors

Unusual-pattern check — no signal. Both inventors assigned to the employer before the US filing (executed 1986-06-25; application filed 1986-07-08), which is ordinary corporate practice and the opposite of a fire-sale tell. There is no evidence that either inventor departed the original assignee within 12 months of filing; I found no corroborating record either way (no public personnel data, no later patents by these inventors surfaced in the family). Treat the "departure" question as unresolved, not as a negative finding.

---

Original assignee

Baudin-Châteauneuf (recorded as "BAUDIN-CHATEAUNEUF, B.P. 19 – 45110 CHATEAUNEUF-SUR-LOIRE, a Corp. of France"; present legal name BAUDIN CHATEAUNEUF).

• Line of business: French industrial construction and mechanical engineering group. Founded 1919 as SNC Baudin et Compagnie; renamed Baudin Châteauneuf in 1952. Core work: steel bridges and ouvrages d'art, structural steelwork, general contracting/civil engineering, génie mécanique (mechanical assemblies), and — relevant here — "complexes sportifs ou de loisirs" (sports and leisure complexes) per its RCS corporate object. Legal form SA à directoire; SIREN 085 780 534; HQ 60 rue de la Brosse, 45110 Châteauneuf-sur-Loire. Revenue €171.2M (FY2024); 500–999 employees.
• Did they ship a product embodying the claims? Unclear / not evidenced. The claimed subject matter is a fixed-installation parachute-jump simulator (cockpit mock-ups, closed rail loop, programmed winch-controlled descent). Baudin-Châteauneuf's corporate object and mechanical-engineering capability make a bespoke turnkey installation plausible, but I found no evidence of a commercial product, brochure, or installation embodying the claims. This is a genuine gap, not a negative finding.
• Current status: Operating. No insolvency proceedings of any kind recorded (BODACC: "Aucune procédure collective"). Annual accounts for the year ended 2025-09-30 were filed at the Orléans Commercial Court registry (BODACC C 20260081, annonce 3137, published 2026-04-28). Not acquired, not dissolved, not in bankruptcy.

Sources: annuaire-entreprises.data.gouv.fr — SIREN 085780534 · doctrine.fr company record · BODACC annonce 3137 · Company history PDF

---

Assignment timeline

There is exactly one recorded assignment against this patent — the original inventor-to-company transfer. No post-issuance assignment of any kind was recorded.

• 1986-06-25 (executed) / recorded 1986-07-08 — Reel 004576 / Frame 0663
  • Conveyance: Assignment — "ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST."
  • Assignor: Jean-Louis Bories; Jean-Paul Gibert
  • Assignee: Baudin-Châteauneuf, B.P. 19, 45110 Châteauneuf-sur-Loire, France
  • Correspondent: not exposed in the sources available to me — I will not fabricate a name. Note the record's owner-of-record address is the assignee's own French address rather than a US attorney/agent address, which is consistent with a direct company-filed recording rather than placement with an outside US patent attorney. This is a single-record chain, so recurrence of a correspondent cannot even arise; the repeat-correspondent signal is structurally unavailable.
  • Context: Initial ownership transfer — employee inventors to their employer, executed ~2 weeks before the US filing date and recorded on the filing date. Ordinary corporate practice.

The chain then terminates. Everything after 1986 is maintenance-fee administration, not conveyance:

Key consequence: the asserted property right died on 2000-04-12, roughly five years before the nominal 20-year term would have run (1985-07-17 priority → 2005-07-17). Any post-2000 assignment or assertion of this patent is legally impossible.

---

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 4737107
    1985 : Priority date 17 July 1985
    1986 : Filed 8 July 1986
         : Inventors assign to Baudin Chateauneuf
    1988 : Patent issued 12 April 1988
    1991 : Maintenance fee paid year 4
    1995 : Maintenance fee paid year 8
    2000 : Lapsed for unpaid maintenance fee

---

NPE / troll-pattern signals

Secondary observation (not itself an NPE signal, but worth logging): the patent's forward-citation trail (US5224425 "Cable skydiving"; US6000942 "Parachute flight training simulator"; US10105564 "Challenge course with return track"; US10213699/11376513/12296277 "Zip track and system"; Bungy New Zealand's US10086297) runs to the adventure-course, zip-line and cable-descent industry — i.e. this is a foundational-adjacent reference for a commercial amusement/recreation field, not a software/finance assertion farm. None of those citing parties are in this patent's chain of title.

---

Verdict

Insufficient data (chain contains only the original assignment)

The complete recorded chain is a single link: the inventor-to-employer assignment to Baudin-Châteauneuf, Reel 004576/0663, executed 1986-06-25 and recorded 1986-07-08 — leaving the original French operating company as assignee of record for the entire enforceable life of the patent. Every NPE indicator returns not present, and independently, the patent lapsed on 2000-04-12 for failure to pay the year-12 maintenance fee (LAPS 2000-04-09; FP 2000-06-20; final STCH closure 2018-01-30), so no post-2000 transfer or assertion was possible. This is a clean single-owner operating-company patent that simply died of fee non-payment — "insufficient data" reflects the absence of any transfer chain to analyze, not an absence of ownership information.

Verify: USPTO Assignment Center — https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search 4737107; equivalent legacy portal https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html). Cross-check the lapse: USPTO Patent Center / PEDS for application 06/883,116, fee-year 12, effective lapse 2000-04-12.

I'll verify the patent on USPTO and pull details on each cited reference.

Now let me pull details on the remaining cited references (the Soviet, French, British, and US auxiliary citations).

Prior-Art Analysis — US 4,737,107

0. USPTO record confirmation (as requested)

Searching for the specific number 4737107 returns the US grant US 4,737,107 (US4737107A), titled "Installation for the control of a gravitational or forced motion, notably for the simulation of parachute jumps." The record is consistent across the Google Patents mirror of the USPTO file and Justia:

• Inventors Jean-Louis Bories and Jean-Paul Gibert; assignee Baudin-Chateauneuf (France)
• Appl. No. 06/883,116; filed 1986-07-08; issued 1988-04-12; priority FR 8510928 (1985-07-17)
• IPC/CPC B64D 23/00 (Training of parachutists); examiner-credited class 434/29
• Status: Expired – Fee Related (lapsed 2000)

Disambiguation note (per the "do not auto-correct / no similar numbers" rule): my searches also surfaced a Japanese patent number 4737107 (iron-based powder, 2007), a French trademark 4737107 (2021), and a Russian patent RU 2832674 C2 that cites US 4737107 as a search-report reference. None of these is US 4,737,107 and none is treated as such below. The US face-of-patent citation data below is taken verbatim from the authoritative patent text.

⚠️ Contradiction flag: The prior generated "Patent summary" section listed the examiner's references only in aggregate. Two different citation lists appear in the record and must not be conflated — a "Patent Citations (6)" list (the US/EPO search-report citations, one of which, SU197412, appears in only one rendering) and a separate "Family Cites Families (5)" list (citations raised against the EP/FR family members). I distinguish them below.

---

1. Examiner-cited references ("Patent Citations")

2. Family-cited references ("Family Cites Families")

---

3. Per-reference description and § 102 analysis

Methodological caveat (stated up front, per operating rules): I have full or near-full text for US 2,930,145, US 4,431,183, and US 3,355,580; for the two Soviet references, the British reference, the two French references, and US 2,121,413 I have only titles, dates, and (where available) short descriptive strings — their full disclosures were not retrievable within my search budget. Anticipation requires that a single reference disclose every element of a claim arranged as in the claim. Where I lack the full text, the statements below are "potentially anticipates / relevant to" and not affirmative anticipation findings. Where a reference supplies only some elements, I say so and note it is better characterized as § 103 combination art.

A4 — US 2,930,145 (Green) — the closest genuinely accessible reference

Disclosure: A parachute landing-fall trainer. A trainee wears risers/harness (22) and is suspended from a trolley (38) that travels down a sloping cable (39), coupling/mating into a bumper housing (40) with a locking sear/latch. A governor (adjustable by the instructor over settings 1–7) controls the rate of descent for a given trainee weight, and a rewind spring motor returns the trolley. A slack of ~10 ft is provided to simulate free fall, followed by a shock simulating canopy opening.
§ 102 relevance:

• Claim 1 — reads on several elements: movable load-carrying support (trolley) freely movable on a rail/cable; a harness-borne load; controlled descent. But it does not appear to disclose a "continuous endless rail … then to a return zone," and its descent control is a rate-governing mechanism rather than timed (programmed) control, and its releasable coupling is not "controlled by said programmed means." On the current record it therefore does not fully anticipate claim 1.
• Claim 2 ("support is a carrier") — strongly supported by the trolley carrier.
• Claim 13 (sensor of the beginning of descent actuating the programmed means) — not shown (release is by instructor/restraining clip).
• Claims 14–15 (accelerations) — the free-fall slack + shock sequence is arguably acceleration-related, but no explicit "acceleration greater than gravity" means is disclosed.
  Best characterization: powerful § 103 art against claims 1–2 and the "controlled descent of a harnessed trainee" concept; not a clean § 102 reference for claim 1.

B5 — FR 2,394,488 (Mauret)

Disclosure (title-level): A tower for training parachutists, in which the trainee is carried suspended from a trolley down an inclined cable from the tower to the ground.
§ 102 relevance: Subject-matter-wise the closest non-US analog to the claim-1 concept (trolley + inclined cable + suspended trainee). Potentially relevant to claims 1, 2, and 13, but without full text I cannot confirm the "continuous endless rail with return zone," "programmed means," or "separable coupling controlled by programmed means" limitations. Treat as potentially anticipatory of the preamble/core of claim 1 only; likely § 103 art pending full text.

B3 — FR 1,027,196

Disclosure (title-level): A "parachute descent fairground attraction" — i.e., a gravity/cable descent ride. Relevant as prior art in the same field (gravitational descent over a fixed path). Potentially relevant to claim 1 generally; insufficient disclosure available to assign specific claim-level anticipation.

A1 / A2 — SU 221516 A1 and SU 197412 A1 ("Parachute simulator")

Disclosure: Both are Soviet parachute simulators; titles only. These are the examiner's most on-point citations — a parachute-jump simulator is the stated purpose of claim 1. They are the references most likely to bear on claim 1's general combination (and thus on claims 2, 13 depending on their content). I cannot responsibly assign specific claim numbers under § 102 without their texts; note also that A2 (SU 197412) appears in only one of the two citation renderings in the record, so its exact status as an examiner citation is itself uncertain.

US 2,121,413 (Strong) — "Automatic releasing device"

Disclosure (title-level): An automatic releasable/quick-release mechanism (1938). Relevant principally to claim 1's "separable coupling means … controlled by said programmed means" and to the release elements discussed in the specification (automatic separation of carrier 6 and assisting carrier 8). Potentially anticipatory only of the separable-coupling sub-element, not the whole claim; better as § 103 art.

B1 — GB 516,418 (Dominguez) — "Improvements in loading and unloading apparatus"

Relevant by analogy to the load-catching / loading-and-unloading (coupling) means of claim 1 (the "removable load catching means" recited in the abstract). Potentially relevant to the separable-coupling element; § 103 art.

B4 — US 3,861,318 (Massa) — "Safety ski harness cable system"

A cable system with a body harness for skiers. Relevant to the harness/load-support and separable cable-coupling elements of claim 1 (spec's harness 7 with Cardan ring). § 103 art; not anticipatory of the programmed-descent combination.

B2 — US 2,593,699 (Jervis B. Webb) — "Booster conveyer for gravity conveyer systems"

A gravity conveyor with booster propulsion and return — directly analogous to the closed-loop / return-path and loop-advance features. Relevant to claim 9 ("loop means for displacing said movable load carrying support on its rail") and claim 10 (programmed variable-speed displacement on a closed trajectory). Potentially anticipatory of claims 9/10 as isolated features; § 103 art for claim 1.

A5 — US 3,355,580 (Coney Island) — "Sky ride"

An amusement-park cable-car (gondola) sky ride with cars running between stations. Relevant as art for an endless-loop cable/rail with moving carriers and end structures (claim 1's return/endless aspect; claim 11's structure). It is about lighting aesthetics, not descent/training, so no claim-specific § 102 anticipation; § 103/background art only.

A6 — US 4,431,183 (Reimann) — "Motion simulator"

A suspended motion-simulation device: a carriage suspended from an overhead support on a C-shaped support structure, with a resiliently extensible tether anchored to a fixed point to define and control the motion pattern, plus spring for bobbing and tether-based braking. Relevant to claims 1, 14, and 15 (simulating motion / controlled accelerations), and it is the most recent US pre-filing reference. Its controlled-motion-and-braking concept is § 103 art relative to "programmed means for controlling the descending movement"; it lacks the continuous endless rail and the separable programmed coupling, so no full claim-1 anticipation.

---

4. Bottom line

• No single cited reference, on the record I can verify, discloses every element of independent claim 1 — in particular the combination of (i) a continuous endless rail with a return zone, (ii) a freely movable load-carrying support, (iii) programmed/timed descent control, and (iv) separable coupling controlled by the programmed means. Claim 1 therefore appears not anticipated by these references; they are best read as § 103 combination art (e.g., Green/B5-type inclined-cable trolley trainer + Webb-type booster/return conveyor + Strong/Dominguez-type release).
• The strongest § 102 candidates are the parachute-simulator references the examiner himself cited — SU 221516 A1 and SU 197412 A1 — and US 2,930,145 (Green); FR 2,394,488 is the closest non-US analog. My claim-level findings for the two Soviet references and FR 2,394,488 are provisional because I could not retrieve their full texts.
• Dependent claims map to distinct references: harness/coupling → US 2,121,413 (Strong), GB 516,418 (Dominguez), US 3,861,318 (Massa); loop/return and closed-trajectory drive → US 2,593,699 (Webb), US 3,355,580 (Coney Island); motion-simulation/acceleration → US 4,431,183 (Reimann); rate-controlled descent and landing-fall → US 2,930,145 (Green).

Confidence: High for bibliographic data and citation identity (drawn from the authoritative patent text). Low-to-moderate for the specific § 102 claim assignments to the SU 221516, SU 197412, FR 1,027,196, FR 2,394,488, GB 516,418, and US 2,121,413 references, whose full texts I could not verify — these should be confirmed against the reference documents before being relied upon.

Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4737107/en ; https://patents.justia.com/patent/4737107 ; US 2,930,145 PDF (patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/50/b5/b2/…/US2930145.pdf) ; https://patents.google.com/patent/US4431183 ; https://patents.google.com/patent/US3355580 ; USPTO PTAB record citing US 4737107 (RU 2832674 C2 search report).

I'll ground this analysis using the prior-art references listed on the patent page itself. Let me pull what I can on the key references.

Good — I have strong material on Green (US2930145) and Reimann (US4431183). Let me pull the remaining cited references.

Obviousness Analysis — 35 U.S.C. § 103

US 4,737,107 B1 ("Installation for the control of a gravitational or forced motion, notably for the simulation of parachute jumps")

Note on scope and confidence. Per the instructions, I work from the prior-art listings on the patent page itself. That page distinguishes two groups: (i) the references the US examiner cited (SU221516A1, SU197412A1, US2121413, US2930145, US3355580, US4431183), and (ii) references cited in the foreign/EP family prosecution (GB516418, US2593699, FR1027196, US3861318, FR2394488A1). I retrieved and read substantial text for US2930145 (Green) and US4431183 (Reimann), and partial text for US2121413 (Strong) via a later patent that quotes it. For SU221516A1, SU197412A1, FR1027196A, FR2394488A1, US3861318, US2593699, GB516418, US3355580 I have only the bibliographic record and title as shown on the page. I flag those lower-confidence mappings explicitly below rather than fabricate column/line citations. I also note supplementary identifications art I located (US2311171, US2264919, US2779596) that are not on the patent's face but illustrate the state of the art.

---

1. Legal framework and the person of ordinary skill

The application was filed 1986-07-08 with a 1985-07-17 FR priority date, so pre-AIA § 103 governs, and the Graham v. John Deere framework plus KSR Int'l v. Teleflex rationales apply. All listed references published before the 1985-07-17 priority date (earliest US2121413, 1938; latest FR2394488A1, 1979; US4431183, 1984), so all are available as § 103 combinable art.

Person of ordinary skill (POSITA): a mechanical or aeronautical engineer with a bachelor's degree and roughly 2–4 years of experience in one or more of: cable/rail conveyor and amusement-ride design, trainee-suspension harness systems, and variable-speed drive/control systems. This is a mechanical-arts patent; the level of skill is moderate, and the field is one where mechanical solutions are routinely borrowed between amusement rides, material handling, and training devices.

Claim 1, read literally (including the uncorrected "movable load support support" phrase discussed in the earlier section), requires four things: (A) a continuous endless rail through start → active descent → substantially horizontal → return; (B) a freely movable load-carrying support on that rail; (C) programmed means for timely controlling descent along the active zone; and (D) separable coupling means engaging the support from the start zone to the end of the active zone, controlled by the programmed means.

---

2. What each reference actually teaches (element mapping)

A. Green, US2930145 — "Parachute Landing Fall Trainer" (examiner-cited; 1960-03-29)

This is the closest single reference and, in my view, the primary reference the examiner would build on. Retrieved text establishes:

• Load-carrying support on a rail-like guide, free to move: a trolley 38 with the trainee suspended below by risers 22 "travels down sloping cable 39."
• A full jump cycle: the device simulates "the characteristics of a parachute from the initial free fall to the removal of the parachute harness after contacting the ground," including a controlled free-fall phase ("a slack of about ten feet is provided for the initial free fall"), a canopy-opening shock, descent, and landing.
• Programmed/selectable descent control: a governor with "pre-selected governor settings," plus a graph (Fig. 10) calibrating rate of descent against trainee weight — i.e., descent rate is a settable function, not merely a drag brake.
• Separable coupling: the trolley "mates with bumper housing 40"; a sear/latch locks it and an "automatically operating bumper locking mechanism adapted to be released by the instructor"; cable-and-rewind-spring-motor with ratchets.
• Motion realism: oscillation in a vertical plane and slight rotation about the body axis; harness/riser attachment.

What Green does not show: the continuous endless rail with a return branch (Green is a one-shot tower descent); a time-programmed law of motion (Green's governor regulates speed, not a stored time-varying trajectory); and the coupling being actuated by the programmed means (Green's release is instructor-triggered/mechanical). Green nonetheless discloses elements (B) and, in substance, (C) and (D) in mechanical form.

B. Reimann, US4431183 — "Motion Simulator" (examiner-cited; 1984-02-14)

A suspended passenger carriage with spring suspension for bobbing, swivel/universal-joint suspension to allow rotation about the carriage axis, "separate driving means to sustain the desired motion," and braking means managed via a tether; motion pattern is defined by the tether/anchor configuration. Relevance: (i) confirms that suspension harness/carriage systems with controllable motion profiles and braking were well known in "simulation" before 1985; (ii) the swivel/universal suspension anticipates the specification's "Cardan ring" harness function. It does not disclose a rail, a loop, or a programmed unit.

C. Strong, US2121413 — "Automatic releasing device" (examiner-cited; 1938-06-21)

Retrieved via US2264919's description of the same invention: a hoisting head with "grappling and releasing mechanism" that engages a fitting on the top of a parachute and automatically releases it at a predetermined point in travel ("when the latter reaches the top of its travel, the sliding plate will be depressed … opening the sliding jaws … permitting the parachute to drop"), plus a fail-safe brake on the sliding fitting sensing cable failure. Note: US2264919 describes this as "Patent No. 2,121,413, dated June 21, 1935," which conflicts with the patent page's 1938-06-21; the discrepancy is in the citing document, and either date leaves US2121413 as pre-1985 art. Relevance: automatically actuated, position-triggered coupling/release of a load from a moving carriage was old and well understood well before the '107 patent.

D. US3355580 — "Sky ride" (Coney Island Inc., examiner-cited; 1967-11-28)

A cable-car sky ride with gondola cars moving between park stations. Confidence: moderate. I confirmed the gondolas and station-to-station travel but did not retrieve text confirming the endless-haul-rope/return-loop detail. Sky rides conventionally use an endless circulating haul rope (cars outbound on one side, returning on the other), which is exactly the "continuous endless rail … return zone" architecture of claim 1; I will rely on that general knowledge flagged as inference, not as a quoted disclosure.

E. Foreign-family-cited art (lower confidence — bibliographic/title only)

• FR1027196A (1953-05-08) — "Parachute descent fairground attraction": on its face, a gravity-driven parachute-descent ride, i.e., the same field and function.
• FR2394488A1 (Mauret; 1979-01-12) — "Tower for training parachutists — has trainee carried suspended from trolley down inclined cable from tower to ground": directly a trolley-on-inclined-cable parachute trainer, structurally close to Green and to the '107 rail 5b/5c.
• US2593699 (Jervis B. Webb; 1952-04-22) — "Booster conveyer for gravity conveyer systems": this title is significant because it is a powered assist applied to a gravity-driven carriage to control its motion along a conveyor track. That is precisely the "assisting carrier"/programmed drive concept of dependent claims 3–8 in a non-analogous-looking but mechanically identical context.
• US3861318 (Massa; 1975-01-21) — "Safety ski harness cable system": a cable-driven body harness with coupling/safety for a person.
• GB516418 (1940-01-02) — "Improvements in loading and unloading apparatus": coupling/uncoupling of loads to a moving conveyor.
• SU221516A1 / SU197412A1 — both titled "Parautional simulator" (spelling preserved as recorded): Soviet parachute simulators, i.e., art in the exact field, publication dates not given on the page. Confidence: low as to disclosure content.

F. Supplementary art located (NOT on the patent's face; for state-of-the-art context only)

• US2311171 — parachute-tower ride with a "descent-controlling means" expressly designed to give a rapid initial descent followed by a gentle landing, calibrated for varying "live load" (75–220 lb), and explicitly framed as better simulating a "non-captive parachute." This directly undercuts any argument that a time-varying descent profile (fast at the start, slow at the end) was novel.
• US2264919 — New York World's Fair parachute tower: electric hoists/winding drums, guide cables, hoisting heads with automatic grapple-and-release, "all of this electrical equipment being of standard design."
• US2779596 — parachute-tower ride with a captive parachute on a counterweight that automatically returns to the elevated, ready position — i.e., automatic return of the load-handling element to the start, which is the function of the claim-1 "return zone."

---

3. The obviousness grounds

Ground 1 (Claim 1): Green + a closed-loop carrier system (US3355580) + a programmed/boosted drive (US2593699 or Reimann) + automatic release (US2121413)

Motivation to combine (KSR rationales (A) and (C)):

• Same field of endeavor and same problem. Every reference above addresses moving a person or load along a track/cable under controlled or powered drive. Green and FR2394488 are parachute trainers; US3355580 and US2593699 are conveyor/ride systems. The combination is the substitution of one known track topology (closed loop) for another (dead-end tower cable) to obtain a predictable result: continuous throughput and automatic re-supply of carriers without re-hoisting the trainee to the tower.
• Known technique to improve a similar device. Using an endless loop to return empty carriers to a loading station is the standard, decades-old solution in amusement rides and material handling (US3355580; US2593699). A POSITA seeking to raise the throughput of a Green-type trainer from one jump per hoist cycle to continuous operation would have found it obvious to close the rail into a loop, and to use the patent's own disclosed expedient — a closed chain or circulating carrier (spec at "Such loop means could be for example made of a closed chain").
• Automation of a manual step. Green's release is instructor-actuated; Strong's is automatic and position-triggered. Applying Strong's automatic release to Green's trolley/latch is the substitution of a known automated equivalent for a manual step, yielding the predictable result of repeatable timing — squarely KSR (A).
• Design incentive / obvious-to-try (KSR (F)). Because the "programmed means" in the '107 patent is itself described only functionally (a programmed unit piloting a servo valve or a variable-speed electric motor), and programmable variable-speed drives were ordinary engineering by 1985 (as US2264919's "electric hoists … of standard design" and Reimann's driven carriage confirm), selecting a programmable drive to execute a desired descent law is a predictable improvement, not an inventive leap.

Result: Claim 1 is, in my assessment, more likely than not obvious under § 103 over Green in view of a closed-loop carrier system, a powered/boosted drive, and an automatic release, with the strongest single-reference backbone being Green.

Ground 2 (alternative for Claim 1): FR2394488 (Mauret) + FR1027196 + US3355580 + US2593699

FR2394488 is a tower with a trainee suspended from a trolley running down an inclined cable — i.e., a parachute-jump trainer with the "active descent zone" of claim 1. FR1027196 is a parachute-descent gravity ride. Combining a gravity parachute-descent ride with an endless return (US3355580) and a powered booster to govern carriage speed (US2593699) yields every element of claim 1 with the same motivations as Ground 1. This ground is weaker only because I could not read the full texts; it is offered as a secondary combination. (Note also that EP0210897B1 issued from this family on 1990-04-25, meaning the EPO examiner likewise considered these references and still granted — see §4 for why that does not resolve US obviousness.)

Ground 3 (Claims 2–8): the "assisting carrier" and winch sub-combination

These claims add: carrier (2); assisting carrier coupled to the programmed means with removable coupling between carriers (3); distinct rails (4); alternating motion of the assisting carrier (5); a winch (6); a programmed variable-speed geared motor / servo-valve / electric motor (7–8).

• The two-carrier arrangement on parallel tracks is a direct functional read on US2593699, whose entire purpose is a booster carriage that engages a gravity-driven carriage to control its motion on a conveyor track — the same structural relationship as carriers 6 and 8 with dogs 17, 18.
• Alternating (reciprocating) motion is the necessary and predictable consequence of a winch-and-cable drive over a finite parallel rail (claim 5), and the patent's own specification concedes the alternative "the mechanism of the assisting winch 12 could be aboard the assisting carrier 8."
• A winch with a programmed variable-speed geared motor under a programmed unit is the combination of a standard hoist (see US2264919's hoists, drums and "push-button controlled starting rheostats" with "automatic brakes") with a programmable variable-speed drive — a routine substitution of an electrically controlled drive for the mechanical governor of Green, with a predictable improvement in controllability.

Motivation: once the developer decides the descent must follow a specified law rather than a constant rate (a requirement Green's governor cannot meet), replacing the governor with a winch plus a programmable motor is the natural, well-known solution. Claims 2–8 therefore also appear obvious.

Ground 4 (Claim 9 — loop means; Claim 10 — programmed variable speeds on a closed trajectory)

• Claim 9 (loop means to displace the support on its rail) is met by any endless-conveyor return (US3355580; the specification's own "closed chain") — obvious for the throughput reasons given.
• Claim 10 (programmed unit driving the support at programmed variable speeds on a closed trajectory) is the one dependent claim with a colorable nonobviousness argument, because it requires the programmed unit to govern the entire closed path, not just the descent. But the result — variable-speed circulation of carriers around a closed loop — is exactly what recirculating conveyor systems and dark-ride control systems did, and US2311171 already taught a deliberately time-varying descent profile (rapid initial descent, gentle landing). Under KSR, extending a programmable drive from the descent leg to the whole loop is a predictable use of the same controller.

Ground 5 (Claims 11–12 — cockpit mock-ups and jump line)

Claim 11 adds "at least one element simulating a portion of an aircraft cockpit"; claim 12 adds two half mock-ups face-to-face whose outlets feed the same jump line via a switch. Aircraft-cockpit mock-ups for jump training were standard (and the amusement parachute towers — US2311171, US2264919, US2779596 — universally have an elevated jumping platform at a tower arm from which the trainee exits). Claim 12's "two outlets, one switch, one line" is a straightforward throughput/merging arrangement that any conveyor or assembly-line engineer would apply to feed a single descent track from two simulators. This is KSR (A) combining known elements with predictable results. Obvious, in my view, though this is the claim most dependent on the skill and design-tolerance of the POSITA (duplicate cockpits carry cost and space penalties), and it could be argued both ways.

Ground 6 (Claim 13 — sensor actuating the programmed means)

A motion/position sensor at the exit opening that starts the control cycle is the paradigmatic "arrange the prior art's elements as dictated by their function" case: Strong's release is position-triggered by mechanical abutment; substituting an electrical sensor to start a programmed cycle is a mere automation of that triggering with predictable results (KSR (A)/(C)). Obvious.

Ground 7 (Claims 14–15 — forced descent, acceleration greater than gravity)

Claim 14 adds acceleration means applying an acceleration different from gravity plus driving means for a forced movement; claim 15 specifies greater than gravity. Reimann discloses a driven carriage "to sustain the desired motion," i.e., powered motion not derived solely from gravity; US2593699 supplies a powered booster that actively drives a gravity conveyor; and US2311171 expressly describes a descent-controlling device deliberately producing a rapid initial descent exceeding a free-gravity-slow fall. Generating accelerations greater than 1 g (beyond a simple "assist") is also the ordinary function of any winch or powered drive. Obvious, subject to the same caveat that claim 15's "greater than gravity" is a numeric-result limitation that adds little unless the specification gives it criticality (it does not — the brief mentions it as an optional variation).

---

4. Counterarguments and the best § 103 defense for the patentee

I should present the other side, because the obviousness case is not a clean sweep.

1. The strongest nonobviousness point is claim 1 element (D) read with (C): the separable coupling is itself controlled by the programmed means so that engagement/disengagement is synchronized with a time-programmed descent law. Green's governor is a passive speed regulator; Strong's release is position-triggered mechanically; neither reference shows a programmed unit actively commanding the coupling. If one insists on a strict element-by-element reading, an obviousness rejection must rely on the express combination Ground 1 (Green + Strong + a programmable drive), and the patentee can argue the combination changes Green's principle of operation (a purely mechanical, self-regulating trainer) into a servo-controlled system, i.e., a "change in principle of operation" argument under In re Ratti/In re Cerasani. That argument is available but usually loses where, as here, the result is not a new function but a more precise and repeatable execution of the same function.

2. Deference to foreign prosecution is weak support. The EPO granted EP0210897B1 on 1990-04-25 over what appears to be substantially the same art, and the French family member FR2584998B1 granted 1992-04-24. That is mildly helpful to the patentee (a respected office found the subject matter allowable), but it is not controlling on US § 103, and US examiners frequently reject over art that foreign offices accepted, especially where the US claim language was amended (the US claim 1 differs notably from the French/EU wording — e.g., the explicit "substantially horizontal zone" and the "controlled by said programmed means" coupling limitation).

3. Non-analogous-art risk. US3355580 (sky ride) and US2593699 (booster conveyer) are not parachute training devices. A patentee could contend they are non-analogous. This argument is weak: the test is whether the reference is "reasonably pertinent to the particular problem" (here, controlling the motion of a carriage on a track and returning it to a loading station), and both are.

4. Secondary considerations. None are evidenced on the record I have. The patent lapsed on 2000-04-12 for non-payment of maintenance fees (confirmed status entry: "PATENT EXPIRED DUE TO NONPAYMENT OF MAINTENANCE FEES UNDER 37 CFR 1.362"), with an anticipated expiry of 2006-07-08. There is no evidence of nexus-bearing commercial success, licensing, or copying to rebut the prima facie case. I found no litigation or 2026 CAFC docket activity for this patent — consistent with the earlier section, and unsurprising for a patent two decades lapsed.

5. Element (A) "continuous endless rail" and claim 1's garbled text. The claim as printed is internally inconsistent ("movable load support support from said starting zone to and the end of said active zone"). I do not correct it, but any § 103 analysis must be built on the claim as the patentee would construe it, per Phillips. A POSITA reading claim 1 in light of the specification would understand the coupling to be engaged from the start zone and disengaged at the end of the active zone — which is exactly the Green-and-Strong pattern. The indefiniteness-adjacent phrasing therefore does not rescue the claim from prior art.

---

5. Bottom line

Overall: On the record assembled, US 4,737,107 as a whole presents a strong prima facie case of obviousness under § 103, driven principally by Green (US2930145), whose disclosure of a suspended trainee trolley with selectable, governor-controlled descent and a releasable latch already meets much of claim 1, with the remaining elements supplied by routine closed-loop conveyor practice (US3355580/US2593699) and automated release (US2121413). The single feature that gives the patentee the best chance of surviving is the coupling synchronized to a time-programmed descent law, and even that is vulnerable under KSR as the predictable application of a programmable variable-speed drive to a known mechanical regulator.

Caveats: (1) My element mappings for SU221516A1, SU197412A1, FR1027196A, FR2394488A1, US3861318, US2593699, GB516418, and US3355580 rest on their recorded titles/assignees plus general knowledge, not on retrieved full texts — treat those as lower-confidence. (2) US2930145 and US4431183 are grounded in retrieved text; US2121413 is grounded in a third-party description of it (with the noted 1935/1938 date discrepancy in that description). (3) The claim-1 text is reproduced as printed, without correction, per the earlier section's approach.

Primary sources used: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4737107/en (bibliography, citation lists, claims, description); https://patents.google.com/patent/US4431183 ; https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/50/b5/b2/90202e77d7dfbc/US2930145.pdf (Green, full text); https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/b8/be/e9/cbcd295c151bfd/US2264919.pdf (describing US2121413's automatic releasing device); https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/da/54/a3/77a3a31b00497a/US2311171.pdf (descent-controlling means); https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/7a/35/0f/c1d7e9c97a83d2/US2779596.pdf (captive-parachute return).