## Facts

- The Wright Company, assignee of a patent for a flying machine, claimed an invention combining wing-warping for lateral control with a rear vertical rudder directed in relation to the wing’s differing angles of incidence.
- The patent’s specification and drawings described a mechanism in which rudder tiller ropes were connected to the wing-warping control so that rudder deflection occurred automatically with wing-warping, in a constant proportional relationship.
- The Wright Company sought a preliminary injunction to stop Louis Paulhan, a French aviator, from flying allegedly infringing aircraft at exhibition events in the United States.
- Paulhan flew Bleriot and Farman aircraft in which the pilot manually controlled the rudder; the rudder was not mechanically linked to wing-warping to turn automatically toward the wing side with the smaller angle of incidence.
- Evidence indicated that the Wright Company itself had at times operated without the specific mechanical interconnection described in the patent.

## Issues

1. Whether the asserted claim (Claim 7) should be construed to require the specific automatic mechanical linkage between wing-warping and rudder deflection described in the specification and drawings.
2. Whether Paulhan’s Bleriot and Farman aircraft, using manual rudder coordination rather than automatic linkage, infringed under the proper construction.
3. Whether a broader construction would render the claim vulnerable to anticipation by prior aeronautical art, affecting the scope appropriate for interlocutory relief.

## Decision

- The court denied the motion for a preliminary injunction.
- The court construed Claim 7 to require the automatic rudder–wing-warping interconnection (including proportional coordination) shown in the patent’s disclosure.
- Under that construction, Paulhan’s aircraft did not infringe because they lacked the claimed automatic linkage and instead relied on manual pilot control.
- The court indicated that a broader reading (covering any rudder used with any wing-warping differential) would raise substantial anticipation concerns, supporting the narrower construction.

## Legal Principles

- In construing “means” language, courts may limit a claim to the particular mechanism shown in the specification and drawings when that mechanism is presented as the operative way the claimed function is achieved.
- When a broad construction would likely encompass prior art and threaten validity, a court may adopt a narrower construction consistent with the disclosure, particularly when deciding preliminary injunctive relief.
- A preliminary injunction in a patent case may be denied where, under the most defensible construction tied to the disclosure, the accused device lacks an essential element of the claimed combination.

## Conclusion

The court denied preliminary injunctive relief because the asserted patent claim was construed to require an automatic, mechanically proportional linkage between wing-warping and rudder positioning, and the accused aircraft used manual rudder control without that linkage; a broader construction was disfavored due to likely anticipation.


Wright Co. v. Paulhan, 177 F. 261 (C.C.S.D.N.Y. 1910)