The following is a guide to sources for patent information. To see whether print sources are available in your library, ask for assistance at the Reference or Government Information desks.

Please note: The U. S. Patent and Trademark Office cautions that a complete patentability search must consider all prior art, including earlier patents, foreign patents and non-patent literature. Both of the PTO's patent databases begin with patents granted since 1976, and the Delphion and Academic Universe sites since 1971.

MAJOR PATENT SITES

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Patent Database

Full text and bibliographic searching of US patents from Jan. 1976 to the present. Full text of patents, including images, is available free of charge (requires Tiff viewer to print). The Bibliographic database consists of the front pages of U.S. patents. The front page of a patent includes data such as the inventor's name, the patent's title, and the assignee's name, as well as the abstract and a brief description of the patent's contents. The Manual of Classification is available from this site.

Delphion Intellectual Property Online

U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) patent descriptions as well as full text patents from 1974 to present. This collection also includes extended bibliographic text and some images since 1971. Patents are available for printing in PDF or Tiff formats.

Academic Universe Subscription access only; check with your Library

Under the Category Legal Research are links to full text patents, without illustrations, from 1971 to the present. Searching is available by keyword or by patent or U. S. classification number. You can also search the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Manual of Classification.

GUIDES TO PATENT RESEARCH

General Information Concerning Patents

Patent Drawings

Manual of Patent Examination Procedure

Attorneys and agents registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

STEPS IN PATENT SEARCHING

STEP 1

Patents are searched using a class/subclass or name of patentee or assignee.

For a name search, skip to step 3 below.

To determine the relevant class(es)/subclass(es) use the Index to the U.S. Patent Classification

Sources

May be in print in your library

USPTO

Do a keyword search in the web sources for a similar patent; look at the classes/subclasses used

Product	Class	Subclass
Heaters..Open Type	126	344+
Design, heater boiler	D23	318+
Electric	219	281+
Heating Systems for Buildings	237	56

STEP 2

Further refine identification of appropriate patent class/subclass with the Manual of Classification

Sources

May be in print in your library

USPTO

Academic Universe

Class 126: STOVES AND FURNACES

Subclass
344	WATER HEATERS
345	. Kettle Furnace
346	.Canning
348	.Steam generators and cookers

STEP 3

Identify patents issued in the class/subclass numbers selected or name of patentee/assignee in the Index of Patents

Sources

May be in print in your library: not cumulative, must search each year.

For the current indexes not yet bound, see index section in each weekly issue of the Official Gazette.

USPTO

Delphion Intellectual Property Online

Academic Universe

Patents are listed by:

1. Class/subclass number AND

2. Name of patentee or assignee.

CLASS 126

Subclass	Patent No.
65	4,971,045
101	4,971,025
344	4,971,027
431	4,971,028

STEP 4

Look at the full text patent

USPTO (TIFF viewer required for printing)

Delphion (TIFF or PDF required for printing)

Academic Universe (no illustrations)

STEP 5

If patent is too old or not available, examine patent summaries; use the Official Gazette Patents

Sources

May be in print in your library: weekly, arranged by patent number. Older years may be in microfilm: check with your Government Information service desk.

4,971,027 -----------------------------------patent number

PORTABLE STOVE

Frederick W. Kreiger, 2316 Garland Dr., Missoula, Mont. 59803 ----------patentee

Filed Feb. 1, 1990, Ser. No. 473,496

International Class F27H 1/00

U.S. Class 126- Subclass 344 15 Claims



l. A portable camp stove apparatus, comprising:

a rigid, upright enclosure having an open top end and a closed sidewall;

means disposed within the enclosure for defining an upper chamber within said enclosure

[Top of Page]

FULL PATENTS

Patent and Trademark Office

U.S. Department of Commerce

Washington D.C. 20231

Check with office for price

Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries

Check with these libraries for information on obtaining full patents.

USPTO (TIFF viewer required for printing)

Delphion (TIFF or PDF required for printing)

Academic Universe (no illustrations)

FOREIGN PATENTS

Canadian Intellectual Property Office Patent Database

Over 75 years of patents: For patent documents which are either laid-open applications or are patents granted since August 15, 1978, the CIPO Canadian Patent Database contains bibliographic data, textual data (titles, abstracts and claims) and image data. For patents granted prior to August 15, 1978, the Database contains bibliographic data, the text of titles only (no text of abstracts and claims) and image data.

European Patent Office (Esp@Cenet)

Provided by the European Patent Office, esp@cenet allows searching of European, WIPO, Japanese, and worldwide patents in general. Full text of patents is available free online for the last two years. Earlier years are stored offline and may be ordered. Esp@cenet can also be used to find English-language abstracts of documents in the European Patent Office's in-house databases of patents from throughout the world . A large proportion of the data goes back to 1970.

Delphion Intellectual Property Online

The Delphion collection contains European patent applications published by the European Patent Office. The collection has bibliographic text and full document images of applications for European patents issued from 1979 to present.