The phrase “nose of wax” has come to be very popular in patent litigation – and is often used in a variety of ways. Thus in the 1970s case Sterner Lighting, v. Allied Electrical Supply, the Fifth Circuit (before the formation of the Federal Circuit) declared that:

“[a] patent may not, like a ‘nose of wax,’ be twisted one way to avoid anticipation and another to find infringement.”

The phrase “nose of wax” is mostly used to say that a patent holder may not construct (construe) the claims of a patent in two different ways, one to claim infringement, the other to uphold validity.