This invention relates to a hair nose and ear clipper (NEC) or “tondeuse pour poils de nez et d'oreilles” (TNO) in French.
The nose and ear hair clippers (NEC) are now well known to users facing the problems of hair growing in the nostrils and the hollow of the ear starting in the middle years.
Different solutions have been proposed to address this problem with one of the first dates back in 1933 when U.S. Pat. No. 1,973,631 patent presents a solution based on a double superimposed cone with slots and adapted on a pair of scissors. The hair to be cut penetrates into the slot in the two cones and the shear action cuts them.
Although the NEC have experienced many changes since that time, the basic mechanism remained the same.
Document U.S. Pat. No. 2,987,818 (1959) presents a cylindrical and wire form accessory adaptable on a razor. This accessory allows to easily penetrate the nasal and ear cavities.
Document U.S. Pat. No. 3,731,379 (1973) and FR 2 430 829 (1978) present a cutting device exclusively adapted to a NEC function and driven by an electric motor in a stationary head that has the shape of a revolving solid, specially adapted to be introduced in the nasal cavities.
Document U.S. Pat. No. 4,958,432 (1990) discloses a NEC with different types of stationary heads and a plurality of blades arranged as rings.
Other improvements have also been proposed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,272,752 B1 (2001) with special blades or in U.S. Pat. No. 6,067,714 (2000), which features a self-cleaning system by aspiration of water by making the NEC head turn under water.
The improvements of recent years are disclosed in EP 1 747 858 B1 (2006) that offers a particular positioning of the blade on the rotating head and in EP 1 749 622 (2006) which offers a flow path specific to flushing water through the NEC shaving head.
More recently still, EP 2 298 511 B1 (2010) discloses a routing of rinsing liquid around the blades, EP 2 301 728 A1 (2010) discloses a specific arrangement of the blades, US 2011/0010941 A1 discloses a translational movement in the axis of the NEC with blades and either side of a rod in an extension of a handle.
Despite improvements in recent years, all the NEC of the state of the art, outside side blade clippers, usually have a cutting mobile device turning within a stationary rounded cylinder shaped head which can primarily cut hair on the front in the direction of penetration of the cavities where the hairs are located. This type of NEC virtually cuts nothing in the exit direction of the cavities because a penetration of the hair into the slots of the stationary head is provided on the front mainly, and to a lesser extent on the side faces.
This invention aims to provide a NEC that offers cutting the hairs by the front face of the shaving head during the penetration direction as well as by its back side during the withdrawal direction from the nasal and ear cavities, by offering a special stationary head geometry equipped with slots to open the round part not only in front and/or side of the cylinder that we call the front and side faces in the penetration direction of the shaving head but also on its rear section.
This invention discloses a motorized hair clipper for hair growing in the nose and ear cavities comprising a shaving head with a moving blade and a stationary blade, the stationary blade being equipped with slots for the penetration of the hair on the face and on the side face, seen in the shaving head introduction direction in the cavity to be shaved, characterized in that said stationary blade also has slots for the penetration of the hairs on its back to also cut hair during the withdrawal of the shaving head out of the cavity to be shaved.
The preferred invention operating modes include at least one, or any appropriate combination of the following characteristics:
The stationary head has an overall shape of truncated dual cone;
The head has a unique spring pushing the blades against the front and back faces of said head;
The stationary blade has an opening in the center of its front face;
The stationary blade has an opening in the center of its front face and the drive cylinder has an opening on its side face;
The stationary blade hair penetration slots make a cutting angle with the radial direction and with respect to the said shaving head rotation axis.
The stationary blade hair penetration slots extend uninterrupted between the front and the back faces through the side.
The origin of this invention lies in the observation that state of the art nose and ear clippers (NEC) shave the nose and ear hairs in the direction of the penetration of the shaving head in the ports concerned. This is simply due to the lack of slots for the penetration of the hair in the stationary blade on all sides of the head. On the state of the art NEC heads, the penetration slots are generally located on the front side, i.e. the front face of the head in the direction of the penetration into the cavity to be shaved, the slots usually overflow a bit on the side faces as shown in
To increase the shaving efficiency, this invention offers a NEC with a shaving head with slots for the penetration of the hair on the set of faces of the stationary blade, so also on the back side which allows to considerably increase the shaving efficiency and to limit the number of back and forth movements for the same result.
Preferably, the mobile blades 5 hair penetration slots 7 extends uninterrupted between the front 2 and rear 4 faces passing through the side face 3. The slots are therefore not interrupted by a potential gap between the face 2, side 3 and back 4 slots allowing them to function as a comb which is the desired effect.
To further improve head cleaning ease, we can provide an opening 12 on the stationary blade 5 central part dome and even associate it with an additional opening on the drive cylinder 13 to ensure a water flow through the device when rinsing.
The mobile blades 6 are pushed by a single spring 8 against the inner wall of the stationary blade 5, when it has a dual cone shape. The state of the art stationary blades usually need two springs, one spring to push in the direction of the rotation axis direction, and another for the thrust in the direction perpendicular to the rotation axis.
To avoid that the mobile blades enter the slots for the stationary blade 5 hair penetration, they make a cutting angle with the radial direction of the shaving head; to improve the cut, they also form an angle with said shaving head rotation axis.
The device according to the invention can be equipped with one or several luminescent electrodes to illuminate the holes to be shaved.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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14180988.9 | Aug 2014 | EP | regional |
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind |
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PCT/EP2015/066448 | 7/17/2015 | WO | 00 |