Most men in this country shave daily with a safety razor. Modem safety razors generally have one or two stainless steel blades mounted in a disposable plastic handle, or in a disposable head. The twin-blade razor is currently very popular, and is advertised to produce a smoother shave than a single blade.

If two blades are better than one, it might follow that three would be better still. But for some reason, triple-blade razors have never caught on, even though a number appear in the patent literature.

I have found that a better shave can be obtained from a triple-blade razor, than from a double-blade razor, where the blades are unequally spaced. Preferably, the trailing blade is spaced from the middle blade by a distance about 50% greater than the leading and middle blades.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the invention is to improve the shave one can obtain from a reusable safety razor.

A further object of the invention is to reduce the consumption of modern safety razors.

These and other objects are attained by a triple-blade safety razor wherein blades are unequally spaced.

According to another aspect of the invention, the life of the blades is prolonged by subjecting them to a magnetic field. The magnetic field may be created by a multipolar permanently magnetic strip affixed to a surface of a razor hood, close to the blade. When the hood is on the razor, the blades are subjected to magnetic fields tending to maintain their sharpness. The magnetic fields may also be developed by electromagnets controlled to produce a particular magnetic moment alignment.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS The accompanying drawings, Figure 1 is a perspective view of a safety razor embodying the invention, and a cover for the razor; Figure 2 is a sectional view taken on the line 2-2 in Fig. 1 ; and

Figure 3 is an exploded perspective view of the razor.

Figure 4 is a perspective view of one embodiment of the present invention showing a method of magnetizing a metal strip during the production of the razor.

Figure 5 is a sectional view taken on the line 5-5 of Figure 1.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT The drawings illustrate a safety razor having a disposable plastic handle 10 with an integral head 12 in which three stainless steel blades 14.16,18 are affixed. The razor and blades are entirely conventional. Instead of an integral head, the head and handle could be made separate components, so that the handle could be reused when the head was replaced.

The bottom blade 14 is called the"leading"blade in this description because it engages whiskers first as the razor is drawn over the skin. In one embodiment, the leading blade is separated from the middle blade 16 by a first separator 15 whose thickness is about. 020 inch. The trailing blade 18 is spaced from the middle blade 16 by a second separator 17 about. 030 inch thick.

The total spacer thickness (0.050 inch) equals that of conventional twin-blade razors, so that the head geometry need not be altered. The blades themselves are conventional, except they may be magnetized as described below.

Having experimented with various blade spacings, I have found that much better shaves are obtained where the blade spacing is unequal, than when it is equal. In particular. the leading and middle blades should be more closely spaced than the middle and trailing blades. In one embodiment, the trailing spacer 17 is about 50% thicker then the leading spacer 15.

EXAMPLE I A male subject with a heavy beard shaved daily, after a standard routine of beard conditioning and wetting, alternately with a standard double-bladed razor (Gillette Track 11) and a triple-bladed razor whose blades and other features were identical to the double-bladed razor. except for the addition of a third middle blade. The spacing between the middle blade and the leading blade was maintained by a. 020 thick spacer, and the spacer between the middle and trailing blades was. 030 thick. The subject rated the shave obtained with each fresh razor for shaving comfort (ratings 1-5,5 being most comfortable) and facial smoothness (ratings 1-5.5 being smoothest), and reported after how many shaves the razor became subjectively "uncomfortable".

EXAMPLE II The test of example I was repeated, this time comparing the three-bladed razor described with another three-bladed razor having equal. 025 thick spacers between the blades, so that blade spacing was uniform.

The head when not in use, is best kept covered by a hood 20 made of a molded plastic. The hood comprises two short end panels 22, and three long walls running parallel to the length of the blades. Those three walls include a short side wall 24, a long side wall 26, and an oblique top wall 28, all of which appear in section in Figure 2. The cover contains a pair of permanent magnetic strips 30, 32, which are affixed along the entire inner surface of both the short side wall and the top wall respectively. When the hood is installed, the magnets are in close proximity to the blades.

It is desirable to have the magnets approach the blades as closely as possible, to maximize their effect.

The preferred magnetic strips are flexible, rubbery elements containing permanently magnetized barium ferrite magnetic particles. Such strips are very commonly used as refrigerator magnets, and are readily available.

Except when the razor is being used, the hood should be kept on it, to expose the blades to the influence of the magnetic strips. While I do not fully understand the reasons why magnetization works, preliminary informal testing has demonstrated remarkable prolongation of blade life. In fact, I have found that during a shave, I can improve the comfort of the blade by briefly reinstalling the hood. Also, I have observed that blades subjected to the invention are less likely to nick or cut than are blades never exposed to a magnetic field.

While a complete understanding of the phenomena involved is not necessary to successful practice of the invention, I believe that the blade edge is made more resistant to bending and dulling by the magnet's aligning the magnetic moments of the blade.

Since, in one embodiment, the blades are not magnetized during the manufacturing of the blades, the invention works best when the hood is kept on the blade as much as possible. It should also be beneficial to adjust the angle of the aligned magnetic moments, relative to the blade edge, using tools available to the person of ordinary skill in this field.

While the inventive hood described above is a particularly simple and direct way to applying magnetic fields to a razor edge, it should be understood that the invention may be practiced a number of ways, of which the foregoing is but one example. It may be possible, for

example, to integrate the magnets into the razor head. If the hood is maintained separate, it may be sold together in a kit with one or more razors, or it could be marketed as a separate item. The materials of the hood, and its dimensions and shape may be varied with benefit. I have describe the best mode of the invention I presently know.

Since the invention is subject to modifications and variations, it is intended that the foregoing description and the accompanying drawings shall be interpreted as illustrative of only one form of the invention, whose scope is to be measured by the following claims.