Thread: Noise isolating earphones

What you're looking for are Hearos, I used to use them when I was a gig photographer. Cut out all the damaging stuff but still let you enjoy the music.

Edit: sorry just realised you're looking for headphones. These could still be an option of you wanted to use a stereo for the music.

Sensear.
In-Ear Headset | smartPlugs | Sensear

I have the ear muffs. $500+ and they are garbage, absolute garbage. I reckon they made me deaf. They are supposed to have passive noise reduction, while also actively cancelling out machinery noise while amplifying, or just letting through speech. But what happens is that the machinery noise sounds like an old TV which lost reception, and the speech is a garbled mess. I wore them for about 6 months, had a headache everyday after standing infront of a radial arm saw all day in a truss plant. The saw is probably 107-110dB. Swapped to standard earmuffs which I forgot the name of, red Peltor, and no more headaches.

Originally Posted by elanjacobs

Not the ones you're probably thinking of; I'm trying to find in-ear headphones that will passively isolate as much noise as proper earplugs. Not active noise cancelling that needs power.

I've always used earplugs instead of muffs because my ears get way to hot and muffs press my safety specs into the side of my head and it's incredibly uncomfortable. I'd like to be able to listen to my own music at work and having ear buds under earmuffs isn't an option I'm enjoying.

Anyone got ideas? Does what I'm looking for even exist?

Do you mean ear protection shaped like in-ear headphones?

Earphones look like they block noise but they are not really designed toto do this, probably because manufacturers don't really want to block all external stimuli and are deliberately designed to be a bit leaky so as to protect users hearing by letting excess sound out.

The other reason earphones can can't do much to block out external sounds is that to do this properly in-ear fitting hearing protection devices have to fit really snug right INTO the ear canal.

I find listening to music etc with ear phones while working in the shed or driving far too distracting and it has led to several close calls so I no longer do this. Funny thing is I can have the radio pr MP3 player on and that doesn't distract me anywhere as much.

I appreciate you are in a work place with other workers etc - I guess keep looking for a more comfortable set of ear muffs.

Have you though about getting a set of lightweight ear muffs and cutting a groove in the ear surround to enable the glasses arms to fit through the groove?

Thanks guys, but neither of those are what I'm after. Hearos are just earplugs and Sensear are active (needs a battery)

The Shure SE line claim to have up to 37 dB of noise attenuation, but that sounds like BS to me.

Originally Posted by BobL

Do you mean ear protection shaped like in-ear headphones? I mean in-ear headphones that double as earplugs. Or earplugs that will play music, however you want to think of it.

Earphones look like they block noise but they are not really designed toto do this, probably because manufacturers don't really want to block all external stimuli and are deliberately designed to be a bit leaky so as to protect users hearing by letting excess sound out.

The other reason earphones can can't do much to block out external sounds is that to do this properly in-ear fitting hearing protection devices have to fit really snug right INTO the ear canal.

I find listening to music etc with ear phones while working in the shed or driving far too distracting and it has led to several close calls so I no longer do this. Funny thing is I can have the radio pr MP3 player on and that doesn't distract me anywhere as much. I only use earphones when I'm doing low-risk stuff like sanding.

I appreciate you are in a work place with other workers etc - I guess keep looking for a more comfortable set of ear muffs.

Have you though about getting a set of lightweight ear muffs and cutting a groove in the ear surround to enable the glasses arms to fit through the groove? It's not just the glasses, my ears get way too hot to use muffs for more than 20-30 mins, even in the dead of winter

Hope that clears it up a bit

Pretty sure the sensear earplugs have NRR 31 when they are switched off. When switched on, it does all that active stuff like suppressing machine noise while allowing speech and buzzers/sirens through. But try before you buy infront of 115db machinery. Because like I say, they sux!

Originally Posted by elanjacobs

Thanks guys, but neither of those are what I'm after. Hearos are just earplugs and Sensear are active (needs a battery)

The Shure SE line claim to have up to 37 dB of noise attenuation, but that sounds like BS to me.

Sure is.

It's not possible to get a NRR of more than about 30 dB using anything that sits just in the ear like an ear phones - same with regular ear plugs worn by the average joe.
Ear plugs that are form fitted right down inside the ear canal by a professional audiologist can get to about 33 dB.
Quality HD earmuffs can get to about 33 dB - because these cover the whole ear and are designed to press quite firmly and best of all can usually be fitted properly by most people.

To get more than this you need to wear something like a old school deep sea divers helmet to fully isolate the users head from the sound. This is because at about 35 dB more noise is conducted through the users skull direct to the inner ear than is conducted through the ear canal.

Originally Posted by elanjacobs

Hope that clears it up a bit

Thanks - I think you are going to be battling to find what you are after.

The sad thing is that there are lots of tradies out there blowing their hearing by using earphones to mask work noise by turning them up more than necessary.
It reminds me of the octogenarian at the mens shed who takes out his hearing air as a form of hearing protection.

The plugs we have at work are NRR 33 (Howard Leight MAX), but NRR dB doesn't equal real world dB according to the internet:
Noise Reduction Ratings Explained | Cooper Safety Supply
http://multimedia.3m.com/mws/media/9...rating-nrr.pdf

NRR 33 may only give 13 dB reduction in real world use

I had some Shure SE 530s a godd few years back and they were overpriced Chinese rubbish, they did block noise fairly well but my cables split after less than a year, I found out quite a while later that the warranty was increased to two years as it was such a common problem on what was an insanely overpriced headphone.

My favourite are X-Ears, they are also Chinese but this is reflected in the price, they are about 1/10th the price of what my Shures sold for and the ones I have had have sounded almost as good. There used to be some crazy discount codes for them but now the good prices are found in their E-bay store, they post from Germany.
I had these Xears® In Ear Kopfhörer aus Bambusholz Earphones Experience 2mm starke Kabel | eBay 2mm Cable? And then some sports ones with the cable up over the ear, I didn't like them all that much, they still sounded nice but they weren't super comfy.

The headphones come in a small bag, no box no booklet telling you that you are the smartest person on earth for buying this product etc etc. You do get one pair of foam tips which are great(will get spares next time) and a few silicon(or similar) ones. They do take a while to burn in and if you go to full volume too quickly you may damage them just like any other speaker.

My Shures did isolate from background noise a bit better, but I still wouldn't buy another one of their products out of spite, hahaha!

Originally Posted by elanjacobs

The plugs we have at work are NRR 33 (Howard Leight MAX), but NRR dB doesn't equal real world dB according to the internet:
Noise Reduction Ratings Explained | Cooper Safety Supply
NRR 33 may only give 13 dB reduction in real world use

Unfortunately it's a bit more complicated, see
https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/z-draft-un...alculation.pdf

The plugs we have at work are NRR 33

Leaving aside that the figures are possibly over inflated, the 33 NRR will be for when fitted by a trained audiologists under controlled conditions. Not for when they have been rattling around in a tradies dusty pocket for a couple of days and fitted in a rush.

When using my biggest chainsaw with the modified muffler (116 dB at the operators ear) I use both plugs and muffs.
I cannot actually hear much of a difference between wearing both and just wearing the muffs, but there is a obvious difference between wearing both and just the plugs.
I have been using that chainsaw periodically for the last 7 years and according to my audiologist my general hearing has gone from being below average compared to my peers to above average compared to my peers.
It's not that my hearing has improved, it has just not deteriorated as fast as my peers. I do have some specific frequency issues which apparently are due to exposure to too much 70's rock music.

One guide to purchasing any hearing protection is, does the supplier provide more info just a single figure NRR i.e. audio frequency spectrum data.

whoops dual post

I've the same prob as you Elan, muffs heat my head up terribly. I've found the red Peltors are the best so far.

I bought them on Amazon, but they also sell shooting head muffs that incorporate impact googles. A shame that they won't ship that style here though (probably the word "gun" triggers the customs Nazis). Let me see if I can find them, for if they worked on a gun range they should be Ok for woodwork.

Edit: here they are https://www.amazon.com/ClearArmor-14...dp/B00NKSMPZW/ the glass arms are very thin and fit under the sides. They are listed below in the "also bought with" section.

I will say I never rush my plugs; always roll them, lift the top of my ear, insert and leave to expand. Audiologist has also confirmed that I'm doing it properly. My hearing is quite sensitive (still getting perfect results on the bi-annual tests after 9 years working) and if they're not in properly I can feel it.

There is a frequency graph on the box, I'll try and get a pic up. For what it's worth, they're Class 5 26 dB on the SLC80 scale

When I do use muffs they're Peltor H10 and I can definitely hear the difference between with glasses and without, so they're clearly not sealing as they should.