In-ear headsets

A year or so ago I bought audio headphones from Sony (Fontopia) that
impressed me greatly with their small size and audio quality.
Furthermore, they block out most external sound.

So I got to thinking about whether something like this would be a good
alternative to heavy and uncomfortable headsets for flying.

Lo and behold, there are now a few headsets out on the market that are
variations on this theme - extremely light, in-ear. Supposedly as good of
noise reduction, passively, as many ANR headsets.

Yet I can't find any actual reviews of these headsets anywhere.

So for a recent long x-country, I decided to make something of my own,
since I didn't want to spend $500 or so on an unknown headset.

I used an impedance adjusting transformer and a couple of plugs/jacks to
adapt the earphone to a standard stereo audio jack. I then plugged in my
in-ear audio headphones. A short flight with them (using the hand mike)
seemed to indicate that this might be viable.

I then tried to figure out how to get a mike attached so that I could use
the earphones without a hand mike. Although I'm not completely happy with
my solution, I bought a PC headset mike unit and cut off the existing
mike; attached an aircraft mike to the end and wired it up. So I wear the
headset with the one-side earpiece *over* the in-ear earbuds.

I just flew 30 hours with this setup. Findings:

- Overall, much more comfortable than my Telex Echeleon ANR headset
- I can now wear a hat when I fly
- Ear buds sometimes tend to want to fall out. I sometimes had to push
them in a bit more to re-seal for sound blocking. I might need to go from
the medium to the large seals.
- Noise reduction probably slightly less than the Telex, but not bad
- Too many cords with the PC headset, the adaptor, and the earbuds. Need
to tie-wrap.

Overall, this was a good experiment and I really liked the in-ear
approach. Before I spring for $1000 for a Bose, I'd really like to know
how the ~$500 in-ear units work. Anybody have any experiences with one of
these?

Tim

Wings wrote:

Overall, this was a good experiment and I really liked the in-ear
approach. Before I spring for $1000 for a Bose, I'd really like to know
how the ~$500 in-ear units work. Anybody have any experiences with one of
these?

Tim

I have a Panther Cat. It has three drawbacks where I wouldn't recommend
paying $500 for it for ordinary GA flying. The drawbacks a

1: Much too busy. Requires a spiral mike cord, a junction box, a
splitter and too much wiring between all the stuff.

2: Audio in only one ear.

3: How do you fix it if it breaks?

Advantages:

It works.

The custom molded earpieces are comfortable and can easily be worn under
a stylish leather flight helmet for open cockpit flying. I had my plug
patterns injected (into my ears) by a professional audiologist (or
whatever they're called), but found that I could do a better job all by
myself just by following the instructions provided in the kit.

Nick Scholtes has an article on how he built his own molded in ear units
for PPC flying. It can be found he

http://makeashorterlink.com/?W2884215D
--
John Kimmel

remove x

"He's dead, Jim."

Wings,

Yet I can't find any actual reviews of these headsets anywhere.


Aviation consumer had one a while back, but it didn't cover the
new-generation units, only the first wave.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

1. I am biased, I admit it...

2. Save your hearing... Any setup that sounds louder than a good ANR
headset is doing long term damage... Trust me on this Dr. Denny

3. Get LightSpeeds... Change the cushions annually so they are always
soft...


cheers ... denny and Fat Albert the loud Apache