I'm not messing around, price is no object - best hearing protection

Since he says "hearing protection" and not "sound reduction" or "sound suppression", can we assume that he's only concerned about his own hearing and not the noise that the firearm would make that his neighbors might hear?

If so, I really don't think that you can get it "as quiet as a mouse on cotton" if you are going to physically be holding the firearm during the firing of it.
 
My audiologist prefers the Westone DefendEar brand. I opted for a set of the digital 1s as well as a set of the solid plugs. Total cost for todays visit $1450 with a discount. Will report back within about a month how they are working out. The solids (non digital) should be about two weeks or so

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The cycling of the action you can hear on an outdoor range with the best hearing protection.
"...want the sound from an AR15..." With how long of a barrel? Makes a difference.
 
Here is the deal, 3 weeks ago we went to an indoor range and shot for 3 hours. Last week we went again and shot for another 3 hours. For 3 days after that, I was slightly lightheaded and dizzy in the mornings only. I thought it was a blood sugar/blood pressure thing. I discussed the matter with a co-worker who has had a lot of problems with blood sugar/pressure and ear trauma. He stated that my problem was ear trauma. The symptoms have subsided and I don't want them again. My wife and I both have 30 db ear muffs and we both hate sticking things in our ear canals. There is no sound deadening in the range and there is a lot more noise compared to where we shoot outdoors. So that is where we stand.
 
Have you tried the foam ear plugs? They are pretty comfortable. If you can't double up with them and ear muffs, you're pretty much excrement-out-of-luck.
 
NRC 30 is a very decent rating for muffs. Most that I see aren't rated that high. I think mine ar NRC 25 or 27 -- I double up with the muffs and foam plugs when I shoot indoors, and it's still nowhere near soundless. (Especially when somebody a couple of lanes over cuts loose with a .357 Magnum or a .44 magnum.) If you can't tolerate plugs under your muffs, I think you're stuck shooting outdoors.
 
If you are having the level of problem you describe, you need 2 layers of 30+ db protection.

Layer 1: find a foam ear plug you can stand that is 30 db or more nrr rated.

Layer 2: find an electronic muff which is 30 db nrr rated.

Wear both at the same time.
 
AL45,

A very good friend, who works as an instructor at a gun range, has several brands of electronic headphone type hearing protection. I told him I want to buy this type so I asked for his advice. I don't recall the several brands he has but the Howard Leight electronic protection offered the best results. All, except Leight, had background hiss. The volume on the Leights can be adjusted so when someone is standing next to me with empty cases he is rattling around in his hand, the high end frequencies will slightly irritate my ears. So the good news is, the Leights can be adjusted for a wide range of hearing situations.
 
The best hearing protection doesn't cost money. It's actually quite cheap.

Get a pair of 34 decibel reduction muffs and 30-32 decibel reduction ear plugs.

I've never seen ear muffs that reduce greater than 34 decibels. And as far as ear plugs, the max I've seen is 30 or 32. I use both muffs and plugs.

The thing about the 34 decibel muffs is that they aren't pretty or stylish. They're somewhat bulky and ugly. But in the end, hearing protection is more important than fashionable ear muffs.

The more expensive hearing protection items are expensive because they use electronics. They also tend to have a design that is somewhat considerate of design and style: usually they're less bulky and lay more flat or more compact. The downside is that they only have a decibel reduction of 20-28. Expensive doesn't mean more protection; rather, it just means fancier and prettier.

The problem with silencers is that other people don't use them. Maximum hearing protection would be everybody using a silencer+ear muff+ear plug.

If you want even more reduction, some new indoor ranges are designed with sound absorbing or sound wave deflecting technology (there's a new range here in my city that is about to open, and they are allegedly using this sound reducing design). At public ranges, the potential for damage comes from the repeated and nonstop sound of gun fire around you. So unless everybody is using a silencer, using a silencer, yourself, isn't going to help much.
 
No one makes what the OP wants. I wish they did because I'd buy a pair. I've tried many different types of muffs, plugs, and combinations of the two. I hear no perceivable difference between the fancy electronic muffs and a pair of hearing protection that I can purchase from Harbor Freight which has about a 34db reduction.

The only thing the electronic muffs that I've seen/tried do is allow you to hear people talking to you. They don't actually (the ones I've looked at) reduce the db to anything close to a mouse-poop.

FWIW, when I'm shooting by myself, NOT hearing the jibber-jabber of other folks is a bonus. I'd pay more for jibber-jabber-canceling muffs if I had to!:D
 
Skans said:
The only thing the electronic muffs that I've seen/tried do is allow you to hear people talking to you. They don't actually (the ones I've looked at) reduce the db to anything close to a mouse-poop.
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True ... and the reason is because they can't. They've pretty much reached the limits of the technology, if they don't want to make the muffs so large and heavy that nobody would buy or wear them. The electronics don't do anything at all to improve the noise reduction capability. All the electronics do is provide a microphone outside the hearing protection envelope and a speaker inside the envelope, allowing the wearer to hear what's going on better. There's an electronic cut-off circuit (typically set at around 80 dB IIRC) -- outside noise louder than the cut-off gets blanked electronically, but it still enters physically.

So if there's a noise of 120 Db and your fancy electronic muffs are rated at 30 dB reduction, the electronic function will be shut off by the noise cancelling circuit but you'll still hear 90 decibels (120 - 30) of good, old-fashioned noise.

To put that in perspective, according to one web site I just looked up a "typical" 9mm handgun produces 159.8 dB of noise. A .45 ACP produces 157.0 dB, and a .357 Magnum produces 164.3 dB.

Source: http://www.earplugstore.typepad.com/got_ears_get_informed/2012/09/how-loud-are-different-guns.html
 
If you truly want that much noise reduction, the only real choice is to go to surgeon that operates on the inner ear and have him remove your eardrum or whatever to make you completely deaf.

Now, one *could* argue that the solution is worse than the problem, but look on the bright side -- you won't have to listen to your wife or in-laws anymore. :)
 
I use Howard Leight earplugs which have a 33 NNR, plus Pro Ears 30 NNR muffs. Even with these it's not fully quiet. It's not only the Db emitted but also the exposure time that matters. I try and go during the slowest times, limit my session to 1 hour, and if someone brings a cannon I'll take a break. With a rifle you're best using an outdoor range if available, which will also lessen the exposure.

Make sure you use the products properly. Check a mirror when using foam plugs, and run the tip of your finger around the edges of earmuffs to ensure there are no gaps in the seal.

If there was no sound reduction material in the indoor range, then I would go elsewhere.
 
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Glad you are seeking the best help available. I lost much of my hearing shooting with only cotton in my ears. One time taking the cotton out of my ear to hear to talk and forgetting to put it in when shooting over the hood of a jeep with a .357. The other time my buddy fired his 8 MM mauser at the back of my trunk while I had my head in it. In both instances my hearing was damaged forever.
 
This is one subject area of the sport I have put a lot of effort into learning. We only have one body, and I don't want to inflict damage intentionally. The only unsuppressed gun at or under 140 Db is a .22 rifle. Everything else is well above this Db limit.

Next year I will be buying suppressors for the calibers I shoot. This is one item that shouldn't be part of the NFA. A suppressor is a hearing protection device, and should be no harder to buy than a magazine. We could eliminate hearing damage risk for most calibers if this was liberalized.
 
TheGunGeek said:
This is one subject area of the sport I have put a lot of effort into learning. We only have one body, and I don't want to inflict damage intentionally. The only unsuppressed gun at or under 140 Db is a .22 rifle. Everything else is well above this Db limit.

Next year I will be buying suppressors for the calibers I shoot. This is one item that shouldn't be part of the NFA. A suppressor is a hearing protection device, and should be no harder to buy than a magazine. We could eliminate hearing damage risk for most calibers if this was liberalized.
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With .22LR, you're basically limited to factory loads, but there are a couple that are quiet enough that you don't need hearing protection. The standard velocity ones though need hearing protection.

If you reload your own ammo in other calibers, it's possible to create a loading that quieter than a a .22LR. I've loaded some .38/.357 mag at level that I find quieter than a standard velocity .22LR and they are still powerful enough to kill an armadillo late at night (while not disturbing the neighbors). If I had been using a .357 rifle with those loads, it would have been even quieter.
 
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