ACOUSTICS2008/3110 Impulse and continuous noise reduction of tactical hearing protection systems

Tactical hearing protectors are devices designed to protect the wearer from high levels of impulse noise while providing some ambient listening and communication capability. Many of these devices also provide some attenuation of continuous noise. The ecacy of these types of devices depends on the amount of impulse noise protection and continuous noise protection, the quality of the ambient listening capability, and the intelligibility of the speech communication capability. This paper will describe the peak noise reduction of approximately 1 ms duration impulses with peak levels at 165 dB and 195 dB, for several earplugs and earmus. The frequency dependent reduction of impulse noise measured using an acoustic test fixture (the