The truth?

There was a long thread on the forum a few months ago about using suppressors on magnum hunting rifles. If you care to look up and review the thread it has a lot more discussion.
Overall, I would say the opinions in the thread were mixed about the effectiveness on magnums. Suppressors are just a tool/ accessory and the success or failure in meeting a user's objectives depends a lot on expectations. If you don't like the results on a magnum hunting rifle, you can always switch the can to another platform where you feel the results are more effective.

I've worn foam plugs most of the time at work and tried muffs alone and with foam plugs. Seemed to me the mugs caused more echo inside them and it seemed louder with them on when wearing plugs too. Plus we were required to wear safety glasses and the muffs don't seal around them. Been next to steam joint failures with 70psi steam blowing out and you see your co-worker lips moving but can't hear anything, can't hear yourself either for that matter. That with both hearing protection in. I prefer the standard yellow EAR foam plugs for everything unless it's just intermittent cuts on tablesaw then I'll use muffs.

I have some experience here.
In the ear plugs measure about 5dB reduction. Muffs measure closer to manufacturer rating in the ear canal. The biggest reason is bone transmission of sound.
I demo cans for the uninitiated to familiarize them with what to expect. I have sold cans since 2008 without a disappointed customer. These facts are related.

To the OP: consider your expectations in your disappointment. Where or how did you get the expectation? Salesman? Video? Want? If you start over in that process, you may find you are happier with your purchase.

Lastly, we have several sources of sound. The round going off is one, and it gives us muzzle blast and some guns give action noise. Then we have the bullet traveling. Subsonic flight is quieter than supersonic. We cannot affect the sound from flight other than launch speed, but we can mitigate it by being away from large, flat surfaces that reflect that sound back to us. Even bushes can reflect some sound from a supersonic bullet back to us. Avoid those and you cut down a lot of noise. Conversely, using sound absorbing surfaces helps us at the ear. Ever shot from a hay stack? Amazing sound reduction. Using fixed actions cuts ejection port noise and icky combustion gases into our faces/eyes. Being aware of these things and setting realistic expectations will go a long way toward end user happiness.

gvjm said:

. When shooting my 7 mag, with a tuner brake, indoors I use my foam ear plugs and head muffs. Each is rated at around 30db reduction.

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cohunt said:

I still wear plugs or muffs--- but doubling up on protection doesn't double the dB lloss-- I can't remember the equation but you can't add plugs to muffs numbers

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Nerd Alert:

+5 NRR is the most you get from doubling ear pro.

OSHA says the formula is:
* Subtract 7 from the higher NRR
* Add 5 from the second pair
* That's your net NRR

This isn't impulse math, but for total exposure., OSHA also says subtract 7 from the NRR on single ear pro against the C-score for the shift measurement, that's why there's the reduction in the first step. I think it's a time weighting factor mainly.

I wear double ears a lot, and with the highest NRRs I can get. I'm already needing to get hearing aids for other issues, shooting doesn't help my case at all. So I save what I can as best I can.


RE: the original premise. I will agree that many/most suppressors are not "hearing safe". The AR platform is almost impossible to suppress close to safe levels because of the gas port noise. But it's a lot better than shooting without any ear protection, which honestly happened a lot more than I liked before I had the cans.

One primary reason for suppressors is that it makes echolocation much more difficult, depending on how far away from the target you are that can change reactions significantly.