Hearing Tinnitus and Shooting

[Tumbleweed]

Hey all.
Kind of an odd post but maybe some of you have experienced my issue. I've had undiagnosed tinnitus for many years now. Some from shooting in my early years with either no hearing protection or not enough. Some from being a musician and dealing with loud stage monitors.

I shoot a lot. Much of it for my own enjoyment with my rifles as well as working up loads for other people. These are almost all magnums with muzzle breaks. For the last 6-7 years I've found the need to wear ear plugs as well as muffs over the top. I use the highest dB reduction rated plugs and muffs that I can find.
After shooting I STILL get worse than normal ringing in my ears as well as the "waves" of very brief hearing loss. I would describe this as like muting the sound to my ears for about 2 seconds and then it comes right back. This of course only happens after shooting. Hearing seems to go back to normal after several hours.

I find it hard to believe that I can still get enough noise through 2 layers to bother my ears! Has anyone else experienced this? Do you have a better form of hearing protection that I'm not aware of that could give me enough protection?

Thanks
Jesse

 

[dfanonymous]

Yes. From anywhere from being on a flight line to m2 .50 bmg, and explosions. I've not worn ears and it sucks, especially after the damage is already done.

However, I don't do anything about it. I just wear my peltors more often and change the cups out when they aren't working as well. I don't like not being able to hear on ranges or whatever, so I don't double up, but I know the guys that work on the flight lines use double all the time

 

[Hand Skills]

Hi Jesse,

Sorry to hear of your suffering. Doubling up muffs over plugs is about the best one can do for PPE.

I have a set of the Howard Leigh Impact sports I use overtop of plugs. The headphones have microphones that amplify ambient sounds to help with communication and awareness but they don't boost loud sounds.

Keep in mind not all plugs and muffs are equal. Look for SPL reduction of 29dB or better.

Industrial Foam plugs offer some of the best reduction in the ear canal.

Muzzle brakes are really loud though.

Here is a pretty good article on muzzle brakes and sound; https://precisionrifleblog.com/2015/08/07/muzzle-brakes-sound-test/

It's important to understand the logarithmic nature of the decibel scale, because just a 6dB increase equates to DOUBLE the sound energy.

In your case, a silencer is probably worth looking into. Unfortunately they are illegal here in Canada, so I just stick with non-magnum calibers and avoid muzzle brakes at all costs. As someone who uses my ears professionally the tradeoff of 1/2 the recoil energy for 1000 times the sound energy is just not worth it.

 

[ShtrRdy]

I've got hearing loss and tinnitus pretty bad and I double up on hearing protection too. I'm using some custom molded in the ear and the biggest Peltor muffs I could find. I don't have the hearing blank out like you described. You might want to visit a Ear, Nose, Throat doctor to see if they could help.

 

[26Reload]

Maybe build a sectional wall that is behind your muzzle..maybe even with the front of your stock to try and alleviate some of the muzzlebreak repercussion.....might be a money maker.....

 

[Tumbleweed]

Maybe build a sectional wall that is behind your muzzle..maybe even with the front of your stock to try and alleviate some of the muzzlebreak repercussion.....might be a money maker.....

I've actually thought about something like this. For me it would need to be pretty quick and easy to set up or I wouldn't want to fool with it. Maybe something I can clamp too my bench. I'll have to think about that some more.

 

[26Reload]

Start with so.e plywood...angle it back the same direction as your brake but much wider...just wide enough to see thru....good luck...get pictures while developing....keep consulting....great ideas are subject to scrutiny of others....which can make it better....
I also know a guy that used tires to modify gunfire noise....think giant suppressor.....

 

[BallisticsGuy]

That you have tinnitus says you probably have some notable permanent hearing loss. I've had severe tinnitus for my entire adult life and much of my pre-adult life associated with profound hearing loss from 4kHz on up from exposure to gunfire and rock concerts. Most sound frequencies (anything over 5kHz) are completely opaque to me. It wouldn't matter if you made 5kHz waves at 140dB, I wouldn't perceive it as audible sound.

It's pretty normal for my ringing to change pitches and loudness occasionally all by itself and I'll occasionally experience what seems like a sudden onset of long lasting high intensity high frequency pulse at a seemingly completely different frequency from my normal ringing. That's just part of being hearing impaired for me. After taking in-ear plugs out after a while wearing them what/how I hear is always perceptibly different from how and what I normally hear for a while. It's totally normal for a damaged sense organ to throw spurious signals into your CPU. Welcome to being partially deaf.

After a day on the range teaching a large group of student rifle shooters, even though I'm pretty far behind the line all day and even though I'm wearing muffs and plugs, by the end of the day I'm not what I'd call physically ill but I can tell something is wrong... my balance, hearing, vision and attitude are all notably different than normal. It's almost like the flu or having taken one too many of something. That's how blast fatigue affects me.

I suspect you're experiencing blast fatigue. A box silencer (literally a box with a baffle or two that you shoot through) would help but so would be taking off the brakes or trimming your shooting session length and allowing more time between sessions.

 

[Tumbleweed]

That you have tinnitus says you probably have some notable permanent hearing loss. I've had severe tinnitus for my entire adult life and much of my pre-adult life associated with profound hearing loss from 4kHz on up from exposure to gunfire and rock concerts. Most sound frequencies (anything over 5kHz) are completely opaque to me. It wouldn't matter if you made 5kHz waves at 140dB, I wouldn't perceive it as audible sound.

It's pretty normal for my ringing to change pitches and loudness occasionally all by itself and I'll occasionally experience what seems like a sudden onset of long lasting high intensity high frequency pulse at a seemingly completely different frequency from my normal ringing. That's just part of being hearing impaired for me. After taking in-ear plugs out after a while wearing them what/how I hear is always perceptibly different from how and what I normally hear for a while. It's totally normal for a damaged sense organ to throw spurious signals into your CPU. Welcome to being partially deaf.

After a day on the range teaching a large group of student rifle shooters, even though I'm pretty far behind the line all day and even though I'm wearing muffs and plugs, by the end of the day I'm not what I'd call physically ill but I can tell something is wrong... my balance, hearing, vision and attitude are all notably different than normal. It's almost like the flu or having taken one too many of something. That's how blast fatigue affects me.

I suspect you're experiencing blast fatigue. A box silencer (literally a box with a baffle or two that you shoot through) would help but so would be taking off the brakes or trimming your shooting session length and allowing more time between sessions.

Thanks for the insight. I would say my hearing issues aren't nearly as bad as yours. I can still hear the full frequency spectrum except for the stuff over 10-12k. I'm still able to dial in and EQ sound systems really well. Removing muzzle brakes isn't an option. Probably not gonna be shooting any less. Sounds like I need to start designing some kind of baffle system to attach to my shooting bench.