Wednesday, November 30, 2011

What is the best type of hearing protection for shooting with a scoped rifle?

I just assembled a beautiful AR15 with a 24 inch barrel and a Magpul adjustable stock to be used for long distance recreational target shooting. However, I can't look through the scope with my earmuffs on.|||I agree with vangion. Get the rubber style plugs with the cords on them. If you ever visit a military rifle range, you will usually see the rang masters using these. They generally attach them to their campaign hats and push them in their ears when the firing is about to commence (the rest of the time, they strut around like big shots).


|||I build match AR's. And I am an audio engineer.





Your AR will crank out 137db of noise. Anything over 92db for four hours requires hearing protection. Each time the db level goes up by 3db it actually is a doubling of the noise. Example 93db is twice as loud as 90db. You will find the db rating on the package for the muffs and ear plugs.





The slim over the ear muffs are only good for 19 to 22 db. It's a help, but that extra noise that comes in will ruin your hearing over time. Once gone, hearing never, ever, comes back.





To shoot your AR you will want to use both inside the ear plugs and external muffs. You need to get that noise level down into the low 90's.





An alternate is buy a suppressor - like I did. Consider it an investment in your hearing - you do not want to have two hearing aids like I ended up with after a lifetime of shooting. My AR becomes totally quiet with subsonic ammo and is only 103db of ballistic crack with factory ammo. This means the really comfortable muffs work well.





Hope this helps |||There are several brands of ear muffs on the market. If none of these will work for you, you will need to go to ear plugs. Buy the plugs with the highest NRR rating. The good ones will have an NRR rating of 23 or higher. I have found that the foam plugs that you roll up and stick in your ear to work best for me and are the most comfortable to wear for long periods of time. The next best are the molded ones with 2 or 3 flanges to seal off your ear canal. These are quite good, too but some people do not find them to be as comfortable as the foam ones. You can also buy custom moulded ear plugs but I have tried them also and found that after a while they had become deformed from being stored in their little box and did not seal my ear canals as well as they did when brand new. They are expensive and not worth the money in my estimation. If you can getthehmoldedd plugs or foam plugs with a string running between them, I think they are best because you can remove them and let them hang on your neck and not loose them as you might if you removed the unattached plugs from your ears temporarily. Also the plugs on the string tend to remain clean longerbecausee they are no laid down on a dirty surface like non-attached plug are.|||I would use industrial ear plugs with high decibel protection. And make sure you properly install them in your ears. Lift up the tippy top of your ear as if your trying to make them pointy like an elf. This will open up and expose the ear canal. Then roll the ear plugs between your fingers and then insert. The ear plugs should puff back up and seal your ear canal.|||Rubber ear plugs like the military uses can be found for cheap at any store that sells guns


http://www.aosafety.com/shooters/product鈥?/a>|||The classic orange earplugs on a string.

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