An Electroacoustic Hearing Protector Simulator That Accurately Predicts Pressure Levels in the Ear Based on Standard Performance Metrics

Impulse-noise response pressure waveforms in the occluded volume under a hearing protector (HP) depend on energy transmission by means of its rigid motion, through its material and at skin-contact leaks. The Real Ear Attenuation at Threshold (REAT) and Microphone in Real Ears (MIRE) methods are comm...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Kalb, Joel T
Format: Report
Language:English
Subjects:
ABQ TESTS
ABQ(ALBUQUERQUE)
Acoustics
AHAAH(AUDITORY HAZARD ANALYSIS ALGORITHM FOR HUMANS)
ALGORITHMS
Anatomy and Physiology
EA HEARING PROTECTORS
EA(ELECTROACOUSTIC)
EAR PROTECTORS
Electricity and Magnetism
ELECTROACOUSTICS
Fluid Mechanics
HAZARDS
HEARING
HPS(HEARING PROTECTOR SIMULATOR)
IMPULSE
METRICS
MIRE(MICROPHONE IN REAL EARS)
NOISE
Numerical Mathematics
PREDICTIONS
PRESSURE
PRESSURE MEASUREMENT
Protective Equipment
REAT(REAL EAR ATTENUATION AT THRESHOLD)
SIMULATORS
STANDARD PERFORMANCE METRICS
Online Access:Request full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Impulse-noise response pressure waveforms in the occluded volume under a hearing protector (HP) depend on energy transmission by means of its rigid motion, through its material and at skin-contact leaks. The Real Ear Attenuation at Threshold (REAT) and Microphone in Real Ears (MIRE) methods are common insertion loss measures of this process at a collection of low-level test frequencies. This paper describes a linear HP simulation with an electroacoustic (EA) simulator determined with an iterative fitting procedure using the insertion loss data. Combining this simulator with head diffraction and ear-canal models in the Auditory Hazard Analysis Algorithm for Humans (AHAAH) allows free-field pressure waveforms to be transformed to protected waveforms measured at various locations in real and artificial ears by solving the differential equations of motion. Applying the EA simulator to 384 REAT data-sets from an inter-laboratory study using ANSI S12.6 method B for inexperienced subject self-fits gives statistical frequency distributions of occluded volume, leakage elements, and predicted hazard with the four tested HPs and a rifle waveform. Further validation was obtained using manufacturer-supplied REAT data to predict and compare with protected waveforms on humans and manikins near impulse noise sources such as high-explosives, rifles, shoulder-fired recoilless rifles, and howitzers. The original document contains color images. (Revision 3 Sep 2014).