Active Hearing – Listening Out for Your Safety
As technology advances and becomes more accessible, many main contractors are seeing this as an opportunity to embrace these developments to keep the wellbeing of their staff and subcontractors at the forefront. A perfect example of this was seen when a leading main contractor included active hearing protection in their minimum HS&W standards.
Removing your hearing protectors while working in dangerous noise levels is easily done. Simply lifting a cup to hear what a colleague says or removing protectors to answer a call could have an undesired impact on long term hearing. Unfortunately, even short exposures to loud noise can cause damage, despite long intervals of adequate protection. Removing or just lifting the hearing protection for less than a total of ten minutes a day, the attenuation effect drops drastically. This is intensified at higher frequencies where attenuation is optimal.
This is where active hearing steps in as the perfect solution! Bryson has partnered with Hellberg Safety on their active hearing protection range. Active hearing listens out for your safety. With microphones in each ear-cup and an Electronic Protection System circuitry, low speech sounds are amplified while harmful noises over 82dB are blocked. Stay connected to your surroundings with the active listening feature, while remaining protected from harmful noise. You can stay alert to warning signals and communicate with others around you when wearing hearing protectors.
The graph shows how harmful noise can effectively be protected against using EPS systems and active listening. The function is dependent on the noise level outside the hearing protector. The active listening function will either amplify or decrease and limit the sound reproduced through the speakers. The image above shows how EPS & active listening limits high sound levels to a maximum of 82 dB(A) through the electronics while amplifying weak sounds.
The active hearing range is important to Bryson and our customers in two ways; wellbeing of our customers and sustainability. As we strive for excellence in health & safety and protecting their current and future livelihoods, we genuinely feel that this product will help that in a strong way.
In terms of sustainability, you can only start to imagine how many tonnes of plastic ear defenders go into landfill a year; having a premium product increases the worth to the user and increases the life of the product, dramatically reducing the wastage.
Bryson would love to discuss further how we can implement this technology into your H&S minimum requirements to prevent hearing damage and prevent long term effects – listening out for your safety.