Ear Protection

[tarwater_mess]

Re: Farb talk

Tommy and all.. refering to the manifesto is good. But, in regards to safety and authenticity, lets try to keep the later true to the period, while respecting the former.

[TexReb]

Re: Ear Protection

Gentlmen:

I appreciate the input. I can certainly understand the need and desire to use an ear protection that would provide as much protection as possible, which would in turn be the most modern. That for me would be inconsistent with what our hobby is all about. We look to each other to improve the hobby and learn from what others have researched, or have acquired themselves to improve, our impressions.

With this in mind, it appears that I should have been more clear through my intial post, I am wanting to know what is considered period ear protection. I have heard of the cottonballs, but somehow I am don't beleive that Johnson & Johnson were producing cottonballs, as we know them, at the time of the war. I would thus presume that "cotton in the raw" would have been the choice.

I have read accounts of soldiers actually loosing their hearing because they had stuffed material, whatever that may be, down the canal of their ears so far that they were not able to extract it. I would certainly not entertain doing such a thing, but I can understand how, in the heat of pitched battle with the noise of the weaponry that a scared soldier could be a bit overbearing and stuff something down his ears to help ease the noise.

My question is this, does anybody out there know what some of these items were? Was it pieces of cloth left over, or torn, from personal clothing or uniforms? Does anyone have a more specific account of what a soilder used? If anything, this could be an interesting subject to examine.

As I said before, I do appreciate eveybody's input.

Steve Johnston

[Michael McComas]

Re: Ear Protection

Beeswax is certainly a period form of ear protection, having been mentioned in The Odyssey nearly 3000 years ago. Any kind of shaped soft wax that resembles beeswax should be acceptable, to much the same degree that brass percussion caps instead of copper are acceptable. If you really want to go the cotton route, try boll cotton soaked in beeswax. Modern cotton balls are "fluffy" to the point of being nearly useless for hearing protection.

To be safe from hearing loss, you need to attenuate the sound of a percussion cap something like 25 dB. On the average, cloth stuffed in your ears will attenuate the sound something like 5 dB, just enough to give you a false sense of security. Foam earplugs attenuate sound on the average of 32 dB. Well-fitting wax earplugs will be good for anywhere from 20-35 dB, provided they seal. If they don't seal, they're not doing you any good.

If you consider deafness the height of authenticity, hey, they're your ears. But speaking from experience, asking people to repeat everything "in your good ear" gets really old really quick.

-Michael McComas
The Deaf Bastards Mess

[Silas]

Re: Ear Protection

Try the paper from your rounds next time. Roll one up a bit, stuff it into your mouth and chew until it's no longer dry, pop it into your ear. Sometimes the seal is as good as foam. If it fails, roll up another one; just like the other one ...

Mark (Silas) Tackitt,
CHAPS

[Clark Badgett]

Re: Ear Protection

Being a very active shooter, I hear better than most humans. Yes protect your hearing, but with the very low levels of noise caused by black powder blanks, cotton balls would be sufficient. And Major, just how many projectiles do you anticipate being in the air to warrant your use of incorrect eyewear. And most eye injurys associated with shooting actually happens from the side, not front. So unless you have sideshields on those incorrect glasses, you are wasting time.

[major]

Re: Eye Protection

Clark
I admit that most of the flying material that would be encountered on the battle field would come in from the side, but not all. Eyeglasses are not perfect protection but then what in this world is perfect? I have been reenacting for over 13 years and always use eye protection. I have considered side panels but just never got around to working on the idea. I thought about using paper or leather but never did anything about it. I have seen men get hit by a cap fragment near the eye but have never seen anyone get one in the eye. I have seen “cook-offs” where they got powder in the eye and had to flush the eye with canteen water and as far as I know they didn’t suffer any permanent damage. I will admit that something flying into your eye on the battle field is a remote possibility but remember, it only needs to happen once.
Terry

[LibertyHallVols]

Re: Eye Protection

I am closing this thread due to excessive farbistic content. I am all for safety, but promoting 20th Century eyewear and other modern equipment is out of bounds.

[dusty27]

Re: Ear Protection

Maybe going to better events without as much shooting would help your hearing loss. I go to events and don't have to clean my rifle.....