Re: 30+ Silencers Tested with Free Data
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: HPLLC</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
I looked at a few of the reviews and wasn't able to find that unsuppressed reference data for the weapon on that day, nor was I able to find the DB difference between suppressed and unsuppressed averages stated, so it was a little hard to understand just what kind of performance was being obtained in the silencers you tested. Maybe I missed it?
Back when Robert Silvers was doing testing he had some silencers that tested 5 or more DB louder unweighted, and some that tested 1DB louder so the difference will probably vary for each silencer tested, though mil-std for the sake of mil-std makes sense. </div></div>
Every test has a 1M & Ear test in a Excel Spreadsheet that you can download or open & imposed into the webpage is the SPPS Statistical data..........I assume you are not seeing the link at the very bottom of each post, I am guessing you looking for the data in the Excel spreadsheet........look again, it's there. Bottom of the post.
Robert metered unweighed........IMHO........because it makes more sense, he discuessed it in great lenght in his after action reports. Problem is "Mil-STD" is what the "Standard" is......so guys contiune to use that "Standard" just so they can appease the "Mil-STD" crowd......Robert could see this right after doing the chart he and Matt put together........
<span style="font-weight: bold">All Credit Robert silvers / silencertalk:</span>
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The problem with A-Weighing is that <span style="font-weight: bold">it does not match the ear's response at any sound pressure level.</span> Even worse is that it comes closest to matching the ear's response for sounds in the <span style="font-weight: bold">40-50 dB SPL range</span> as described in the paper titled 'A' Weighting Filter For Audio Measurements. Suppressed gunfire is generally in the 120-140 dB SPL range and it would be much more appropriate to have selected the 120 Phon curve. The 40 Phon curve, and hence <span style="font-weight: bold">A-weighting, is entirely inappropriate for anything other than low-level (such as in an office) sound level measurement</span>.
In fact, as shown in figure 3, <span style="font-weight: bold">unweighted measurements more closely approximate the way the ear hears most sounds at 120 dB SPL than the A-weighted curve.</span> Why did the military go out of their way to impose a curve that is worse than no curve at all? Partly because they were not measuring gunshot noise perception but rather trying to predict generic hearing risk for a wide range of environmental sounds, and <span style="font-weight: bold">partly because A-weighting was already established as a standard for measuring lower-level environmental noise</span>.
In conclusion, <span style="text-decoration: underline">the MIL-STD manufacturers commonly use for research, development, and marketing purposes <span style="font-weight: bold">is not appropriate for predicting human perception of suppressed gunshot noise even when perfectly and fairly implemented</span>.</span> <span style="font-style: italic">The elimination of A-weighting and peak-voltage detection and replacing them with a better curve</span> (<span style="font-weight: bold">C-weighting would be better</span>) and a longer time-constant (such as the length of the entire A-duration) would be a good thing to test, but the ultimate solution would be a new standard based on a version of what is outlined in the ISO standard 532-B, modified for impulse sound signatures by choosing an ideal time-constant.
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