# What type of hearing protection for jackhammer?



## Mort

A jackhammer in a confined space, I'd do earplugs and earmuffs. 3M is what I use for the plugs.


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## nap

I concur with mort. Especially since this is inside you need to make sure your protection is adequate. Check the ratings of whatever device you are using. Understand what it means and use that to make a determination of what you believe is adequate.

given the echo effect where the sound is going to not escape like it does outside, I would go all the way and use both plugs and over the ear muffs.


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## Cullen

I will concur with the plugs + muffs combo. 
I've always had tinnitus, then lived with and sometimes played with musicians. No hearing protection, but it didn't seem too loud at the time.

Then I got into shooting. Usually just muffs, even though most of the time it was at an indoor range. Again, didn't seem too loud.

Now, at the ripe old age of 41, I have a hard time hearing certain timbres or frequencies when folks speak to me. Not deaf or near, just really have to listen harder to some people.

The thing about hearing is the bones that cause it to happen are delicate, the damage is cumulative, and it doesn't come back once it's gone.


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## Ultrarunner2017

Thanks guys;
As it turned out, I wasn't the one using the jackhammer, but I was just outside the room where it was being used. I just used the 3M earplugs and was OK. Didn't seem loud at all, until later when I was upstairs in the kitchen - above the laundry where the jackhammering was going on, and it sounded really loud - but then I wasn't wearing the protection in the kitchen.

The jackhammering was limited to a few periods of about 10 minutes each. Most of the work was much less noisy.


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## gregzoll

Foam airplugs, then the Ear covers to help further suppress the noise. As for eye protection, goggles are fine. But if you wear eye glasses, it causes issues. Also get a face mask with the replaceable Cartridges, not the ones that look like Surgical masks.

Also remember that you are going to be raising a lot of dust. Your furnace is not going to like it.

I would rent a fan unit that sits outside the house and uses a hose to pull the dust out of the space. That includes placing a plastic curtain around the perimeter to keep the dust in the working zone, not letting it get all over the house.

As we call it in the military. "Let me introduce you to the sound of my people.".


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## Ultrarunner2017

There wasn't much dust from the jackhammering. The concrete was damp in some areas due to the leakage from the pipe, and the entire trench was only about 10ft x 1ft wide and only about 6" deep. The pipe was only about 3" below the surface of the floor.


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