Wednesday, April 25th 2007

Hearing Loss: How do I know if am exposed to dangerous noise levels?


posted @ 9:29 am in [ safety ]

Most people do not carry around with them a dBA monitor to sample the ambient noise. So how, can you tell if noise is damaging to your hearing? What is considered to be a safe decibel level of noise? Is there graphical way to view noise?

There are a couple of ways to determine if the noise is damagingly loud.

  • After you are finished with the power tool and you turn it off your ears are ringing for a while or sounds seem flat or dull.
  • When talking to a person that is arm’s length away you have to raise your voice considerably, the ambient noise is damaging to your hearing.

According to the CDC that sounds below 85 dBA is not damaging when exposed to it less than eight hours. Personally I think that is too loud and will cause long term hearing loss.

The CDC in conjunction with National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health have put together an interesting graphic that depicts various dBA levels in proportion to each other.

how to look at noise

Here is a list of the decibels (dBA) produced from various common woodworking power tools.

Miter saw

102

Hand Drill (corded)

97

Chop Saw

106

Hammer Drill

114

Chain saw

109

Circular Saw

100

Belt Sander

94

Circular sander

90

Router

95

Planer

94

Table saw

92

Mortising tool

90

Popular woodworking power tools when run under full load produce enough noise to be well above the maximum recommended decibel limit.


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