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decibel

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Bwcad1
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decibel

Post by Bwcad1 »

GOOD ARTICLE ON DECIBELS

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decibel
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geolemon
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Post by geolemon »

Hmm...

My first reaction was "Wow, looks like a college textbook!" Not to friendly to the layman, in that "definition" section.

Then down in the "Acoustics" section, I see a bunch of issues:
Sound levels above 85 dB are considered harmful, while 120 dB is unsafe and 150 dB causes physical damage to the human body. Windows break at about 163 dB.
Hmm... see any mention of frequency in there? No, I don't either.
And I've sat in cars well in excess of 150dB without any physical damage to report.
And even MY sound quality cars all exceed 120dB easily, at least in the bass region. ;)

They go on and on for so long, talking about these dB levels and "what effects they can have" - without one mention of frequency, and how it's a critical player - you can't publish a number like that without discussing what frequency would cause that effect, because "that effect" will happen at a different dB level, for any given different frequency.

And they mention at the top that dB chart that dB is a relative number... but don't discuss specifically how many dB reference "an audible change", vs "doubling of output", etc.

It's good, but I don't think great for the layman unfortunately.
Bwcad1
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Post by Bwcad1 »

read further they mention frequencys. it was just for the chart mainly.
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Bwcad1
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Post by Bwcad1 »

read further they mention frequencys. it was just for the chart mainly.
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Jonathan
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Post by Jonathan »

OSHA has a timescale of how long you can be exposed to given sound levels, better reference. Still doesn't mention freq., though.
Bwcad1
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Post by Bwcad1 »

yea your right i was reading that article before the one i posted sorry lol
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JeremyC
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Post by JeremyC »

Yeah I agree. Freq makes a huge diffrence. I can handle loud pretty well, but if its loud and high pitched it hurts. Especially something like a F16s or F15s intake whistle.
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