Flight Training - November/December 2021 - 41

Listen up
P
A guide to buying an aviation headset
BY IAN J. TWOMBLY
PHOTOGRAPHY BY CHRIS ROSE
ART OF THE FUN OF TAKING UP
a new hobby is diving in deep
and buying all the kit that goes
with it. And when you start
flying, nothing makes you feel
like a pilot more than a headset.
It can also be one of the most vexing
things you'll buy. With dozens of
models to choose from and a confusing
array of features, finding the right
headset can be a challenge. Don't fret.
Here's the ultimate guide to buying a
headset.
WHAT IS A HEADSET?
First, it can be helpful to know what a
headset is and how it's made. Aviation
headsets provide a means to clearly
hear and communicate with air traffic
control and other people in the airplane.
They are created with the goal
of delivering good audio quality when
both receiving and transmitting. Equally
important is their ability to reduce
cockpit noise. Small airplane cockpits
are loud enough that flying without a
headset is not only more difficult, it can
also permanently damage your hearing.
A good headset should be comfortable
to wear for a few hours at a time,
reduce noise, and be durable. These are
the basics. Additional features can be
nice to have and can make life easier,
but they aren't necessary.
Although aviation headsets may
look like nothing more than a couple of
plastic or metal ear cups attached to a
piece of steel with some cables coming
out, headset development is a complex
and highly specialized endeavor.
Lightspeed Aviation is a manufacturer
of premium headsets, and the
company is respected for being first
with many features now considered
standard in the industry. According
to Executive Vice President Teresa
De Mers, the process of building a
new headset begins with customer
feedback. " A lot of what informs our
decision-making is being in the community
and talking to customers, " she
said. From there, ideas are gathered
and considered as part of a structured
development process that includes
engineering, validation, prototyping,
manufacturing, refining, and more.
Through each step, a trusted group
of beta testers tries the product and
provides feedback that helps further
refine the design. The goal is to make a
headset that is quiet, but according to
Lightspeed President Allan Schrader,
comfort is maybe even more important.
" Wearability can be the biggest
differentiator, " he said. For that reason
and many others, development at
Lightspeed begins with the hardware,
or the physical components, and moves
onto the software that refines its
performance.
While in development and after a
product is released, customer feedback
leads to more improvements. Study a
Lightspeed Zulu ear seal and you'll find
that it's smaller than many others on
the market. It's also a quite thin oval
shape. Those choices were deliberate.
Schrader said that a bigger oval
requires more pressure to get a good
seal, so the company kept it as small as
FLIGHT TRAINING NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021
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