Aircraft can get loud. If you’re going to fly anything, especially with a piston engine. You will almost certainly need a good headset to protect your hearing and allow you to communicate clearly.
Initially to begin, almost any flying club or school will provide you with a headset to borrow for free or a fee. However note that, the quality can be questionable after being potentially used by hundreds of different people. That’s why I first of all, highly recommend carrying antibacterial cleaning wipes in case you need to borrow headsets.
I did my PPL using the school’s headsets, but when I went to another club to do my time building, the padding was worn, and left my ears ringing after a couple hours of flying.
That’s when I firmly resolved to get my own. For others determined to go down the route of commercial flight training, I’d recommend buying a good headset as soon as possible. Your hearing and future career will thank you.
Over-Ear, In-Ear or On-Ear?
The most versatile, all-round would be the over-ear headset. I have seen it used from my general flying to commercial airline pilots. They often offer good noise cancellation and are mostly sturdy. The only downside would be that they’re slightly bulky.
In-ear headphones like the Bose Proflight are less common, especially in general aviation but I do hear good things about it from my airline pilot colleagues. It may not be so ideal for sharing and I have personally never tried it. They’re a lot more compact which makes them convenient to travel with.
On-Ear headsets are what my company provides in each aircraft, from the likes of Sennheiser and Telex. Honestly, unless you’re planning on buying headsets solely for airline operations. I would not recommend these. Comfort wise, I don’t really like the on-ear feel for long periods of time, and for passive noise cancelling, I have doubts these on-ear headsets without active noise cancellation would work well for loud piston-engine aircraft.
Active or Passive Noise Cancellation
I have had the batteries in my headset controller run flat and the active noise cancellation kick out during a flight. In critical phases of flight, there’s no time to change the batteries and that’s why I highly recommend your headset have good passive noise cancellation so that you can still hear with low batteries.
What connector to choose? XLR, GA or LEMO?
When searching for a pair of aviation headsets you’ll soon come across terms like GA-plugs, XLR and LEMO. These all refer to the type of connectors these headsets come with.
If you fly Airbus, you’ll have to likely use a headset with an XLR plug or get an adaptor from GA twin style plug to an XLR plug.
With Boeings (which I’ve never flown) the most common option seems to be the dual-plug connector.
Some headsets like that from Bose come with the XLR plug option. If you snag a good deal, you can get a XLR to Dual GA pin adaptor to use in other light aircraft. It does add to the cable length, however I know a colleague who used a Bose XLR headset during flight training and is pretty satisfied with the quality. Honestly, with adaptors your headset will be pretty versatile. If you fly Airbus, you’ll have to likely use a headset with an XLR plug or get an adaptor from GA twin style plug to an XLR plug.
LEMO plugs, are something I’ve never seen haven’t heard much of. Unless you know you’re going to be flying an aircraft with one of these plugs, I’d recommend choosing from the other two types of connectors. These plugs are 6-pin and take power from the aircraft, meaning no batteries should be required for active noise cancellation.
Which headset did I end up choosing?
For my first headset, I ended up getting a Lightspeed Zulu 3, which I’m very satisfied with. The build quality of the headset is excellent, the active and passive noise cancellation works very well, and it comes with a long 7-year warranty.
The spare headset I bought for family and friends to use was a FARO headset without active noise cancellation. It’s a fair bit cheaper than the Lightspeed I have, and way cheaper than any Bose. This headset served me well as a backup and while it is slightly bulky, I have heard no real complaints about it from anyone who used it.
Whatever you do, please use a certified aviation headset.
I heard of and seen pilots use all sorts generic headsets with an adaptor to connect to the aircraft. It often leaves a buzzing noise which can be irritating to the other pilot. So if you’re flying with others, do get a headset that’s built for aviation by a reputable company, it will be well worth the investment and better for safety.