I am again considering buying headset ( I considered the purchase already twice during training but never purased any ).
Do you guys have your own or do you use some company sets or just what is available in the airplane ?
Any recomandations ? tia
We have the Bose A20 in our aircraft. Love’em!
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We are using LightSpeed headsets in our King Airs, but I honestly don’t know what model they are. I can find out when I go to work tomorrow though. They are very nice, but I don’t feel they are as durable as David Clarks…it seems like we send them out for repair quite frequently. Then again, we have a lot of pilots piling in and out of the aircraft for many, many cycles each day…so the wear and tear on them is probably going to be greater than what a normal pilot would put on them.
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Do you like them Beach ? Or you prefer other manufacturer ?
I like them. They are light and very good for active noise reduction. That said though, I don’t have anything more recent to compare them to. I think Bose makes an exceptionally good headset from what I hear…and I haven’t kept up to date with the latest and greatest David Clarks. Back when I was in flight training (piston singles) the DC 13.4 was all the rage because of how light it was…that was really before ANR headsets were coming on the market.
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Really? I am jealous. We have very average one’s on our aircraft. Aside from our shiny new NEO’s which for some strange reason have the cheapest telex heatsets you can find. Can’t hear a bloody thing and the passive noise reduction is akin to holding a blade of grass near your ear.
So as the NEO’s are becoming more prevalent, I went out and purchased my own Bose a20.
As @Troll said above, they are really good. I am a tight wad and I must confess that the price of them is ludicrous for what they are. But they are good and your hearing is something you can’t get back.
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We used to have Peltor headsets. The upgrade to A20’s was monumental!
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We use cheap (I’m guessing) Telex headsets in the Global. They do the job but they are not comfortable after a few hours of flight. Definitely not suitable for smaller GA aircraft with loud cockpits.
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As a side note and if you are interested in modding (apparently is easy). You can purchase a passive headset and install yourself active noise canceling module.
A few at work have done this and swear by it + its a fraction of the cost of the Bose A20
{edit}
I guess this also begs the question to what you want out of the headsets. Do you want passive or active noise cancellation (which ups the price considerably).
Maybe @Troll can share his input as well as we both have the same headset.
I was happy with passive. But active noise cancellation really is a step up. Its a little too good in my opinion. Great in the cruise to cut the drone and I believe it lessens fatigue. However on take off, it really takes away the noise of the engines (which I like to hear - maybe harking back to my light aircraft days)
I just keep noise cancellation off on take off and then switch it back on when everything has slowed down in the climb
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Sounds interesting. Got any more info?
Not really a problem in the Dash8… 
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3M ear plugs and some cheapo over ear stuff!
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@Troll. I don’t really know that much about anr kits aside from guys telling me they did it to their passive headsets. But they were happy with them.
I couldn’t tell it was akit. Plenty of Google and you toob vids about anr kits
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My main requirement is comfort.
As almost all ’ default ’ headsets you can find in aircrafts are some old DC / ProPilot or something similar and they are realy heavy and not comfortable at all.
They are all ’ pasive ’ but after hour or two they are pushing against the sides of the head so strong that they feel like ’ active ’ 
So the 3M earplugs will not cut it
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There is something like this.
Again, not cheap. I have only seen one person wearing it at work and it was new. So no info on that
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looks fancy, but I am looking for something described as A20s - ’ configuration for higher noise environments ’
A20s seems to be realy good sets…
I’ve done a fair bit of instruction in GA aircraft over the past half-decade. Personally used several Bose X, Bose A20, David Clark’s, and several Lightspeed models. My current headset is a pair of Lightspeed Zulu 2.
My 2 cents on the matter is that Bose A20 sound the best. They are the most clear when ANR is active in a noisy environment. However, I find the clam shell design with the hinge in the middle of the headband horribly uncomfortable after more than 30 minutes of wearing them.
My personal set of Lightspeed Zulu 2 are pretty close to the same audio quality, have a few more gadgets like bluetooth syncing for a cheaper price and are much more comfortable. However, in the four years I’ve owned them, I have had to send them back to have the ANR repaired twice. Both times they were repaired under warranty; I only paid shipping. The Zulu 2 do not seem as durable as the old-school David Clark’s that I used throughout my flight training. I still keep the DC around as a spare. Supposedly the newer Zulu 3 have fixed some of the durability issues, but I have no first hand experience.
David Clark are making a new ANR design called the one-x. I used them once as a demo and found them not quite as comfortable as the zulus but pretty close, personally more comfortable than the Bose. Sound quality was perhaps slightly less clear than LS or Bose. No idea on durability though, I only wore them for one flight.
TLDR: For my students who can afford a good ANR headset I would heartily recommend the Lightspeed Zulu or the Bose A20. My preference being the Lightspeed offering for a lighter, more comfortable fit.
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Thx for the experiences with the LSs.
I was checking also those. Checked again what they have available and they have new model - TANGO Wireless! headset… interesting
Hmm sooo seems like Bose or Lightspeed !??
@troll what is your ( and your felow pilots ) experience with the comfort of Bose A20 set ? thx
I haven’t heard any complaints… But we rarely fly more than 1hr legs. I think our average sector is 28min 
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Hi all, necro’ing another old thread. I’m doing my PPL here in Australia and getting close to solo. Instructor suggests this is a good time to get my own headset (been using the flying school’s headsets) and looking for recommendations for affordable, reliable GA headsets please (and essential features).
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