It seems my ears are not made for IEMs, as I have sealing issues with every single IEM I've tried - any advice?

[sq225917]

Fiio have above average insertion depth. My fh9 are great my Samsung buds fall out.

 

[olieb]

Preface: I've been using in ear headphones, mostly from established companies like Sony, Philips, Creative and whatnot for about 15 years, long before the term IEM was used. Never had any sealing issues. Recently the final pair of my trusty Philips SHE8500 broke and I decided to try out some Chinese IEMs.

So I've ordered the 7Hz Zero:2, the Truthear Zero Red and Moondrop's Chu IIs. On all of them I seem to have sealing issues with every single one of the stock tips.

I don't know, whether that is a solution you like, but this is my take on things (DIY).
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...z-salnotes-zero-iem-review.50226/post-1802979
Cheap, comfortable and the seal is as good as one might ever need (at least with my ears).

 

[RayDunzl]

The power went out here for a couple of hours Tuesday evening.

So I dragged out the IEMs that came with my phone (which I've used about once before), and listened to my favorite radio station (WMNF).

I guess they seal well enough as long as I don't move much.

Became annoyed listening to my heartbeat and breathing, though.

I'll have to make sure I don't have dead batteries for the Patrolman for the next time I'm de-electrified.

Eventually, the last bit of twilight expired, and I lit a candle.

The electric service came back up about a minute later, two hours before their estimated recovery time.

The IEMs are returned to their hiding place.

 

[PjV]

Preface: I've been using in ear headphones, mostly from established companies like Sony, Philips, Creative and whatnot for about 15 years, long before the term IEM was used. Never had any sealing issues. Recently the final pair of my trusty Philips SHE8500 broke and I decided to try out some Chinese IEMs.

So I've ordered the 7Hz Zero:2, the Truthear Zero Red and Moondrop's Chu IIs. On all of them I seem to have sealing issues with every single one of the stock tips. It's the worst with the Chu II, which sound like some old radio from the 50s. lol Interestingly enough, when I slightly angled the Chu IIs upwards and pressed them really deep in (using the largest tip pair), the sound drastically changed, became much deeper and warmer with SIGNIFICANT bass increase. But the moment I stopped pressing them in, the sound returned being cheap and flat. So it's definitely the seal which I have an issue with. The only one I achieve slightly better sealing with its stock tips (only with the largest pair) is with the Zero Reds, probably thanks to the large nozzle. But even then it, subjectively speaking, only 80% at best, using the largest piece of its stock tips. Only when I use my old L-sized tips from my old Philips SHE8500 I achieve a decent seal compared to the stock tips, however they are rather short and I feel like this is still not the intended sound.

Am I the only one with these issues? As I said in the preface, I used many different in ear headphones in the last 15 years, and I never had such seal issues. I feel like this might be partially to the lack of truly L-sized tips that come with the Chinese ones. It's like the largest option is always about M-sized compared to the largest option of tips when it comes to non-Chinese IEMs.

Am I the only one with such issues? Should I just get some larger tips? Or is it also an issue with the shape of my ear canal? As I said, with the Chu IIs I had to aim them upwards in an angle and press them in to get a proper seal and sound.

I have the same (or a similar) problem.
For me, the tips only stay in place if I rotate them quite far.
In fact so far that the earhook doesn't fall behind the ear shell, but on it.
When I mount the connector 180 degrees rotated the earhook passes below the ear and all is well.

 

[ehabheikal]

Depending on iem you might find xlarge tips. Also customs can be made at audiologist.

 

[fragzone]

All I can offer is. Moondrop starfield=absolutely perfect fit with the smaller included tips.

Blon-03....literally not a thing I can do to get a proper seal in my right ear in-spite of the tips I use. Keep trying man or maybe it would be cheaper in the long run to get some moulds, but not if you get lucky trying out a few more.

 

[bigpilot]

I own a KZ AS-16 and I'm very satisfied with the sound quality. It's basically the best headphone I've ever heard in my life.

I would never go back and buy Sony or Sennheiser, which are far inferior and also much more expensive.

 

[paudio]

I definitely can recommend custom iems. For TWS I can recommend Logitech G Fits. They are semi custom molded via lights on the iem body on first unpackaging.

 

[bkjernisted]

How to geta good fit on Moondrop Kato iems.

This morning I removed my eartips from my Moondrop Kato iems and stretched 4 - 3.5 mm by 5.5 mm rubber o-rings over each nozzle. Then I installed 2 spinfit cp155 medium eartips. Other people may need different eartips. But these eartips are wide and long. I have ordered a 4 pack of large...

www.audiosciencereview.com

These are my recommendations.

 

[paudio]

I definitely can recommend custom iems. For TWS I can recommend Logitech G Fits. They are semi custom molded via lights on the iem body on first unpackaging.

Also adv-sound can make custom tips for any iem. Bit spendy but pretty good.

 

[PjV]

I have the same (or a similar) problem.
For me, the tips only stay in place if I rotate them quite far.
In fact so far that the earhook doesn't fall behind the ear shell, but on it.
When I mount the connector 180 degrees rotated the earhook passes below the ear and all is well.

After several weeks I had a bright (or less dim ) moment.
I used boiling hot water while bending the cable. Now the fit is great.

 

[restorer-john]

So I dragged out the IEMs that came with my phone (which I've used about once before), and listened to my favorite radio station (WMNF).

Earphones.

IEMs is such a pretentious term invented by musicians and jumped on by earphone manufacturers. There's no actual "monitoring" going on with the consumer grade stuff we buy.

We aren't Madonna singing in front of 10,000 people needing an isolated feed straight to the ear canal so we can attempt to lip sync in time with the pre-recorded "concert" we aren't actually listening to.

 

[Jimbob54]

Earphones.

IEMs is such a pretentious term invented by musicians and jumped on by earphone manufacturers. There's no actual "monitoring" going on with the consumer grade stuff we buy.

We aren't Madonna singing in front of 10,000 people needing an isolated feed straight to the ear canal so we can attempt to lip sync in time with the pre-recorded "concert" we aren't actually listening to.

As long as customers know the difference between an earbud (doesn't go into the canal a la original apple buds etc ) and whatever we call the in ear variety all is good .

 

[Yorkshire Mouth]

It does beggar belief that manufacturers have spent years, and hundreds of thousands of $s in research, trying to get great/accurate sounding IEMS, and have now not only managed it, but managed to get accuracy at a sub-$50 price, but still appear to make little effort to create a fool-proof fit, despite that having a huge impact on the sound quality on which they've worked so hard.

 

[Ktacos]

Try foams, silicone always terrible for me, but foams are great.

 

[Jimbob54]

I've recently invested in some of Zeos /hifigo render tips .

Interesting idea . Memory foam in a silicone cover. Maybe the reusable /cleanable aspect of silicone combined with the squish of foam . Not the widest of cores though so not good for the chonkiest nozzles .

Might be the magic bullet for some users. Worth a punt at 11/11 prices.