JPH09261788A - Ear microphone - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an ear microphone in which a high frequency characteristic having been absorbed by a part of an ear tip and attenuated in a conventional microphone is improved. SOLUTION: The ear microphone is made up of an ear tip 4 and a case to which the ear tip 4 is mounted and the ear tip 4 is inserted to an external auditory miatus. In this case, a tip of the ear tip 4 is made of a hard material 8 and the other parts are made of a soft material 9. A high frequency characteristic not attenuated is obtained by receiving bone vibration by the hard material 8, from which the vibration is directly delivered to a microphone element. Since the soft material 9 is in soft contact with the external auditory miatus, the person feels no fatigue even regardless of the use of the microphone for a long time.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an improvement of an ear microphone that is inserted into an ear canal to convert bone conduction when a user utters into an audio signal.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Ear microphones used in places where there is a large amount of ambient noise have an ear tip attached to the front part of the main body containing a microphone element inserted into the ear canal, so that the ear canal of the ear canal when the user speaks is inserted. Bone conduction is received by the ear tip and converted into an audio signal by a microphone element in the main body. The bone conduction microphone is not limited to the one that is inserted into the ear canal, but it can capture the vibration of any part of the head bone, but considering the use while performing various tasks, it can be inserted into the ear canal. The type that does is good.

The microphone element housed in the body of the ear microphone is generally rectangular, and the general shape of the ear microphone housing these is shown in FIG.
It will be something like shown below. In this figure, reference numeral 1 denotes a case which is a main body, and a microphone element 2 is provided from the front part.
Is projected. When the microphone element 2 receives a mechanical vibration, the microphone element 2 converts the vibration into an audio signal and outputs the audio signal from the code 3. An ear tip 4 is attached to the microphone element 2.

The user inserts the ear tip 4 into the ear canal, and when the ear tip 4 receives bone vibration due to this insertion, it is transmitted to the microphone element 2. For this reason, the ear tip 4 is preferably made of a substance that easily transmits vibration, but from the viewpoint of preventing discomfort when inserted into the ear canal, it is conventionally made of soft rubber or synthetic resin. . As shown in FIG. 6, the ear tip 4 is provided with a large-diameter hole 5 for inserting the microphone element 2 and a small-diameter hole 6 for allowing external sound to pass. A groove 7 is communicated with the hole 6 so that a person wearing the ear tip 4 in the ear canal can hear external sound.

[0005]

As described above, when the ear tip is made of soft rubber or synthetic resin as in the above structure, the ear canal can be attached to the ear canal excellently, but on the other hand, bone vibration Of these, the problem arises that vibrations in the high frequency range are absorbed and the damping increases.

[0006] As a prior art in this field, Jpn.
There is one described in Japanese Patent No. 44507. In this, several types of heads having different sizes are prepared as the head part to be inserted into and contact with the ear canal, and these can be appropriately replaced according to the user's ear canal. According to this invention, even if the diameter of the ear canal changes due to individual differences, this can be dealt with, and the vibration of the ear canal can always be captured well, but the idea is completely different from the present invention. Is.

The present invention has been made in view of this point, and it is an object of the present invention to provide an ear microphone which is excellent in high frequency characteristics without sacrificing an excellent wearing feeling.

[0008]

As a means for solving the above-mentioned problems, the present invention described in claim 1 is such that the tip portion of the ear tip is made of a hard material and the other portion is made soft. It is characterized by being formed of a material.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect, the tip portion of the ear tip is entirely made of a hard material.

The invention described in claim 3 is characterized in that, in the invention described in claim 1, only a lower portion of the tip portion of the ear tip is formed of a hard material.

[0011]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIG. The tip of the ear tip 4 is formed of a hard material 8 such as ABS resin or elastomer having high hardness, and the other portion is formed of soft material 9 such as silicone rubber or elastomer having low hardness. In the case of this embodiment, the entire tip portion of the ear tip 4 is formed of the hard material 8. The boundary portion between the hard material 8 and the soft material 9 is integrally formed by bonding a separately manufactured one, or when the soft material 9 is molded, the hard material 8 is integrally molded.

FIG. 2 shows another embodiment of the present invention. In the ear tip 4, only the lower portion of the tip portion of the ear tip 4 is formed by the hard material 8 and the upper portion is formed by the soft material 9. The structure of the boundary between the hard material 8 and the soft material 9 is shown in FIG.
Similar to that of.

The ear tip 4 thus constructed is
In either case, the microphone element 2 is inserted into the hole 5 to be coupled to the main body 1. At that time, at least a part of the hard material 8 is brought into contact with the microphone element 2. In the ear tip 4 inserted in the ear canal, the portion of the hard material 8 contacts the ear canal and receives bone vibration. Hard material 8
Is in contact with the microphone element 2, the received vibration is directly transmitted to the microphone element 2.
Since the portion of the ear tip 4 made of the soft material 9 softly contacts the ear canal, it does not become fatigued even if it is used for a long time.

FIG. 3 briefly shows a vibration transmission test method. In this figure, reference numeral 10 denotes a vibration exciter, which vibrates vertically as indicated by an arrow. The vibration frequency can be changed by operating an oscillator (not shown). By placing an ear microphone on the vibrator 10 and measuring the output voltage of the ear microphone while changing the vibration frequency, the frequency characteristic can be known.

FIG. 4 is a comparison diagram of frequency characteristics of the ear microphone according to the present invention and the conventional ear microphone. From this figure, it can be seen that the output voltage of the earphone of the present invention shown by is higher than that of the conventional earphone of shown by especially in a high frequency range. This is an effect of using the hard material 8 since the ear tip 4 is conventionally made entirely of the soft material 9 and is absorbed in a high frequency range and is difficult to output.

[0016]

Since the present invention is the ear microphone configured as described above, by improving only the ear tip portion, it is possible to reproduce a high frequency portion, which was conventionally easily attenuated, at a high level. There are features. Further, since only the portion of the ear tip is improved, it is possible to properly use the ear tip having the entire tip made of a hard material and the ear tip having only a part made of a hard material depending on the use and preference.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a sectional view showing a main part of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view showing a main part of another embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing measurement of frequency characteristics.

FIG. 4 is a graph comparing the characteristics of an ear microphone according to the present invention and a conventional one.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view of a conventional ear microphone.

6 is a cross-sectional view showing an ear tip portion of the one shown in FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Case 2 Microphone element 4 Ear tip 8 Hard material 9 Soft material

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. An ear microphone in which the tip portion of the ear tip is made of a hard material and the other portion is made of a soft material. 2. The ear microphone according to claim 1, wherein the tip portion of the ear tip is entirely made of a hard material. 3. The ear microphone according to claim 1, wherein only a lower portion of the tip portion of the ear tip is made of a hard material.