I have a light speed zulu and love it! but I find myself wondering about retrofit kits for old headsets. Has anyone tried this? How do they work? Might be fun to try it out!

I converted the older of my DC 13.4s to ANR several years ago with the Headsets, Inc. kit, and it works perfectly. I'd say the ANR is on a par with the 2nd generation Bose X--can't compare it to either the Zulu or the present generation Bose A20 because I haven't tried either of them, but I have flown my airplane with the Bose X. The conversion itself is easy to do, if you know how to solder wires with a soldering pencil (a soldering gun has too much heat and will fry the circuit boards).

Plus: the speakers provided by HI are really good quality, so that spoken language is clearer and music is great. Tech support is excellent. Using the auto-shut-off battery box, it warns by switching the LED color from a flashing green to a steady red in plenty of time to replace the battery; even if you fail to notice that, though, and the ANR shuts off, by turning it off and back on, it's good for another 20-25 minutes.

Minus: it uses a 9v battery, with about a 25 hour life span with normal radio use. If you pump music through it, though, that reduces the life span by half. As an alternative, they can provide a regulated power supply that can be hard-wired to the airplane's electrical system--don't have that, so I don't know how well it works. When the ANR is off, the noise is greater than it was without the kit, because one of the things you do in installing the kit is to remove the old sound insulation and install less effective thinner insulation--necessary for the ANR to work. So always carry a spare 9v battery.

If I regularly flew any distance with passengers, I'd convert my other headsets, too. It's a great system. If you already have a headset that you like, it's certainly the least expensive way to go.

Incidentally, I also have added Oregon Aero comfort items to all of my headsets, and the OA Hushkits to my other two DCs. That gets rid of any discomfort caused by the clamping forces of those headsets.

Cary

Another vote for the Headsets, inc. kit here. I added one of their kits to my ancient Peltor set a couple years ago and have zero complaints. Ok, well I do get tired of swapping 9v batteries but such is life.

As Cary said, if you have an old set that you're partial to it's a pretty worthwhile inexpensive investment.

I have installed these (Headsets Inc.) in at least a half dozen flight helmets, and they are bar none the best bang for the buck in the headset / helmet world. They are not on par with the latest greatest from Lightspeed or Bose, but so close it doesn't much matter, and for a huge amount less cash.

Other food for thought; There are currently no helmet manufacturers that build an ANR helmet. This means that if you buy an ANR helmet from a reseller, it has been modified for ANR by that reseller. The two most common retrofits are Headset inc's and DC. DC's position is that they do not support this conversion, and most of the DC helmet conversions I am aware of are not a great mix. This is not meant to be critical of DC or their product, as they didn't design these parts to be retrofitted to helmets. My only point here is that the headsets inc setup is soo good that it even works in the noisier environments that most helmets are used in

Another side note; Even if you plan on doing panel mounted power, order the set up with the battery pack. The screw on receptacle at the top of the battery pack is the same receptacle as the panel mount. Every work plane we have has this receptacle in it, but having a spare battery pack in the flight gear allows for continued ANR in the event of a problem with the panel power as well as use in an unfamiliar / unwired airplane. The only problem I've ever experienced with the panel mount power is a blown fuse (no fault of the kit, poor wire routing on our part). The fuse is an inline fuse and IIRC .5amp or so. If you fly with a cigarette lighter powered GPS and phone charger you may as well keep a few of those in your bag, as it is a common fuse in all of those applications...

Take care, Rob