[BaTou069]

TL;DR - who thinks custom ear tips or sleeves are good or bad? who has good or had bad experience with those?


So, ever since I bought the shure 846 ages ago I considered Sensaphonic custom sleeves, but never went for it, but always had issues with tips, never found the one good fit (tried all tips that came with the shure, westone star red, comply, spinfit single & double flange..)

Now I'm in the market for a new high end IEM but don't want to go custom for multiple reasons (harder to resell, need to reshell after some time, can't share sound with friends, process if unlucky can be daunting ...)

So I looked into custom sleeves/ear tips as ADV, Snugs, Eartune, Headphone.Shop, MeeAudio, UltimateEars, PacificEars...

But then I found this article that shattered my Idea... they basically say that "experts at Ultimate Ears Pro don't recommend to do it because a custom fit tip alters the sound/sound signature by changing the effective canal length - essentially changing the distance that the sound travels"

What a bummer.... so I'm asking the community! What's your experience? Isn't that something EQ could fix?

 

[surfgeorge]

I had a set of custom tips made a few years ago and like the article describes they did alter the sound of the IEMs. This also applies to custom IEMs, they sound and measure differently according to reports and measurements.
One positive outcome was however that I learned more about the shape of my ear canal, which is rather elliptical and very narrow at the second bend. This helped me understand fit issues better.

Since then I have learned a lot more about IEMs and build a quite substantial collection of tips, to help me find the ideal tip for each IEM. Each tip has it's own sound signature, sealing properties and fit. And it's really a journey to find the best tip for each IEM.
I would recommend to keep looking for more tips, and also experimenting with different sizes, it's not always immediately obvious which size is the best.
My go-to tips are: (with cost range)

Moondrop Spring - reasonable
Final Audio Type E - reasonable
Spinfit CP100 - expensive
Sennheiser Gel - super cheap, super soft, Ebay
Sony EPEX10 - cheap
Spiral Dot ++ very expensive, only from Amazon.JP

As a reference, I am currently using:
Sony IER-M9: Moondrop Spring (previously Spiral Dot++, Final Type E)
Moondrop Variations: Spiral Dot ++
UM 3DT: Sennheiser Gel
Sony EX-1000: Sony EPEX10
JVC/DROP FDX1: Spiral Dot ++
(Moondrop Blessing 2: Spinfit CP100 - SOLD)