I've seen this topic somewhere, but couldn't find it. Anyway...

How do you protect your hearing while using headphones, if you do?  Sometimes I'll get a volume spike after applying a plugin  or some synth presets are much louder then others (eg Rapture Pro, Z3TA).  Couple days ago the audio engine stopped with a really loud clunk that caught me off guard.

I had the bright idea today of inserting the Pro Channel Concrete Limiter on the master bus using the default setting. Seems to work but not sure if it's coloring the sound any. I'll probably have to figure out Saffire MixControl and make a bus just for the headphones.

Music is more of a hobby (well, serious hobby) so I don't get into the production stuff too much so I'm asking if the limiter is a good solution for protecting your hearing. How else would you do it?

As you can probably tell from my own posts in the Techniques forum, I am far from being an "expert." But what I will say is, yeah, in my opinion, sticking a limiter on your master bus will help with this issue.
 
However, what might be more important is the level at which you are constantly listening to. Short sharp peaks, although painful, "may" do less damage than a constant, but still bearable high listening level.
 
cheers
 
andy

Yep, not just in working with cakewalk. I'm a drummer and keeping the hearing sharp is a big issue. 
 
For recording and playing, I use a set of custom molded earplugs with a -15db insert. They are musician plugs and are meant to provide a reasonable flat frequency response. They work fairly well. 
 
For recording I put in the earplugs, then use closed heaphones on top of that for my mix. I don't even pipe any of my drum kit into the mix. The combination of the plugs and headphones allows me to set the headphone volume to match what I hear from my kit. Keeps the entire mix fairly low volume, at least for a drummer!
 
I feed the headphones from a wireless monitor amp, which provides a "brick wall" limiter. All the monitor amps that are made for studio or stage have that feature these days to prevent problems from feedback, dropped mics, or other issues.
 
If you're in the control room listening from the outputs of the DAW, you can put a brick wall limiter on the mains to accomplish the same thing. And monitoring from a lower volume is something that is hard to get used to but controls the ear fatigue and the long term hearing. 
 
gabo

For me it is quite simply keep the volume as low as is practical.  That way any unexpected noises shouldn't cause any nasty surprises.

Well, I always keep the volume down and try to remember to lower it when switching presets.  I suppose the occasional brief blast is less damaging than a continuing onslaught of loud music and that's good since it's happened a few times. I'm going to make a new project template with the limiter in place so I don't have to remember to put it in.
Thanks

AFAIK, our auditory system to some extent adapts to a continuing noise, having an automatic self protecting behaviour. You can notice this By the way you often feel the need to increase the volume little by little while you work. The volume that sounded loud enough in the beginning of the session, sounds too low after an hours work. You need to conciously avoid increasing the volume, and have breaks that "reset" your ears.
In the same, when you´re watching TV and you need to lower the volume little By little to not disturb the sleeping ones, you may find surprisingly low volume sufficient.
 
 Randomly repetitive gun shot like sudden sounds are to my knowledge the most dangerous ones.
In practice, though, continuous overload does the most damage.
 

In addition to what was mentioned, that is be wary of the monitoring level, I also take breaks every 30 to 50 minutes and let my ears breathe a little.
 
By the way gbowling, what are the earplugs that you use. I'd be interested in looking them up.

gbowling
I feed the headphones from a wireless monitor amp, which provides a "brick wall" limiter. 

Gary, I'm curious to hear about your experience with wireless monitoring. (Sorry for hijacking your thread, Bjorn.)
 
I sometimes work with a drummer who uses electronic drums, and he always monitors himself via headphones, even on stage. His headphones are plugged straight into his amplifier, though. The technique must work, because he's an incredibly tight player and a real joy to perform with. The only problem is he's not able to gauge his volume with respect to the rest of the band.
 
I recently acquired a new keyboard amplifier that has a headphone output, and I'm finding that very enjoyable for my personal one-man jams. 
 
This has got me thinking about doing all stage monitoring via headphones. I don't think it would look as weird to an audience as it might have 20 years ago.
 
The challenge is putting together a headphone amplifier / mixer into which drums, guitars and keys could all be routed, with everyone having their own monitor mix. And it would have to be cordless for the headphones since it's not practical to run long headphone cables all over the stage.
 
So I've been researching possible solutions. My experience with cordless microphones and guitars has not always been positive: batteries going dead mid-set, interference from light dimmers. I'm trying to determine if the whole idea is even practical.
 

volume knob

Bitflipper, not only is it practical but it's pretty much main stream now. Except most on-stage guys don't use headphones they use in-ear monitors. Which is a fancy word for in-ear headphones!!
 
The difference is that the really good ones are custom molded to your ears. So if you see guys on stage with what looks like custom molded ear plugs, those are actually monitors. 
 
Sennheiser, Shure, AKG, all those guys make the wireless monitor amps/systems. Just go to any music store or web site (musicianfri*, Guitar cent*, sweetwa*) all those guys and search for in ear monitors. 
 
Basically 3 components to these things. A monitor amp piece that you feed your monitor mix to, which is the wireless transmitter. A belt clip receiver that each musician wears. Plug your in-ear monitors or headphones into the belt receiver. 
 
Yep, they have all the same issues as other wireless gear. So you're fighting the same issues as wireless mics, wireless guitar/bass or whatever rigs. They all use the same wireless freqs. 
 
But if you tweak with them you can get them to work well.  Like with cell phones and other battery gadgets, the battery technology has gotten better so that's not as bad as it used to be. Still requires a bit of discipline to charge them correctly but workable. 
 
gabo