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Do wax guards affect hearing aid sound quality?

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I have KS8 hearing aids with ear molds. The have fallen out and have not been replaced. Do any of the users or professionals on the forum know if the presence or absence of those guards affect the quality of the sound?

My take is that they have no impact on the sound UNTIL the receivers get wax in them. Then they will impact the sound and potentially damage the receivers.

You definitely need to get those replaced. CostCo has them, just go in and ask. I fairly sure they will put them on for you too,

We don’t want wax to build up on the receiver. There is a reason those guards are in place!

If you mean from theoretical standpoint, I’d assume that are either designed in a way to not affect sound quality (at least not in a way that average, not trained musician’s ear would notice) or that if they do, sw is adjusted to compensate for that. If it’s the latter, you definitely want to have wax guards.

One thing we know for sure, is what others said, if you don’t have them, and wax gets in, you risk receiver damage that cannot be repaired, so whole wire, receiver (and I guess mould if receiver is encased in it) have to be replaced. Who pays for that, depends on the deal you have with the place where you bought them.

When they fall out do they do so in your ear? If they fall out then there is something wrong with the molds since they do not retain them. Mine has large filters installed.

The in my Widex probably work the same way they do in other brands of aids. They plug into the receiver, between the receiver and the dome. Any wax that gets past the dome runs into the wax guard. The guard has a very small opening with a screen. Wax gets trapped at that screen and can’t get past, the guard may end up completely blocked. Replacing the guard is simple.

I’m going to assume that since the guard is meant to be installed, that the aid is calibrated for use with that guard. Once the guard is plugged you will definitely hear a difference. I would think that with no guard, you won’t hear a difference from an uncontaminated guard.

I can’t image a scenario where the guard will fall out of my Widex, I don’t know how they would have come out of yours.

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