I try to wear the buds 3 pro as much as possible in order to get used to them but lately I've noticed what has to be a terrible design flaw. I own a compressed air tank at home and I use it from time to time. Whenever I do use it and I have my earbuds on, the buds make a LOUD crackling sound (best way I can describe it). It's almost as if I have a loud speaker in my ear that is connected to a microphone, and someone is blowing into it. It gets to the point that it really hurts my ears and I have to take them off. This seems like a dangerous issue and I don't see anyone else mention it. I don't remember if it happens during noise cancelling mode, but I'm sure it does too. I've never had this happen with any other noise cancelling ear buds like my Sony XM4s (the small ones).
There is a limit to the ability to cancel loud noises. When the sound to be canceled is too loud and therefore beyond the capability of the earbuds to cancel, you will experience exactly what you have described. Using your compressed air tank must be producing some very loud noise, possibly loud enough to cause ear damage if you aren't wearing any ear protection.
To me it happens when using ambient noise as well. The shop has plenty of loud noises, but only reacts that bad with compressed air. Further, the crackling sound goes away as soon as I hover my hand in front of my ear bud as if to shield it. I don't even have to cover my ears. I can even wear a light hoodie over the earbuds and it will work fine. It's interesting.
