I thought having a fun conversation with friends is about this sort of thing. I've seen longer and more intense arguments and discussions about the crucial play call in a early season football game than we put into this.
Problem with mature content illustrated
- Thread starter Flint
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I thought having a fun conversation with friends is about this sort of thing. I've seen longer and more intense arguments and discussions about the crucial play call in a early season football game than we put into this.
Not being a sports fan and no interest in football I have to agree.
Deacon
Humble Servant
If anybody is ever in the STL area and wants to experience this firsthand (and is not prohibited from handling firearms or ammo), give me a shout and we'll see if we can make it happen. A .22LR can become almost silent (can hear the bullet hitting the target as a separate sound from the shot). A 9mm or .45, they can be quieted down to the point of being able to fire them without ear protection (not recommended, but possible) at an indoor range. A 5.56mm AR-15, that's still loud. But as the video shows, the character of the noise is changed. Out past a hundred yards or so, it might as well be silent. You won't recognize it as a gunshot, but in anything approaching a noisier environment, you may not even hear a suppressed pistol at that range.
But keep in mind, these silencers get big. An Octane .45 is as long as the gun itself. That's not getting concealed easily (as opposed to these secret agent movies where there's a tiny little can on a gun carried in a shoulder holster).
In spy movie story lines, a silencer is meant to allow for killing without raising the alarm of those in the neighborhood or distant portion of the building, not to make it possible to shoot someone in a crowded restaurant and no one would notice. That makes sense. But, yes, this idea that a security guard could be shot and the cleaning guy just around the corner not realize something happened is very unlikely.
My point is that the only thing a suppressor will make nearly silent is a .22. Anything bigger is still loud. They remove the need for hearing protection when shooting outside, but they still make a decent amount of noise. It drives me nuts that people in movies shoot service caliber rounds out of short suppressors and there is almost no noise. That misleads a lot of people and misinforms the debate over their legality.
The noise level is also impacted by the speed of the bullet. You cannot suppress the sound of the bullet breaking the sound barrier. Suppressors work much better with sub-sonic ammo.
The noise level is also impacted by the speed of the bullet. You cannot suppress the sound of the bullet breaking the sound barrier. Suppressors work much better with sub-sonic ammo.
But you can buy or load ammo which propels the bullet at speeds below the speed of sound. My buddy has plenty of 5.56 ammo for that.
I am aware of that, but even that doesn't make the things as quiet as they are shown to be in movies and on TV. The only caliber that quiet is .22.
TKoP
Well-Known Member
Ok, if it's tropes or Hollywood dumm (sic) stuff that drive you crazy -- "it's military grade encryption -- it'll take me at least 20minutes to hack this..." or cars that explode ALL the time.. or not closing doors.. or security footage that you can zoom in 1000% and get a crystal clear image of the license plate... or the car that won't start when someone is being chased..
All standard pressure .45ACP ammo in 230gr weight is subsonic. Ditto most 185gr .40S&W loadings and 147gr 9x19 loads. 5.56 never will go subsonic- you do that, no point in shooting 5.56. It's just too light a bullet. That's why the .300 BLK was developed- neck up the 5.56 to a .30 cal bullet, then the heavier loads are subsonic (but useless at longer ranges).
I do my own loading for range ammo, and yes, I can download anything to subsonic velocities (speed of sound is roughly 1125 feet per second). Thing is, with a lot of bullet weights in a lot of calibers there's not enough energy left to cycle the action in a semiauto (or fully auto, if one has one). The entire package is designed around a certain amount of energy from the round- too heavy and it beats it to death, too light and it won't cycle (example: I've found that with really small 9mm pistols, 115gr loads tend to cause malfunctions- go to 124gr ammo and it works fine). One can fiddle with spring weights to make stuff work, but depending on how things are there may not be enough room to make it work with lighter/heavier springs. But even with all that, there's still some sound from a semiauto's action. The quietest suppressed gun would be a target velocity .22LR (stays subsonic- if a bullet transits the sound barrier it can get some instability from the shock wave) in a manual action rifle with a good can on it. That sort of thing you won't even hear 20 feet away in a building (assuming a measure of background noise).