Silencers/ Supressors

[Spike Pretorius]

All this technical blurb seems very impressive but unfortunately I can't take it seriously because of the repeated references to using full auto.
In the real world you don't use full auto fire. Period. (Maybe the yanks do but that another story) Even with an LMG you still only use short 2-4 shot bursts.
The reference to using an R1 on full auto beggars belief. Using a 556 like a garden hose is Hollywood or maybe fun n games on a shooting range.
Technical know-how in the workshop vs real world know how from the field.
I bow to your apparent superior knowledge of suppressor technology but the full auto nonsense is undermining the value of the input.

[Gunna]

I believe the "full-auto nonsense", as you put it, is more for longevity and continuous use testing and evaluation.

[Glockster]

Agreed.

[wah]

Hi if you try and sell a silencer to an army, they would want proof that the thing does not melt. Yes I know that short burst are fired, but if you build a bridge to carry 100 tons, you design it for 600 tons. Why normally only short burst are fired is that rifles climb (to the top right with right handed shooters and top left with left handed shooters). So what you say, is that is OK to have a muzzle brake to reduce recoil, but it is not OK to reduce recoil much more and reduce sound as well. Not very logical.
Even on semi auto, an experienced shooter will shoot at 100m at a rate of about 2.5 rounds per second and this will heat up a silencer nicely to he point that any aluminum silencer will be destroyed. Sionics stipulated that no more than 3 rounds should be fired in succession. If on the other hand if I know that my silencer has been tested 2000rds non-stop firing (of course magazines had to be changed) I have one worry less. Or do you think that somebody will accept an MP-5 silencer that is not full auto tested? There is an earlier post where a guy from the Freestate claimed he fired 16500 rounds while culling and I believe him. I bet this is a steel silencer. Now there are silencers like the MOOSE that get sold with a 'guaranteed life of 20 000 rds'. This would require 4 barrels and R400 000,- of ammo to prove or disprove, but some blow up with the first shot of a .300 Win Mag because there was no technical blurp by the manufacturer because he was too stupid to design the thing properly and was not able to calculate pressure and temperature.
One more thing, If I lie in an ambush, I would try and get as many enemy walking towards me as possible before they hit the deck. Without silencer, you get one burst off, hit one guy, the other are gone invisible. With a silenced rifle on a bipod such as the R-4 you would get a bunch of them. Furthermore, if a rifles recoils more than the minimum possible (with a silencer), after one shot, you are off the target area, in a featureless savannah, you have no idea where they are, your next shots will never be near the enemy. It looks to me that your experience comes from watching movies.

And if firepower (that is what we are really talking here) is not important, make recommendations that all armies in the world will be issued Ruger #1 and Center Contenders. The next thing you might suggest that only single shot weapons be licensed in South Africa. Regards

WAH

[Wanderin' Zero]

I have been very fortunate to have been gifted one of the now extremely rare R1 silencers manufactured by Mr WA Hundt (username wah) for the SADF some thirty odd or more years ago, designed to be capable of being used in full auto. It's a beautifully manufactured piece of kit and the quality is clearly second to absolutely none. He certainly is a man who knows his subject, not to mention something about firearms as a whole. A great pity indeed that he is not here anymore. His scientific knowledge in relation to firearms is such that it is well worth overlooking his rather Germanic directness. He was probably the only true firearms and ballistics scientist this site has ever had. Anyway, there it is.

A) titanium and aluminium are not suitable for full-auto extensively.

B) the silencer that blew up was MOOSE silencer elling for R4500,

C) I have analyzed this thing and found that the pressure in the first chamber was about 120bar when using 300Win Mag and the rear part will blow off at about 90 bar. This is like operating a workshop compressor at 8 bar knowing it will blow at 10 bar. Do you call this sound engineering? I call this guesswork engineering.

Lets get a few things straight. Inormally try not to talk about myself. After I read a report of the FBI testing silencers and realizing that the FBI had no clue what was going ion, 30 years ago I designed the first silencer for High-vel rifles. At that time EVERYBODY still said that HV cartridges cannot be silenced. At a stage I manufactured silencers for Armscor and all silencers used by the SWADF were made by me. My design still forms the basis of many silencers made in the RSA, some with my permission, some without.
And still today, no matter of the clever talks, few people, if any understand the use of HV silencers.
I can give some examples of idiotic statements involving quotes from "a marine sgt involved in fire arms testing who claimed that a rifle bullet has a higher vel at 200m than at the muzzle".
Or the FBI who could not explain why a silencer sounded louder (measured actually) the further they moved from the muzzle.
Or one of the first three 5.45x39 cartridges brougt by South African Journalist Al.J.Venter from Afghanistan was given to me for analysis. Of the other two, on was given to the CSIR and the other to Bob Brown publisher of SOLDIER OF FORTUNE.
The only cartridge I had enabled me to determine that the lowest possible Vo of the AK-74 would be 870m/s, the absolute max nver more than 930m/s but the most probable velocity would be 900m/s. and I was spot on.
The US Army, later got some ammo as well, made tools to make barrels, made tools to make shells and bullets - and got to 900m/s. At great cost the elite in the US over a few months did what I did in an hour.
Using imperial system in Ballistics will allow a poor understanding of the matter, so there is a lot of guesswork engineering going on. Especially in silencers. Now tell me how many round on full auto did you fire? 3 or 10? or with 11 people and eleven magazines shooting over 2000rounds during which firing the plastic front stock of the rifle melted and fell off.

You keep mentioneing that you shot all these silencers, but I asked before, how much full auto did you actually shoot?

And do you iknow that titanium is more corrosive than Magnesium or Aluminium? Titanium can only be melted on a inert atmosphere because Titanium BURNS BEFORE IT MELTS. And stainless steel when really hot might warp and not go back t its original shape. Dont hide behind military and LE, just tell me your experiences.

So just please tell me which silencers you shot in which caliber non-stop and how many rounds fired.

Regards

WAH

Hi if you try and sell a silencer to an army, they would want proof that the thing does not melt. Yes I know that short burst are fired, but if you build a bridge to carry 100 tons, you design it for 600 tons. Why normally only short burst are fired is that rifles climb (to the top right with right handed shooters and top left with left handed shooters). So what you say, is that is OK to have a muzzle brake to reduce recoil, but it is not OK to reduce recoil much more and reduce sound as well. Not very logical.
Even on semi auto, an experienced shooter will shoot at 100m at a rate of about 2.5 rounds per second and this will heat up a silencer nicely to he point that any aluminum silencer will be destroyed. Sionics stipulated that no more than 3 rounds should be fired in succession. If on the other hand if I know that my silencer has been tested 2000rds non-stop firing (of course magazines had to be changed) I have one worry less. Or do you think that somebody will accept an MP-5 silencer that is not full auto tested? There is an earlier post where a guy from the Freestate claimed he fired 16500 rounds while culling and I believe him. I bet this is a steel silencer. Now there are silencers like the MOOSE that get sold with a 'guaranteed life of 20 000 rds'. This would require 4 barrels and R400 000,- of ammo to prove or disprove, but some blow up with the first shot of a .300 Win Mag because there was no technical blurp by the manufacturer because he was too stupid to design the thing properly and was not able to calculate pressure and temperature.
One more thing, If I lie in an ambush, I would try and get as many enemy walking towards me as possible before they hit the deck. Without silencer, you get one burst off, hit one guy, the other are gone invisible. With a silenced rifle on a bipod such as the R-4 you would get a bunch of them. Furthermore, if a rifles recoils more than the minimum possible (with a silencer), after one shot, you are off the target area, in a featureless savannah, you have no idea where they are, your next shots will never be near the enemy. It looks to me that your experience comes from watching movies.

And if firepower (that is what we are really talking here) is not important, make recommendations that all armies in the world will be issued Ruger #1 and Center Contenders. The next thing you might suggest that only single shot weapons be licensed in South Africa. Regards

WAH