Other silly things we do when bored…
Sometimes you have to do things because you can.
I present: the Silenced revolver!:
I should know sometime next week how loud it really is.
Category: Suppressors
Some more suppressor hosts
I haven’t been able to do much shooting the last few weeks due to inclement weather, and various obligations (like paying the bills…) so I took a few minutes tonight to snap a few pics of some more of my suppressor hosts.
I’ve posted about most of these before, but I figured having some better photos and talking about why I like them would be better than not doing anything at all.
I originally built this ruger charger type pistol to test barrels and such for the long awaited SBR build that I completed recently. Once I was done with the testing, I added a few parts, and built this little gun. It’s quite accurate for such a short barrel, mostly due to the Kidd barrel, but it’s also a reasonable suppressor host. I say reasonable instead of great, because the Kidd barrel is just a bit too long to keep the cheap bulk ammo subsonic, so it’s louder than it would be if the barrel was an inch shorter.
This Contender G2 hasn’t really been talked about a lot yet, but it’s really a great host. Being a single shot, there’s no action noise aside from the hammer falling, and no ejection port noise either. The 16.25″ barrel requires subsonic ammo, like any other .22 rifle, to stay quiet, but it’s very accurate, and I’ve used it to shoot pests out at the old family homestead without annoying the neighbors.
The Walnut stocked Ruger 10/22 started life as a standard pre-warning gun. I still have all of the original parts I took off (barrel and trigger assembly) but I wanted something I could shoot with the suppressor and open sights, so I built the gun using the 21″ custom made SS barrel, and put a polymer trigger group on the rifle because it was already built with the auto bolt release, extended mag release and 2# trigger. I like the rifle a lot, but haven’t had a lot of opportunity to shoot it, as I’ve been working with other guns since I built it.
I’ve talked about this flamed out bump-fire .22 rifle before on the blog, but I don’t think I ever got a picture with the can attached. The Tac-Sol barrel of course is amazing, and pretty central to the build.
Evening at the range
A few weeks before Christmas, I took Kevin (my occasional camera man) to the range, and we did some shooting.
There was no particular theme to the evening shooting, but we got a little video of a few of the suppressor hosts in action. In particular, the Mauser 105 that I’ve talked about repeatedly, and the TC contender rifle.
As always, both guns were exceptionally quiet, and very nice hosts. Almost all the shooting was with CCI standard ammo, but the smith 422 shooting was with old stash CCI blazer. Here’s the video for your enjoyment:
Stamp collecting: Ruger 10/22 SBR build
After getting my Form 1 back to build this Ruger 10/22 SBR, I didn’t waste much time. I engraved the receiver myself using an old set of gravers. It’s ugly, but readable and conforms to required spec’s.
The barrel is 3.5″ to keep even hot bulk pack ammo and CCI mini-mags subsonic, the sight is a ‘Docter’ optic micro red dot, the stock is a custom built bumpfire stock and the trigger assembly is a Kidd 2-stage unit.
Video:
Update:
I’ve made some of the last changes to the configuration, and wanted to answer a few questions. First off, I’ve added a Vertical fore-grip and extended the thumb stud. This is what the updated rifle looks like:
And I wanted to explain some of the modifications to the stock.
When I added the choate folding portion to the stock, I machined away the fixed stock to fit the folding mechanism and butt-stock section. I also cut down the front end of the stock. Here’s a comparison next to a standard AA stock:
As you can see the choate folding portion is a good fit, and allows the overall length to be much shorter.
The LMA mechanism is what allows the magic to happen, it’s a series of linear bearings and precision ground rods intended to reduce friction. The photos below show the LMA in the rearward and forward position. The block that is moved in the photos actually remains stationary in the stock, and allows the guns action to smoothly slide forward and back.
I hope that helps to answer some questions!
Doing stupid things and getting away with it.
I remember years ago reading an original Maxim silencer advertisement, and reading through their brochure. One of the things that struck me was the mention that you could fire shotshells through the suppressor just like any other gun.
If you ask online about shooting .22 shotshells through a suppressor, you will be told not to do it. You will be told this for good reason. Firing shotshells through a suppressor is a pretty bad idea. The shot could spread out and cause damage to the baffles, not to mention lead up the suppressor.
Since the Tac-Sol Cascade Ti has a generous through bore (.290″) and is fairly short and made of solid titanium, I figured I would tempt fate and fire some .22 shotshells through the suppressor to see if they worked. I figured I would know right away if they shot or the capsule weren’t clearing the suppressor.
I started out by placing some cardboard 6″ from the muzzle of the gun, and firing. The hole created was .244″ in diameter and uniform. I tried again at the same distance, the the shots were consistently less than .250″. That was good enough for me.
I started out slow, and just fired one shotshell through the can, after inspecting the suppressor and seeing no indications of contact, I fired a magazine full, still no contact. I was limited because I was shooting into the bullet trap in the safe room, so I couldn’t really back up and check out how things sounded or if it effected patterns at all. I hope to get to the range to try some more later in the week.
For now, a short video shooting into the bullet trap.
A new toy: Tactical Solutions Cascade Ti
A few months ago I got my machine-gun, the Reising model 50 in .45 ACP. It wasn’t my first time handling an NFA firearm by any means, but it was the first one I owned.
Interestingly enough, it wasn’t the first NFA weapon I bought. About 3 months before buying the machine-gun, I had paid for a Tactical solutions Cascade Titanium suppressor. I paid the dealer in July, but frustratingly he didn’t file the form3 to transfer to my dealer until the end of October. The can finally arrived at my dealer in December, With all of the holiday merriment and requisite family obligations, I didn’t get to file the form 4 until January.
Fast forward 9 months to early October, and I get a call from my dealer telling me that the 2 stamps I filed in January came in the mail. I went and picked both items up this morning. I made the quick drive to my favorite local range, and spent a little time on the trigger, and burned a little ammo.
The Tactical Solutions Cascade Ti suppressor design is several years old now. It’s a little dated in some ways, but still performs reasonably. The reasons I went with the Cascade Ti were threefold. First, it’s full auto rated. Considering my enjoyment of full auto shooting, I anticipated the future need for any can I would own to be F/A rated. Second, it’s made entirely from titanium, meaning that it can withstand cleaning methods that would literally eat other suppressors for breakfast. Third, it’s rated for magnum rimfire and the 5.7×28 round (although since purchasing mine, the company has changed the rating for newer made cascade ti’s to include the magnum rf’s but exclude the 5.7 and .22 hornet, I assume due to manufacturing changes).
Overall the can seems to be very well made, the machine work looks good and everything is nice and tight. The natural titanium finish works fine for me, but I understand it wasn’t the most popular thing out there.
The real issue that a lot of folks will have with the cascade ti is the fact that it’s a ‘sealed’ can. That means that it isn’t designed to be taken apart for cleaning. This was a concern of mine initially when looking at suppressors, but after researching the cleaning method referred to as ‘the dip’ I decided I didn’t mind a sealed can, as long as it was impervious to that cleaning method. I had no desire to take the can apart to clean it every few hundred rounds anyways.
To be completely honest, when I purchased the cascade ti, I wasn’t hoping for or expecting the quietest suppressor on the market. I was concerned with it being full auto rated, easy to clean (the dip) and being hearing safe or better. I got all of that.
The cascade ti isn’t the quietest can I’ve shot, but it does reasonably well on pistol length barrels, and does very well on rifle length barrels. Being able to shoot without hearing protection is a nice change.
I took a variety of ammo with me to test the suppressor, as well as several hosts.
The Thompson Center Contender G2 was a very good host with it’s 16.25″ barrel. With subsonic ammo, it was pellet gun quiet. I also tried CCI’s ‘quiet’ ammo in the gun, and it was indeed, quieter still.
I also brought a Ruger Charger style pistol with me as a host. I had a custom 3.5″ barrel made for the gun, and I still need to do some tuning to get it to cycle 100%, but the barrel length does keep everything but stingers subsonic. using bulk pack winchester the gun was hitting dirt clods at 50 yards without issue. In my rush to get out the door, I forgot to put any optics on the gun, so I wasn’t aiming at the dirt clods as much as pointing at them. still, it was quiet with the can, and probably had as much action noise as anything else.
Of course, the S&W 422 pistol with it’s 4″ barrel and high sight line is a natural suppressor host. This gun has proven to be an excellent host for suppressors, the alloy (not zinc!) frame seems to help keep the action noise a little quieter, the 4″ barrel keeps all of the bulk pack ammo subsonic, the sights are visible, even over a suppressor as large as 1.5″ in diameter, and the gun is accurate and easy to shoot. With Standard Velocity Ammo, the combination is very quiet.
Of course, a day of shooting wouldn’t be complete without some (simulated in this case) full auto fun! The Ruger 10/22 with the Tac-sol X-ring barrel, Kid trigger, Fostech AA2 stock, and of course, the cascade ti. This is where the F/A rating comes in handy, and also why I wouldn’t want to clean it every hundred rounds! You can hear the gun speed up while I’m shooting it in the video, that’s me finding the ‘sweet spot’ for bumping. Since subsonic ammo has less recoil energy, it takes a light touch to make the bumpfire run.
All in all, I am quite pleased with the Tac Sol Cascade Ti. It’s not the quietest can out there, but for me it’s a great compromise between weight, price, ease of maintenance and durability. It’s hearing safe on all of my hosts, and even though there are more .22 suppressors in my future, the Cascade Ti will remain in use for the foreseeable future.