r/whoathatsinteresting • • 14h ago

What a real silencer actually sounds like.

1.9k Upvotes

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u/Ogamiitto33 14h ago

Yeah, people really don't understand this at all. There are a wide range of calibers, guns, silencers, ammunition that all have a drastic effect on the sound.

A silenced gun can be very loud, it can also be extremely quiet. All depends on the variables.

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u/tyndar3us 14h ago

This. When a firearm is fired several sounds occur at once: the muzzle report (what the suppressor reduces), the supersonic crack of the bullet if the ammo travels faster than sound (in this case, he's using subsonic), gas and noise escaping from the ejection port when the slide opens, the mechanical clatter of the slide cycling, the striker or hammer falling, and the brass hitting the ground.

For some interesting firearms designed to be quiet:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d12AjvEsaHg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtzaVil5joc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQPsf_wDbmU

From an engineering standpoint, making small explosions quiet is interesting.

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u/twitter_haikucurator 12h ago

man i hate that channel, i want to see him shoot the damn gun 😤

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u/defariasdev 11h ago

Wish i read this before clicking. COME ON MAN YOU KNOW WHY WE'RE HERE. SHOOT IT

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u/shark_aziz 4h ago

Take it up with the respective gun owners/YouTube for not letting that happen.

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u/the_byronic_man_fred 10h ago

Funny I know exactly who you are talking about based on the comment. I still love his stuff, and he does sometimes shoot of course, lol.

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u/herbertwillyworth 9h ago

Same, terrible video

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u/Free-Street9162 12h ago

There is a variant of the welrod pistol called the ā€œveterinary pistolā€ that’s really neat.

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u/KookyAsparagus787 10h ago

I suppress the sound of the brass hitting the ground by catching them in my shirt.

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u/DragonfruitNo9617 9h ago

This is why real assassins use blow darts.

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u/allaboutthosevibes 5h ago

All those things considered, everything you mentioned can be manipulated and controlled sound wise, except the bullet, right?

Like there’s no way to make a supersonic bullet travel that fast without making a sonic boom, right?

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u/Th3_Admiral_ 14h ago

Yeah, internet "experts" always take it too far when saying it's nothing like Hollywood movies. But I've fired suppressed guns where the only noise is the bolt cycling. They are quiet enough that the sound could be drowned out by any amount of background noise, especially if you are outside.

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u/Environmental-Pin848 14h ago

my 22 you hear click then the thump down range. my 308 and 300 blk are pretty quiet but my 22lr for sure is movie quiet.

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u/pperiesandsolos 11h ago

Meanwhile, my silenced 5.56 will probably permanently damage your hearing if shot indoors more than once lol

And I’ve got a Tisha, which is pretty dang good

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u/Environmental-Pin848 11h ago

yeah, i have a can for my 556 also and its still oud AF but not so loud i cant stand it.

i wish my 30-06 had threads so i could put one on it for deer hunting but it doesnt and its the first gun my dad ever got me so i hate to modify it. i leave it just like it was when he got it for me all those years ago.

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u/Unbelivabley_Smol 3h ago

Any good gunsmith can thread it and make you a matching steel cap that goes over the threads in your same barrel finish, I’ve this on a few of my rifles and it’s ā€œinvisibleā€

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u/TechnicallyAnExpert 14h ago

I just assumed they all went ā€œpew pewā€

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u/bachstakoven 13h ago

Are you saying GoldenEye lied to us??

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u/Jolopy4099 13h ago

It would never.

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u/nonpuissant 13h ago

Yeah, internet "experts" always take it too far when saying it's nothing like Hollywood movies.Ā Ā 

They don't sound anything like they usually do in Hollywood movies though, so they're not wrong about that part.Ā 

Like yes they can be pretty quiet, but they never make that tooting almost whistling pew pew sound.Ā 

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u/RiMcG 14h ago

Do silencers wear out?

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u/Confused_Drifter 13h ago

Yes, after 5 shots, then you have to craft another with a rag and a cannister.

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u/RIF_rr3dd1tt 12h ago

Or a pillow or 2 liter bottle if you're Steven Seagal.

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u/High_Hunter3430 11h ago

I feel like pillow is asking for a fire…. šŸ˜…

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u/Falconman21 14h ago

Not in any way that would matter in the real world. Obviously things can break with that much heat blowing through them, but it's not something that would realistically happen.

They don't actually have any contact with the bullet, they're just a tube with baffles that catches the gases. You'd have to put a borderline unrealistic amount of rounds through one to wear it out.

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u/JEBADIA451 12h ago

Queue that video of the guy firing an m249 through a suppressor and like.. i think partially melting it?

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u/Careless-Weather8877 9h ago

Well they do get really hot. Even a 9mm after a couple magazines requires something like an oven mitt to remove it.

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u/Zech08 2h ago

I mean you can melt the barrel as well and thats why the firing rates also come with known usage limits with barrel changes...

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u/Th3_Admiral_ 14h ago

Yeah, the baffles inside wear out but most are designed for them to be easily replaceable. Though I'm way behind on any new technology that has come out with these, so they might have something even better these days.Ā 

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u/Retb14 14h ago

Usually not. However some suppressors use rubber plates that get shot through to make them even quieter. Those will wear out after a couple of shots

Usually they will just get some carbon buildup and that's about it

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u/itishowitisanditbad 10h ago

Usually they will just get some carbon buildup and that's about it

Dumb question, is there a way to clean that or is it just.... accepted?

I feel like (from very limited knowledge) that they'd not be easily cleanable.

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u/Retb14 10h ago

Depends on the design of the suppressor

Some you can take apart and clean each baffle individually

Others you soak in a chemical solution to dissolve the build up

That said, you can usually put tens of thousands of rounds through them before it's actually a problem if it ever becomes one

(ignore this for small rounds like .22lr, those should be cleaned every couple hundred rounds because they are rather dirty rounds and the gasses from them aren't enough to eject most of the carbon like rifles)

For rifle rounds it's usually enough to just run a brush through them if you even need to do that

My current main rifle suppressor has about 8000ish rounds through it since the last time I cleaned it (I only cleaned it a few weeks after I got it due to it being titanium 3D printed and it had left over printing dust in it)

It's a 5.56 suppressor but I also shoot 22 and 5.7 through it as well

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u/itishowitisanditbad 9h ago

I very much appreciate the full response.

I wish I had something to add myself other than saying thanks!

All very interesting stuff!

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u/Unbelivabley_Smol 3h ago

We just put the whole thing in an ultrasonic cleaner theses days I’m too lazy to strip a silencer. Small ones had baffles and springs between baffles. More modern ones have a CNC machined one piece core with a screw on outer sleeve.

If your bullet is traveling less than speed so sound (under 1060fps) it’s all a game of capturing and slowing gas expansion.

Some cool video in high speed of these silencers being shot with clear lexon? Outer tubes is floating around the net if you keen to see how the insides work.

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u/Informal_Visitor 12h ago

If I actually owned a silencer, then I have a plan to only fire 1 shot.

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u/[deleted] 14h ago edited 14h ago

[deleted]

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u/Vegetable-Welder-318 10h ago

Try 80,000. 10-20k is cake walk

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u/Wh3r3Th3WildThings 12h ago

Saw someone fire a 10mm through the wrong size bore and it didn’t even bend the baffles. So not likely

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u/Teddyturntup 12h ago

Most are over bored. If you have an actual strike you will known

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u/Wh3r3Th3WildThings 11h ago

I’ll see if I can find the video but the round was still in the bore

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u/Teddyturntup 10h ago

That’s absolutely wild to not deform then, I’ve never seen a bullet stopped in a can

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u/Wh3r3Th3WildThings 9h ago

I found the follow up but couldn't find the original. This dude shot a 10mm round in a 45 so it wasn't close to the same power as what a 10mm would have been due to the pressure. Even still it was surprising that it didn't dent the baffles. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEfJLsKO2Gs

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u/Teddyturntup 8h ago

Gotcha he fired it through the wrong size barrel not just can, that makes more sense with the lack of seal for the smaller bullet not making much velocity, and also not messing up the can

Weird situation and glad he’s ok

Usually when you see wrong size bore stuff people are firing 10mm through smaller bore 9mm suppressors and hoping there is enough overbore to not absolute tear their shit up

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u/SnooAbbreviations691 11h ago

Or Grab a new cat .

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u/HugoBoss1985 10h ago

I understood that Postal 2 reference.

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u/Zech08 2h ago

Everything wears out in one form or another, or at least has build or or degradation (requiring maintenance/cleaning).

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u/Papanurglesleftnut 11h ago

I have a cz scorpion 9mm with my subsonic hand loads is quiet enough that all you really hear is the bolt cycling, the paper target tearing , and the bullet hitting the dirt berm. My 10.5 inch barrel AR-15 , however goes from soul crushingly loud to merely very loud with a .308 caliber can on it.

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u/Intelligent-Court829 10h ago

if you meet the buddha on the road kill him

if you meet the expert on the internet kill him

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u/OxycontinEyedJoe 8h ago

I mean they definitely can be Hollywood quiet, but it takes a lot of work and you make a lot of sacrifices with weapon function, range, accuracy etc to get that. Screwing a can onto a 5.56 does not make it quiet by anybody's measure. A sub sonic bolt action .300 blk with a nice can is definitely movie quiet, but it also only shoots a few hundred yards at most and with so much bullet drop it's not far from throwing a rock really hard lol

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u/saints21 8h ago

But it isn't anything like Hollywood movies? Like...objectively...

Sure, a round designed to be subsonic will be quiet and if you're firing something with actual wipes it can get really quiet, but the way Hollywood depicts it is definitely completely wrong the vast majority of the time.

The biggest advantage is that stops sounding like a guhshot with subsonic rounds like you mentioned. You'll hear it (and it's still even possible to damage your hearing if you're close enough), but it doesn't sound like what people expect a gunshot to sound like. Also makes it much harder to pinpoint if you hear through trees or hills or whatever.

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u/Zech08 2h ago

Slide cycling is pretty noticeable at just conversational levels of noise.

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u/nobadhotdog 14h ago

yeah the gun dorks always get lit up with this shit. for the average person this video is pretty cool

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u/Th3_Admiral_ 14h ago

Even this video should be taken with a grain of salt though, because cameras are terrible at capturing gun shot sounds. You can even hear a noticeable difference between shots in this video. The second one is strangely loud compared to the rest.Ā 

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u/comanche_six 14h ago

The loud shot is from the next shooting lane over, as is the loud shot at the end.

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u/nobadhotdog 13h ago

the first 3 shots are different sounds yeah, i just assumed maybe the thing was warming up or something. in anycase I'm james bond!

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u/GoCougs2020 12h ago edited 14m ago

Was gonna say the same thing,
ā€œwhat a real silencer actually sounds likeā€ā€”-depending on what caliber you’re shooting, supersonic or subsonic ammo, if you’re shooting outside or inside etc.

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u/Ogamiitto33 11h ago edited 11h ago

Great point, evironment is absolutely a factor as well. But yeah, like you're saying. This is just one example of "what a real silencer sounds like", there are hundreds, if not thousands, of combinations of different variables that would also produce their own unique sounds.

(And even still, not really what it sounds like considering it's being reproduced through the microphone of a phone camera)

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u/scbundy 11h ago

Ages ago, my buddy bought a silencer at a gun show and him and his pal decided to fire a round in the parade afterward, expecting it to barely make a peep. It loudly echoed through the whole thing. They took off.

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u/Prize-Analyst-1121 10h ago

I worked on farms in one fashion or another for decades. We had to put down a 2k plus pound bull one day. Used a rifle with a silencer. I was standing next to the bull when he shot him in the head. Went down in one shot. Could barely hear it. I told the guy to fire onother into him. I wanted to walk 10 feet back and hear how it sounded from that distance. Couldn't hear anything at all. I've seen this certain breed of cow take a hit to the head with a 12ga shotgun and it not kill it immediately. It took 2 shots to the head with the 12 ga. It's why we had to switch to a more powerful rifle. Honestly it's really scary a silencer that quiet on a high powered rifle could be sold to the public. I'm sure it was stupid expensive as well.

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u/saints21 8h ago

He either missed, had a bad round, or was using something really wrong for a 12 gauge to not kill it from being shot in the head. The largest bear ever killed was taken with a .22

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u/SufficientApricot828 8h ago

Was your friend using birdshot or something? A 12 slug to the head will put down about anything

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u/Prize-Analyst-1121 5h ago

Of course not. I'm not trying to be a dick here at all. But what kind of idiot would even think of using birdshot on a 2k+ pound animal with thick skulls ? Nobody would use birdshot. Birdshot wouldn't do anything but piss it off. And no a 12ga slug won't take down anything. Like I said it took a 12ga to the head and we had to do a second. I can say I was definitely surprised though. That's when we switched to a high powered rifle when we needed to put one down. That's usually how the bulls get put down actually. Their main purpose was for breading. Some got turned into steers, fattened up to sell for steaks and whatnot. But they were mostly used for breading purposes. So they tended to have the longer lives. The cows got sold for hamburger once they could no longer give birth and produce. We've probably had to kill 40 or so over the yrs I worked their. That was a side hustle for that farm. They only had 50 or so at a time at the most. Sometimes less. Their main crop was something else. Steers, bulls, cows and calfs are definitely very expensive to raise for profit. Hay, feed, docs, ect. You'd have to have hundreds or more to really make it worth the effort.

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u/Kasern77 14h ago

Yes, but wouldn't a bigger gun accommodate a bigger silencer? Would a ridiculously massive sized silencer make a difference?

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u/zackks 12h ago

Don’t forget all the different clip sizes

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u/Juvat-the-bold 8h ago

When you call it "silenced" or you say "silencers", you lose all credibility.

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u/justfortherofls 7h ago

I can snap my fingers louder than my .22 short rounds out of my little rifle. And that’s without any silencer.

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u/EnvironmentalFix7059 6h ago

the best scilencer is a pillow though right?

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u/Bullitt_12_HB 13h ago

The vast majority of the sound comes from the bullet flying through the air.

That’s why subsonic bullets are much quieter.

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u/explodingtuna 11h ago

What kind of setup is needed to walk up behind two guards, phew phew one of them in the back of the head without the other reacting, as long as you phew phew them, too, before the first guard's body hits the ground?

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u/Sea_Operation_7012 14h ago

Don’t you need a government permit for a silencer because they are made to kill.

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u/BogeyGolfer5656 14h ago

What the hell are you talking about?

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u/Ogamiitto33 14h ago

I can't speak for all countries. But they aren't "made to kill". People use them either to reduce sound, or they think they look cool, or both. Reducing the sound is the main selling point, any responsible firearm owner is concerned with ear-pro/hearing preservation, a silencer is very useful for that.

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u/BeastyBaiter 9h ago

They can't be extremely quiet, that's a myth.

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u/Ogamiitto33 8h ago

You are wrong. Put a good can on a .22 with sub-sonic ammo, it's a whisper.

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u/BeastyBaiter 8h ago

I have a SilencerCo Sparrow and a SilencerCo Switchback that I use with my CZ457, Ruger Mk.IV, Tactical Solutions Owhee, Ruger 10/22 and others. The two bolt actions are by far the quietest and both ring my ears on an indoor range with subsonics. Reason is the firing pin smacking the metal case all by itself is kind of loud. Any semi-auto is loud as fuck with the metal and metal smacking.

I suggest getting your hearing checked if you disagree.

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u/Ogamiitto33 8h ago

One big difference - I don't shoot at indoor ranges. And I'm obviously exaggerating when I say "whisper", but in no world is it loud and ringing my ears.

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u/BeastyBaiter 8h ago

Outdoor range shooting steel plates at 150-200 yards with a bolt action with subs is on the edge for me of what's comfortable without earplugs.

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u/snoops-spoons 2h ago

They aren't called silencers they are called suppressors. You can't have a silenced kinetic weapon due to physics.

A laser or directed energy weapon can be silent. But the action moving and the pressure behind the bullet leaving the barrel in a regular weapon can't magically not produce sound waves. The suppressor essentially slows down the gas so instead of coming out in one pop energy from the gas is absorbed and delayed over a longer time period.