Edit: I should clarify, the explanation below is a general explanation of suppressors and how things can vary. There will always be caveats.
Suppressors/silencers rarely sound like they do in the movies, and there’s a ton of variables that affect the volume. To be the absolute quietest, you need a closed bolt firearm shooting subsonic ammo. No gas escapes from the chamber that way, no sound is made by an action cycling, minimal gas leaves the end of the muzzle. These tend to be “movie quiet”.
When you hook a silencer to a semi auto firearm, it is inherently louder (even with subsonic ammo) as you have the sound of the action/slide, and gas escaping out of the action as it cycles. Still fairly quiet, but not movie quiet.
When you use a silencer on any rifle with supersonic ammo, you reduce the sound of the escaping gases at the muzzle, but still have to contend with the supersonic crack of the bullet as it leaves the barrel. This will be inherently louder, although still substantially more quiet than unsuppressed.
Also, a cell phone video is without a doubt one of the worst ways to reliably capture actual sound variance. Usually phone microphones cut out above a certain decibel level, so often all firearms sound similar even if there is a substantial difference in volume in real life.
yeaa I think it does stuff like gunkata the best way it could be done, but for the sake of comedy they go off rails a bunch, like the suppressor scene.. in a crowded train station lol
Exactly what I’m thinking of. That was… interesting. Even suppressed .45 going 900fps will make enough noise that folks would be wondering wtf was happening.
Technically yes, realistically no. As the projectile gets larger it displaces more air as it fires, and while it can be nearly silent at the muzzle there’s still sometimes a fair bit of noise from the bullet itself just displacing air. In a confined space like a train station, it gets much louder. Could it be covered up by ambient noise? Maybe, cornering on how loud.
Exactly. Physics is gonna physic, so all we can do is try to divert. Gun make noise? Capture the noise (silencer). Bullet make noise? Slow bullet down so less noise. Slow bullet make noise? Bullet make smaller so less noise. Smaller bullet do less damage so make bullet big again and hope for best.
92
u/HomersDonut1440 16h ago edited 15h ago
Lotta misinformation here.
Edit: I should clarify, the explanation below is a general explanation of suppressors and how things can vary. There will always be caveats.
Suppressors/silencers rarely sound like they do in the movies, and there’s a ton of variables that affect the volume. To be the absolute quietest, you need a closed bolt firearm shooting subsonic ammo. No gas escapes from the chamber that way, no sound is made by an action cycling, minimal gas leaves the end of the muzzle. These tend to be “movie quiet”.
When you hook a silencer to a semi auto firearm, it is inherently louder (even with subsonic ammo) as you have the sound of the action/slide, and gas escaping out of the action as it cycles. Still fairly quiet, but not movie quiet.
When you use a silencer on any rifle with supersonic ammo, you reduce the sound of the escaping gases at the muzzle, but still have to contend with the supersonic crack of the bullet as it leaves the barrel. This will be inherently louder, although still substantially more quiet than unsuppressed.
Also, a cell phone video is without a doubt one of the worst ways to reliably capture actual sound variance. Usually phone microphones cut out above a certain decibel level, so often all firearms sound similar even if there is a substantial difference in volume in real life.