Thread: Suppressor effectiveness - Think about this!

Originally Posted by Tentman

The supposed noise from "bullet flight path" of 150 dB must be quite close to the muzzle or otherwise those people who mark targets would be as deaf as posts I'd think - and I've done enough of it, in the old days hardly anyone wore ear protection doing it, even now heaps of people don't bother and its certainly not mandated on range operating procedures.

No, the bullet flight noise is usually taken 90 degrees off the axis of the bullet path and one meter to the side. It is irrelevant how close the actual gun is (past 100 meters anyway). The only factor is the size of the bullet and that it is still supersonic. The numbers indicated are consistent with tests done by Dater in the states of 152 for 308 and 147 for 223. I have not recreated these tests because the current body of knowledge is pretty well defined.

Doubling the distance will roughly drop 6db. So when patching in the butts you will be around 2m from the bullet flight causing a reduction. I usually wear spongies when patching.

Tuukka, can you link the original article in Finnish? Usually tech articles are decipherable even if I am illiterate in the language.