flash suppressor

[Stebalo]

Anyone have a comparison photo of a rifle being fired at night with and without a flash suppressor? I keep hearing people saying that with the AWB gone, people can snipe out windows at night with a flash suppressor and no one will ever know where the gunfire is coming from. Never mind the fact that a suppressor is in fact a legal attachment provided there aren't more than 1 other 'deadly' attachments on the weapon.

 

[RavenVT100]

I would love to have such a photo myself, just so I could show people the difference.

I would also argue that a flash suppressor makes it more obvious that the flash is indeed coming from a firearm. With the flash pattern that most suppressors cause, there is no mistaking the flash for anything other than a firearm.

 

[Aguila Blanca]

The purpose of a flash suppressor is not to make the flash invisible to the target (which is impossible) but to reduce the flash blinding of the shooter. It's a flash "suppressor," not a flash "eliminator."

 

[Brett Bellmore]

How could anyone think a flash suppressor would suppress the flash as seen by the target, or people near it? The thing DOES need to have a hole in it, after all.

 

[stevelyn]

Any military veteran who has ever participated in a nighttime live fire excercise can tell you flash supressors do not supress much flash. If nothing else they create a distinct flash signature.

 

[Librarian]

Here's one without a suppressor ; here's an S&W .357 .
Here's a whole series , but I don't read/speak German.
An M44 at night.

But I don't find any direct comparisons.

 

[C96]

The flash suppressors seem to work by breaking up the cloud of burning gases.
The military M16 one does an OK job, the four pronged one by SA IIRC does
a better job. Dillon used to sell the four pronged one.

Now that "normal" AR's are allowed in many places it would seem to be not too
difficult to do a comparison. I compared my preban to my son's various AWB
versions. It depends on the ammo, the barrel lenght and the ambient light
but they do make some difference. But they do not make you invisible like
the author of one newspaper article stated.

allan

 

[Old Dog]

Diane Feinstein, in almost every anti-gun speech she made in support of the AWB, stated that the sole purpose of the evil flash suppressor was to hide the location of a shooter as he murdered other human beings ...

Most of us know what they're really for, let's stop reassuring each other that we all know what they're for; we need to instead start educating the media NOW. The sheer volume of stupidity as far as what firearms are capable of or what their purpose is according to the media and the anti-gun movement needs to be countered.

 

[Aguila Blanca]

Most of us know what they're really for, let's stop reassuring each other that we all know what they're for; we need to instead start educating the media NOW. The sheer volume of stupidity as far as what firearms are capable of or what their purpose is according to the media and the anti-gun movement needs to be countered.

Unfortunately, not enough of "us" know what they're for.

I wandered into my local gun shop the day the AWB ended, just as a local TV news crew was interviewing the owner about the ban. He had a pre-ban upper in his hand, and was in the midst of explaining to the news hounds that the flash "hider" was to conceal the shooter from the enemy during night engagements.

I didn't want to make him look like an idiot in front of the news hounds, but I did take him aside after they left and gave him a good talking to. The notion that the purpose was to prevent (or reduce) night blindness on the part of the shooter was a totally foreign concept to him, and this is someone who really should have known.

 

[Old Dog]

(heavy sigh)

... and then there are the folks who REALLY should have known ...