Chapter 16, Page 4
The following excerpt was taken from Superior Arms, a monthly publication featuring news, reviews, and specifications on the latest firearms, military-grade tech, and cutting-edge gear available on the market.
Reviewing the ANR-291 “Whisper” Suppressor
By Aven Rode
I’ve been a product reviewer with Superior Arms for five years and I’m convinced we’ll never be able to quash the misconception that suppressor attachments can magically render a gunshot near-silent or, at least, reduce the sound to a slight pop. The interchangeable term silencer—a pet peeve of mine—does little to combat that ongoing myth.
Let’s be clear, even when using a suppressor, the average firearm is far from quiet. Though muffled, many guns can still emit a sound close to that of an ambulance siren (decibel reduction varies wildly depending on quality of suppressor, type of firearm, subsonic ammunition, etc).
Fortunately, Kraftor Dynamics has developed the ANR-291 Whisper—a suppressor that finally brings us one step closer to that desired ‘silent shot’ (we’re still not quite there yet).
The ‘ANR’ stands for ‘Advanced Noise Reduction’ and to call it a game changer would be an understatement.
We equipped the ANR-291 to a TAR-90—an assault rifle popular with private militaries. Firing an unsuppressed TAR-90 produces a noise equivalent of 160 decibels but, with ANR-291 attached, the sound produced is only a mere 40 decibels—that’s a 120 decibel reduction! By no means silent, it’s a remarkable feat nonetheless.
Unlike typical suppressors, the ANR-291 employs a series of miniaturized multi-vent neutralizers (MVN) within the attachment, causing a dramatic reduction in decibel output. Kraftor Dynamics is tight-lipped on the internal workings of their MVN system, but it appears the tech-heavy ANR-291 uses an intricate system of sonic dampeners to effectively disrupt and weaken sound waves (as opposed to simply cooling the gas within the muzzle). Herein lies the ANR-291’s disadvantage: due to this revolutionary method, the residual high-temperature/high-pressure gas inside the muzzle is not dispersed, which leads to evident muzzle flash. Most suppressors tend to reduce or eliminate muzzle flash entirely, making this the ANR-291’s singular drawback. Even so, Kraftor’s latest suppressor offers a reduction in noise that has yet to be rivaled and, for many, will serve as an acceptable tradeoff.
Danger Zone One. Story by Midnight. Art by Salaiix.
So far, have only been introduced to ‘suppressors’ via media (movies and TV), and they have never been silent
Reason most people don’t take notice of them, is because it’s ‘easy’ to ignore a single ‘pht’ than a load ‘bang’
If ‘normal’ surpressors reduce the muzzle flash why not stack the units, use the first to reduce Most of the noise, and the second to reduce the Flash while still reducing some of the remaining noise? We stack filters in other places to increase their effect, why do guns only allow 1 attachment? Just like stacking other filters I’m sure there’s a point of diminishing returns, but I’ve never heard of anyone using more than one. On a rifle I can’t see that it would make it that much more unwieldy.
You can and it has already been done by increasing the length, but there are significant drawbacks to this. https://www.quora.com/Can-a-gun-silencer-be-stacked-to-provide-better-silencing
Here in Norway an arms store once made full barrel length silencers for .22 rifles. When you fired that with subsonic ammo, the loud click when the firing pin hit the cartridge was the most noticeable sound.
Though, it wouldn’t work on any larger calibers, even if you were to use subsonic ammo. Normal ammo is supersonic in most cases, and the bang from breaking through the sound wall is very loud.