Muzzle Brakes, Compensators & Flash Suppressors

Muzzle Brakes, Compensators & Flash Suppressors

 

If you’ve handled or seen firearms very much, chances are you’ve seen some weapons that have funny looking grooves or holes on the sides or top of the end of the barrel. Sometimes, these are cut sight into the firearm itself, while other times, these are ‘add-on’ devices that are threaded onto the end of the barrel. What are these features for, and how can they help you?

Generally, these devices are called either muzzle brakes, compensators, or flash suppressors. While they can look similar, there are definite differences between each of these devices in what they do. Let’s take a brief look at each.

 

Muzzle Brakes

A muzzle brake is a device that vents gasses from the barrel in such a way to help reduce the ‘felt recoil’ of a weapon. How does it do that? Grooves or holes are cut at an angle such that gasses are expelled in a somewhat backward direction; this provides a bit of ‘forward thrust’ on the barrel, to help counteract the natural recoil of the gun…this means the ‘felt recoil’ of the gun (as perceived by the shooter) will be a bit less.

The graphic to the left illustrates this, showing how the gasses are vented back, away from the muzzle. Of course, since these gasses are being vented back from the muzzle, they can sometimes be felt by the shooter, or those nearby (another great reason to always wear eye protection!).  Muzzle brakes can be made with these holes/vents anywhere radially around the barrel, though some are made to vent only to the sides, to help prevent getting the combustion gasses directly back on the optics (or the eyes) of the shooter.

 

Compensators

A compensator works on a similar principle to a muzzle brake, in that it vents some of the gasses off, just ahead of the muzzle, but for a different reason. A compensator will generally have the vents/slots only along top side of the barrel; this jet of gasses will help ‘push’ the barrel down slightly, to help ‘compensate’ for muzzle flip (rise).  By preventing the muzzle from rising as much after a shot, the shooter can reacquire his sight picture quicker and make faster follow up shots.  Competitive pistol shooters often use compensators for faster shooting, but those gasses coming out of the top end of the barrel will tend to smudge any optics after prolonged shooting.  Compensators (like muzzle brakes) can be either part of the original gun design, or can be aftermarket add-ons.  One relatively new (and popular) firearm with a built-in compensator is Sig Sauer’s P365 Macro, shown to the right.  The compensator slots can be seen at the top end of the slide, close to the muzzle.  Add-on compensators are commonly attached by threading them onto the end of a (threaded) barrel.  Firearm owners who want to add a compensator to their weapon may have to buy a threaded barrel, if the gun did not come factory-equipped with one.

 

Flash Suppressors

As the name implies, a flash suppressor (sometimes called a flash hider) is used to help reduce the muzzle flash of the weapon… generally, flash suppressors are found on rifles, not handguns. While many folks think that muzzle flash is coming from unburned powder that creates a big ball of flame… that’s actually not quite the case. The superheated combustion gasses (from powder that had previously ignited) simply expand into a large “ball” or sphere; the light comes from glowing soot in these super-hot gasses, just as you see yellow and orange flames in a fire.  Often found on AR-15 platforms, flash suppressors (such as the ‘bird cage’ type shown on the left) work by helping to break up that big ‘bubble’ of expanding combustion gasses and venting them into different directions; this makes a pattern that is overall smaller than the larger single blast.

 

Other Muzzle Devices

While brakes, compensators and flash suppressors are the most common muzzle devices, there are a few others, including barrel shrouds and sound suppressors (sometimes called ‘silencers’). Barrel shrouds are meant to resemble a suppressor, but have no function, other than cosmetic. Some will argue that the additional weight on the barrel helps reduce barrel rise, but that effect is limited at best.

Suppressors are meant to reduce the audible signature of the muzzle blast… but the “ins-and-outs” of how a suppressor works is a story itself and is something we’ll tackle in another article.