I bought a FN510 last week, and am taking it out the range Friday.  

I'll try it out with my SilencerCo Osprey, in .45, to see how things work.

Couple of questions for those who've run cans on 10mm:

How well do they suppress?  I'd think they would be louder than 9mm or .45's - supersonic like a 9mm, with lots of gunpowder like a .45.  That said, that's the same as any rifle carttirdge, and yet there's a huge difference between suppressed and not with a rifle.

For a good .45 can (I have the Osprey, and an AAC .45 TiRant), any issues with pressure for most 10mm loads, which seem to be .40 S&W power levels?  For instance, the blasting S&B ammo I'm going to use is a 180 grain bullet at 1050 FPS (advertised at 1150 FPS but users say 100 FPS less in reality) or so, so that should be fine.  Is there a certain muzzle energy loading that you'd not use in a .45 suppressor, such as anything above 550 foot pounds of energy?  

Subbed for updates.

Just got my CGS Nautilus out of jail and planning to try it out on my 10mm Banshee but haven't had a chance yet.  Had many of the same concerns as you regarding pressure but from what I could glean most reputable .45 cans should be gtg.

From a quick browse of Midway and 10mm ammo, there seem to be 3 big catagories of 10mm ammo from an energy standpoint.

.40 S&W in a 10mm case - 180 grain FMJ at 1050 or 1100 FPS, and less than 500 ft-lbs. of muzzle energy.  These are the blasting loads from Euro companies, Federal Eagle, etc.

Lower power 10mm loads - 180 grains at 1150 or so FPS, or 200 grains at 1100, and 500-625  ft-lbs. of muzzle energy.  These are the defensive loads from Federal, Winchester, and Sig, which Sig being at the higher end of the power range.

Full power 10mm loads - 180 grains at 1300 FPS or 200 grains at 1250 FPS, the classic Norma/Bren Ten load.  These are the Underwood and Buffalo Bore loadings, and are 650-700  ft-lbs. of muzzle energy.

.40 S&W loads should be no problem for a .45 can, and I don't think the lower power 10mm would have issues either.  I would not fire full power 10mm in a .45 can unless I'd gotten the OK from the manufacture of it first.  

There are some specialty loads around 220gr or 230gr that will probably stay subsonic.

I  use a custom 220 cast bullet from mountain molds ( now retired and out of biz )

Works with my 45 octane.

I don't load it hot mainly because I'm killing paper with it.

I asked about this in AAC's industry section several years ago. Although AAC didn't reply others did so here you go;

10mm through a Ti-Rant 45?

I have a Glock 20 but never bothered to set it up for a can so I continue to use a Raptor II on my MP5/10mm subgun. Overall I'm pleased with the sound when shooting subs and I imagine the Ti-Rant would be a decent performer in this role.

I've used both an osprey 45k and tirant 45 on my 10mm.  Yes, it is louder than 9 and 45 primarily due to the supersonic crack.  My main use is hunting and I always have the osprey k on there for that role.  Definitely takes the edge off in hunting scenarios.

Handloaded 180gr, or heavier, 40SW. 10mm isn't ever subsonic unless it is loaded down below 40SW pressure, at which point you may as well handload 40SW brass. I like 180gr HP and 3.8gr of E3.

I've not tried to meter the isolated crack, but yeah, it's effing loud.  So is .357 mag, and especially .44 mag or .45 win mag



I'm not an audiologist, but have researched this phenomenon a bit, and it's the combination of the low velocity and bullet profile.  The less aerodynamic and slower moving bullets cause different shock wave forms that propagate closer together and closer to the shooter than much faster and more "slippery" rifle bullets.  The sonic crack of high velocity rounds doesn't bother me out in the open, not even the big .375 RUM.  But suppressed supersonic 9mm, .357 mag, 10mm, etc I find very offensive, similar to an unsuppressed short barreled .22 pistol

Conversely, tiny hyper-velocity bullets produce a "small" crack that seems muted/echoey and rather distant.  I barely notice it with the .17 Rem putting little 20 gr pills out at 4,300 FPS

I’ve wondered how much duration has to say about how we perceive the loudness of shots. Using arbitrary numbers, a sonic crack on a .308 will be more likely to be perceived to be loud at 5yds than at 50, and a 180@1200 fps will spend more time in a zone where the shooter will perceive as loud than a 180@2400fps. The time period where the shooter will perceive the boom as loud is twice as long.

Yes, proximity plays a huge roll.  I wish I had the education in acoustics to explain it better, but I'll do my best.

Sonic crack doesn't propagate right out of the muzzle, one can easily demonstrate this for themselves firing suppressed supersonic rounds into a "quiet" backstop like dirt at very close range.  The slower, less aerodynamic bullets have to be a lot closer, though.  In my experience, generally won't get a crack off a high velocity rifle bullet if you're within about 8 feet of that backstop,  but with supersonic pistol rounds, it's more like 1-2 feet.  Well, every doubling if distance attenuates dB by 6, so even a single event of the same amplitude is 12 dB higher at 2' than 8'.

Simple and intuitive aerodynamic principles tell us that the more surface area there is interacting with the air, the more drag we have.  While the total surface area matters, the most critical aspect is the frontal area.  Where supersonic flight is concerned, the more frontal area we have, the more shockwaves will pile up, ergo more shock waves will hit you and from a closer distance, so it's louder.  Larger objects also obviously produce larger shockwaves, which is of course why we can hear and feel the sonic boom of an aircraft from thousands of feet, but the shockwaves of the relatively minuscule bullet shed energy and become normal soundwaves over much less distance.  10mm ends up being one of the loudest because most of the bullet profiles used for the round are a truncated, and that wide, flat face causes lots of pressure to build.  As Hoser noted, when using round nose bullets at the same velocity, the sound is a little less offensive.

That certainly explains why suppressed supersonic .22lr sounds quieter downrange than suppressed supersonic 9mm flat nosed ball.

Wasn't that bad at all on my RIA

Besides being loud, the G20 with obsidian 45 gave me more hot powder blowback on my face than anything else I’ve tried.

I tried out my 510 with my .45 Osprey, and it worked very well.  Much better that I would have guessed.

Without it, on an outdoor range but with close cement walls and a tent cover, which seems to hold the sound in, it was pretty loud even with plugs and muffs.  But with the can on, a dream.  Very quiet, very little recoil, and no noticeable change in POI compared to without it.

As noted above, there was a lot of blowback to the face..  Now I tend to have lots of oil on my guns, but still there was much more blowback than even my Glock series, which is known for spitting back at you.  It was at the point that I took the can off to look at it and make sure I wasn't eroding part of the baffles out, but by looks of it, that wasn't the case, just power/oil/carbon from other range trips.

Shot it with S&B 180 gr FMJ, which are either loaded to 1050 or 1150 FPS, depending on what source you believe.  So decent power ammo, but not the 1200 FPS that seems to be baseline for true 10mm ammo compared to 40 S&W.  

Attached File

I’d guess the lower end of that.

Even 1150 is pretty light.

My target/plinking 10mm load is a 180 at 1250.
Defensive loads are 180s at 1406 avg from a 5" barrel.

It'd be nice if the 10mm case could accept longer bullets, but they start to thicken pretty far up.  I'd love to stuff them with 250 gr or heavier for some thumper subsonic loads.  But such a bullet would have to have a boat tail shape to fit the case.