My father loves his AR, which is currently a ban-era neutered SP1 with a Bushmaster lower receiver and A2 furniture.  The light pencil A1 barrel is nice,  and keeps the weight down, and accuracy is quite good.  It's a neat rifle.

But...he has considerable hearing loss and shooting his rifle isn't going to make it any better.   So we started discussing the options,  and he's interested in getting a 9mm or .45 ACP upper conversion for it,  and also he's interested in a silencer.    

I know about the legal issues surrounding a silencer.   Form 4, background check,  200 dollar transfer tax,  etc...  

But who's a good source for silencers?   I don't have any info on who makes them or where to get them.

Also, I'd like to learn about the various .45 and 9mm upper conversions that are available.   Any info you can offer is going to be helpful.

The objective is to create what is essentially a silent rifle.  I expect to run subsonic ammo in it, and with an effective silencer the result should be a rifle that makes very little noise, and most of that will be from the action cycling.      This is probably the only kind of rifle that he could shoot without damaging his already very bad hearing even more.

Thoughts, comments, suggestions?

Chris

Hearing protection...of course I know that!   Hell,  I wear hearing protection every time I start up the lawnmower!    He always uses hearing protection when shooting or working with loud machinery, too.

My father uses custom fitted 30 dB plugs AND 20 dB rated muffs on top of that, and it's STILL not enough for him to shoot without it hurting his hearing even more!     It's really sad,  but he does want to shoot if he can do so without wrecking what's left of his hearing.   As it is now,  he has to be watching my lips and I have to speak clearly and fairly loud for him to understand me.    It's pretty rough.

CJ