Short barrels and muzzle flash

[yorketransport]

There have been a couple threads over on LRH lately where people ask about building a short barreled rifle, and they always get a bunch of people telling them what a bad idea it is. It always leads to guys who have limited experience with short barreled rifles talking about what a waste it is to shoot a 20" barreled rifle in any given caliber and how the muzzle flash will be so bright that it'll show up on satellite photos. Since I've spent a decent amount of time playing with specialty pistols with barrels ranging from 14-20" I thought I'd work on giving some real world results of shooting various chamberings from short barrels.

I've had specialty pistols in about 30 different chamberings ranging from 221 Fireball up through the 338 SnipeTac in barrel lengths ranging from 14" up to 20". I'm pretty comfortable with my level of experience in this area. Yes, there will be some muzzle flash when you shoot a short barreled gun at night. It's really not that far off from shooting most chamberings from a longer barrel though. I don't have very many guns any more where I have the match pair of rifles and pistols but I do happen to have a matched pair in the most extreme example I could think of, the 338 SnipeTac. What better way to test the blinding muzzle flash of a short barreled gun than by comparing identical loads burning 140gr of powder in 20" and 30" barrels right at dusk?

And here's a 338/375 Ruger burning 77gr of powder from an 18" barrel at roughly the same time of night. If Jasnt can get a video of his new 338/375 Ruger rifle right at dusk that'd be a great comparison!

I'll get more videos of some of the other guns as I get time.

[CAMPMEAT]

 

[Biggerhammer]

I can get way more muzzle flash than that out of a .45 ACP and Blue-Dot.

[jasnt]

Will do 👍🏻

[mountainman]

Its all in the powders used👍

[Biggerhammer]

My M1A SOCOM. 168gr Blackhills Match )))))) 16” bbl.

Much better than Blue-Dot! Gotta love it!🙃 Yorke’s pistol and rifle have a incredibly low flash signature. Considering the amount of powder being burnt.

[Yondering]

Its all in the powders used👍

Yes, absolutely. Some powders are very flash suppressed, and some are not. I really like short barrels, but there's no denying the increased blast.

Here is an image sequence of a shot from my 12.5" 6.5 Grendel. Powder used was ~30 grains of CFE223, which gives the best performance for that 123gr bullet weight in that cartridge. This wasn't at dusk, just mid-afternoon on a typical wet side cloudy fall day. The flash is normally daylight visible even in full sunlight.

This gun has a single port brake, which directs the flash out to the sides instead of just a big fireball.

animation here: http://i.imgur.com/4K9xu5g.gifv

[Biggerhammer]

Way cool series! I don’t mind muzzle flash. It’s not like the majority of us are shooting in caves.😊 Just part of the game. In over thirty years of reloading I have never purchased a rifle powder with muzzle flash in mind. Burn rate comparable barrel length yes but muzzle flash has never been a concern.

[yorketransport]

Its all in the powders used👍

That’s it!

I’ve had people tell me that a faster burning powder won’t have as much of a flash. Those pics of the 308 and the Grendel do a great job shooting down that theory.

[mountainman]

Hopefully you got my tongue-in-check sarcasm lol😉
Out of all the specialty handguns I have owned over the year, the craziest for flash was a Lone Eagle in 22-250. No matter powder or load, you could start a campfire from 50 yards with it lol! Not so good for nighttime varmint hunting😀

[Yondering]

Its all in the powders used👍

That’s it!

I’ve had people tell me that a faster burning powder won’t have as much of a flash. Those pics of the 308 and the Grendel do a great job shooting down that theory.

It's not really about burn rate though (and even if it was, it'd be relative to the cartridge capacity). Some powders just flash more than others.

For example, look at the 10mm pistol cartridge with full power loads: Blue Dot and AA9 are both of similar burn rate (Blue Dot is slightly faster), and both make similar velocity in that cartridge, but are very different in flash. Blue Dot makes huge bright daylight-visible fireballs, but AA9 is flash inhibited and makes almost no flash at all even in the dark.

The CFE223 powder used in my Grendel load above is obviously not flash inhibited. Some of the other powders appropriate for that cartridge don't make nearly as much flash even in that short barrel, despite making almost the same velocity and being about the same burn rate.

Mountainmain, I'm not sure why you meant the statement about powders as sarcasm; it's absolutely correct.

[jasnt]

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[Yondering]

Looks like a little more flash from Rl17 than from H4350 - that matches what I've seen in my Creedmoor as well (with only about 60% as much powder).