This is a design / legal question I've been wondering about.
If you take a "normal" silencer design that has an outside tube and inside baffles and you shorten the outside tube to half its length so that the internal baffles are open to the air in the front half ,is it still considered a silencer or a is it a flash suppresser or muzzle brake? So in effect it would be 1/2 silencer on barrel end and 1/2 Muzzle brake on exit end. thanks rj

If the device reduces the report of the weapon, it is considered a silencer by law.

Thanks for your quick reply. Now I know, rj

Even if the suppressor part was cancelled out by the muzzle brake part, i.e, the device actually made the report louder, or it just broke even, it would almost certainly still be a "silencer" in Federal eyes, since it would clearly constitute intent to manufacture a silencer, even if it did not work. Quite a number of people have gone to jail for building machine guns that don't work, and never could, but Uncle Sam was not feeling merciful.

poikilotrm wrote: ↑Thu Nov 21, 2019 1:07 am If the device reduces the report of the weapon, it is considered a silencer by law.

Even if it doesn't but was designed and intended to, it's a silencer.

18 U.S.C., § 921(A)(24)

The term “Firearm Silencer” or “Firearm Muffler” means any device for silencing, muffling, or diminishing the report of a portable firearm, including any combination of parts, designed or redesigned, and intended for the use in assembling or fabricating a firearm silencer or firearm muffler, any part intended only for use in such assembly or fabrication.

Even empty tubes with end caps that have a hole are considered silencers (which is why I can recore suppressors that didn't actually have cores when they came in)

And remember that each part is a silencer in and of itself, so those exposed baffles would each be considered a silencer.

If you try to make a silencer, but actually make a "loudener"?? , then the government has to prove intent to make a silencer. All you have yo say is you were making a muzzle brake. The parts thing can get thorny though.

poikilotrm wrote: ↑Fri Nov 22, 2019 8:22 pmAll you have yo say is you were making a muzzle brake.

Ask Sig how well that worked-out for them

T-Rex wrote: ↑Sat Nov 23, 2019 7:32 am

poikilotrm wrote: ↑Fri Nov 22, 2019 8:22 pmAll you have yo say is you were making a muzzle brake.

Ask Sig how well that worked-out for them

Sig expressed design intent for end users to put tubes over their muzzle brakes

fishman wrote: ↑Sat Nov 23, 2019 9:08 amSig expressed design intent for end users to put tubes over their muzzle brakes

This is irrelevant and never revealed in the actual court case.
Sig presented a design that had a purpose other than that of a silencer. Which makes it, by definition, not silencer.
If you read the court case, the only time the ATF was able to reduce the report of a firearm, during testing, was when they put a tube around the device.

T-Rex wrote: ↑Sat Nov 23, 2019 11:49 am

fishman wrote: ↑Sat Nov 23, 2019 9:08 amSig expressed design intent for end users to put tubes over their muzzle brakes

This is irrelevant and never revealed in the actual court case.
Sig presented a design that had a purpose other than that of a silencer. Which makes it, by definition, not silencer.
If you read the court case, the only time the ATF was able to reduce the report of a firearm, during testing, was when they put a tube around the device.

My memory on it is hazy, but wasn't the issue with the Sig brake that it had a shoulder at the rear and a nut at the front, thereby allowing it to be made into a suppressor simply by installing a tube? Same thing that got a bunch of similar Chinese "muzzle brakes" seized recently?

ECCO Machine wrote: ↑Sat Nov 23, 2019 1:12 pm My memory on it is hazy, but wasn't the issue with the Sig brake that it had a shoulder at the rear and a nut at the front, thereby allowing it to be made into a suppressor simply by installing a tube? Same thing that got a bunch of similar Chinese "muzzle brakes" seized recently?

There were 2 big points, made by the gov.
1. When a tube was around it, it reduced the sound of a firearm.
-Well, no s--t. Put a tube around (probably) any muzzle brake and the same should happen.
-However, a tube was not included, when Sig sent the design in for clarification.
2. The muzzle brake had the exact part number as the core to Sig's silencer (because it was the same part).
-Again, this point should only seal the deal that it's not a silencer. It clearly shows dual usage and doesn't meet the definition of silencer.

Alas, this is not how the court saw things.
The kicker is, that at almost the exact same time, the ebay guy was in court defending those monocores he was selling as muzzle brakes. ATF didn't even attempt to test fire it, with or without a tube. Court found him not guilty.

The Chinese ones come drilled and with a tube. I'm one for ambiguity, but that thing is definitely a silencer.

I am not a lawyer ( I am a Private Investigator) but if your defense to a criminal charge of illegally manufacturing a silencer is to just explain to the nice people in federal court that your "silencer" does not actually work, and it's really just a muzzle brake, you may be disappointed. Rational, plausible, and even completely truthful communications to prosecutors are generally not a sound strategy. The "Burden of Proof", like the "Presumption of Innocence", are largely sophistry.