
CCI’s Subsonic HP, for example, reduces velocity to 1050 fps and therefore lowers the decibel level to around 68, almost half the normal high-velocity. 22 LR ammo and a suppressor are combined, you’ve got a whisper-quiet, deadly accurate small-game firearm.Īll the major ammunition manufacturers offer subsonic. 22s because they exhibit 37 percent less wind deflection due to the disproportional increase of air resistance near the sound barrier. 22 LRs are more accurate than supersonic. And as smallbore competitors know, subsonic.
SUBSONIC SPEED AND LEAVATION CRACK
So while the energy to cleanly kill small game remains, the downrange crack vanishes. 22 LR offers around 1050 and 100, respectively, a negligible difference to any rabbit. 22 LR load delivers around 1200 fps and 140 foot-pounds of energy at the muzzle. Speaking of which, rimfires are where subsonics really shine. Subsonic Rimfire Loads Offer the Best Balance for Hunting It’s like shooting a rimfire but with more punch. At the very least, this ammo is a hoot to shoot on the range thanks to its mild recoil and low noise. This type of load is ideal for home defense, where shots are measured in feet and taken in tight confines that exacerbate hearing danger. That’s marginal performance for deer and hogs beyond 50 yards, but it’ll do the job on longer-range varmints where noise is an issue. 648, at 500 yards it surpasses the energy of a full-power 55-grain.

But because of this long bullet’s incredible ballistic coefficient of. Hornady’s 300 BLK subsonic 208-grain A-Max load, for example, delivers 480 foot-pounds of energy from a carbine’s muzzle.

It should be noted that these long bullets are most accurate when fired from barrels with fast 1:7 twist rates to stabilize them at subsonic speeds. 300 AAC Blackout (which function well in modern sporting arms with a simple upper receiver swap) have become the preferred subsonic centerfire round for sportsmen, as well as for the military and law enforcement. That’s why rounds with long, large-diameter bullets like the. To compensate for less velocity, you need more mass. The other is because a lack of energy going forward equals a lack of energy going backward-and so they can fail to cycle semiautomatics. This is one reason why you rarely see subsonic. 22 LR-the difference between a load for deer and a load for prairie dogs. But if you reduce the velocity to a subsonic 1100 fps, it produces only 150 foot-pounds. At 3250 fps, it produces 1,280 foot-pounds of energy at the muzzle. Since energy is the product of mass times velocity squared, a slower bullet has exponentially less energy than a faster one of the same weight. Is Subsonic Ammo Powerful Enough to Take Big Game? There’s still the question of performance, which is significantly hampered by going subsonic. But if all we wanted was quiet, we wouldn’t pull the trigger at all. Quietest of all is to use a silencer in tandem with subsonic ammunition, which can reduce the sound of gunfire to a whimper in the rain. It’s just one way to mitigate the noise.Īnother way is to buy a silencer (legal in 39 states), which will greatly muffle those escaping gases. So while subsonic ammo does eliminate the downrange crack, and does reduce the bang at the muzzle somewhat due to its lower velocity, it won’t make your centerfire rifle sound like mouse feet on felt. Walney down the road into a fit of agita. It’s the latter bang that causes hearing damage, reveals shooters’ positions, scares game, and works Mrs. Most of the noise inherent with shooting a rifle, however, comes not from the bullet breaking the sound barrier, but from expanding gases rapidly escaping the rifle’s bore. When a moving object, such as a bullet, breaks that threshold, there is an audible shock wave that sounds like the crack of a bullwhip. What is Subsonic Ammo?Īt sea level, the speed of sound is roughly 1127 feet per second. Still, subsonic ammo does fill an important niche for many hunters and shooters. Your rifle will still go bang, and none of this quieter ammo is powerful enough for hunting big game much past slingshot range.
SUBSONIC SPEED AND LEAVATION FREE
Subsonic cartridges do produce less noise than full-velocity rounds, but there’s no free lunch-as usual.

The label on the ammo box says subsonic, so this stuff won’t spook every deer in the county like your earth-shattering aught-six does, right? Well, sort of. We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs.
