Will this work, or Can you help me? Blanks/Suppressor

[NickB]

Different that Military Blanks?

I'm almost positive the Hollywood blanks contain a ton more powder intended to create muzzle flash for film, but I'm not 100% certain of the differences. It was shocking how the Hollywood blanks tore that can apart...

[Ned Christiansen]

I don't know but I'm asking a guy who knows. He's very busy and frequently incommunicado so don't count on anything.

I guess you're gong to be someplace that is not a range. But I would like to suggest that whatever you do for this, you will probably have little (blank) ammo and little chance to test it-- and could wind up burning a lot of expensive film crew time on trying to get it to work-- and failing.

Several years ago I had a guy who was wrangling guns for some kind of South American-made movie where he was going to be shooting his HK33 and needed it to function--where to get blanks and how to make the gun run with them? was the question. Well it just wasn't in the budget or my schedule to try and figure this out plus I was not going to try to source, and attempt to ship to SA, a BFA for an HK and several hundred blanks. It was a street scene in the capitol city and they had the permits for the noise etc. but there were going to be close-ups of the guy firing the gun so it had to work. I said use live ammo! Just get some plywood and make yourself a box say 4' X 4' X 8" and fill it full of sand, and shoot into it. Could that work for you?

[Ned Christiansen]

So my friend's comments are this. Bearing in mind that for the movies, they might be looking for different qualities, like, safety first. In a recent conversation it was interesting to learn that the blank firing arrangement preferred in most cases these days is a fully blocked barrel and weak blanks that will cycle the weapon without anything coming out the muzzle. This is a safety thing and not ideal in some other aspects like recoil and flash-- but it's quiet and safe. Like, contact shots are no hazard.

He comments that military blanks are not tremendously loud compared to some movie blanks...... they considers them "1/4 flash", where they have on a set or at least have available, in different calibers, blanks made to give different levels of flash for different scene requirements. He cannot offer a source for these. He further comments that movie blanks tend to feed better as the military blanks are stubby by comparison.

Making a Hollywood BFA is as easy as it seems, apparently. Something under the FH with a hole in it-- start a little larger than the military one and go smaller is his advice.

If you are doing what I think you're doing, I think you want live ammo and the sandbox. Depending on your conditions and number of shots it seems like it could be as simple as a couple big bags of potting soil maybe....? Like just a few feet in front of the muzzle?

[eodinert]

These guys have a hollywood style blank adapter cheap:

http://www.unammo.com/