Tim Finley

strtp,sthe air,of.
mJsteryfrom
muZZIE brakes

uzzle brakes, air strippers, ..'.,q"n',,s*!'j#w

the felt recoil from a PCP is the blast of air
call them what you wil1, exiting behind the pellet pushing-blast,
the rifle
they've been aróund for backwards. Howevé. r-uil the .ii)
the
almost 20 years and it's discerning shooter can feel the
"i"

time we understood more tiny movement. What he might

about them. Some shootersswear by them, notice too is that he can't see ,,
a few think they're httle -o.L thaÁ every pellet landing on the
ornaments and most use them without metal target.They máy see the",
fully understanding why. As a long-term paint 'splash' on, a
devotee, here's my take on the brake. painted target, but will have,
_ _A little history first. The Sportsmatch trouble seeine the
GC2 was the first production airgun to shot fall
have any sort of muzzle, brake fiited as .
, lú **
standard.I boughtthe l4th
CCZ off the
,
p^ - ^r o d) - u
-
c^t_ :i o n^,, i_. _,.*e=f::.a_l-:",..::.:.,:i.

line and still

have it
today and
rvhile, by

:"fl'u,',?""
o -#
pneumatic rifle
standards, it can't be called to.taTlv**
recoilless,it was a revelation ln the
late i9B0s. Daystate soon followed suit
as did Ripley and Air '
_Arms by fitting on a badly splattered or shot-up
simple vented muzzle devices. There hás one. The more inefficient tñe
been steady development of muzzle brakes. valving system of the PCp then the
evolving into what we now call a¡, more air it wastes propelling the
strippers. pellet and the *o."-r"óil is Telt ,,
Basicaily,the purpose of such devices is when the pellet exits the barrel.
to strip off the turbulent air from around This-is simply the 'for every
the pellet as it leaves the barrel. The theorv action there's an equal and .
being it makes the peilet more stable iá opposite reaction' bit of
flight and therefore more accurate and also Newton's laws of motion "'
directs the unwanted air blast to nesate ''
coming into eftect. Most of
some of the felt recoil of the rifle. A loi of the energy released
by the expansion
of the
compressed
air wili end
up in the
=
--,
ballistics q
:ffi of^terminal
the pellet nrrung
the target, but some is
directed into recoil, This,,.
happens most noticeablv I
with a plain muzzle, wháre
the ar blast is directed
forwards and therefore pushes
the barrel backr,tards in the
opposite direction to thi
pellet's flight.

*''o

The Stevr LG-100 and LG-l 10 PCP
rifles have a moving, spring-loaded weight
directlv beh¡nd the bore of the barrel. This
counterweight is projected backwards as
the pellet is fired to counteract the felt
recoil. It works very well at 12 ft.lbs. but is
even better at its originally designedpower
of 6ft.1bs.,making paper punching versions
of the LGll0/100 totally dead to shoot. I
own three Stevr rifles fitted with the
device and I can always see where I hit, or
indeed miss, which is very helpful on
FT/HFT courses with a tríckv wind.
With very few rifles háving such an
anti-recoil devíce, let's look at the
development of the muzzle brake into
today's air strippers. As on the GC2 the
first muzzle brakes were simple tubes with
angled slots machined into the top surface.
These were angled backwards towards the
shooter to direct the blast of air in the
opposite direction to the flight of the
pellet. The vents were also machined only
on the top of the brake as early PCPs had
the pressurized air reservóir below the
brake, with the
muzzle flush to
the end of the
reservoir. The
ft
brake acted as a front barrel support too, it
being fixed to the reservoir.A variation on
the initial simple design is to fit moderator
style baffles between the vents, and this
works very well.
The very simple angled slot muzzie
brake design was foliowed by Ripley Rifles
until they began fitting a cone inside the very
front of the brake body. The reasoning
behind the cone was to capture and direct
the air blast quicker than the first simple
brakes with no cone present. fupley maestro,
Steve Wilkins, machíned a threaded hole in
the front of the brake into which the cone
could be screwed. It also meant the cone
length could be made speciftc to the pellet
length preferred by the owner and made
cleaning with a puli-through quicker and
easier as the cone could be removed.
Another benefit was owners could fit a
moderator into the end of the brake with an
extended tube from the mod' going back to
the crowning of the barrel to turn the rifle
into a properly silenced one.
Airgun boffin, Pete Dutton, fits cones
to all the muzzle brakes he makes and with
more barrels of PCP's overhanging the air
cylinder now he cuts right-angled slots on
the top and bottom of the brake. I have one
of these on mv Air Aims MPR HFT rifle-
Pete modified ihe large MPR muzzle brake
to produce something very special. The
standard factory brake is very long with no.
cone system and has massive slots on the
top surface.Peté'snew brake has tamed the
felt recoil of the MPR to a significant
amount. That to me is the main reason to
fit a brake - to cut down the recoil.
My Steyr LG-l10 FT rifle generatesno
recoil but I wanted an air stripper type
brake to enhance the u..ur".y^ at lóng
ranges. So I went to Precision... where I
was helped by Phil Hassle.Precision Made
Custom Bits IPCBJ and Phil Has_sleis the
man I went to. He uses a modified cone
which Walther and Steyr also use on their
paper-punching pistols. The cone's
internal diameter opens towards the
target end. The cone has a larger internal
diameter at its exit than where the peliet
enters it after leaving the barrel. The
added bonus with the PCB air stripper is
the cone is adjustable for gap size, or the
distance from the end of the barrel proper
to the start of the cone This is handy when
shooting different lengths of pellets; for
example a .777 calibre, 7.9 grain Crosman
Premier pel1et,whlch I use, is 5.6mm long
and the .177 8.4 grain JSB clone pellets is
6.1mm 1ong.When I first fitted the PCB
model to my FT LG- 1 10 I shot a 42mm
three shot group at 100 yards from a
classic FT sitting position. I think this
proves the air stripper stabilizes the pellet
at long ranges. The PCB does not have
angled slots or baffles to act as an anti-
recoil device, that is not needed on Steyr's.
Phil has changed the shallow angle of the
cone to a steeper one for use on other
rifles now, where the air blast stripped off
does not travel mainly forwards as it does
on the early version he made for me.
Now a word of caution; beware of some
muzzle brakes and air strippers made by
so-called engineers and touted as the real
dea1.Not all such devices are made to the
exacting standards found in Pete and Phil's
'garden
work. Some of these shed types'
have been known to open group sizes and
increase felt recoil rather than making the
rifle more accurate or cutting down on
recoil. Just don't go with the hype. Ask to
shoot a rifle with an example of the brake
you want first, then ask the owner of that
rifle if it really works and if it altered the
point of impact when it was fitted. The real
test is to shoot it yourself, A.ty
misalignment of the brake/stripper to the
 Another thing to think about is that
moderators are fitted with internal baffles
and act as air strippers too. The air is
captured inside the body of the moderator,
exiting some time after the pellet has left
iliilii:llir:ffi ¡.:.,:

the mod', and they do have an effect on felt

:::,--:-

recoil. My FAC rifle jumps like a good'un

without the moderator fitted but acts iike a
different gun when it is. I have a moderator
on my HFT LG-110 too, as I wanted to
tame the blast of the bare barrel and it is
called Hunter FT after all. Another reason
to use a moderator for HFT is so you, and
t-he shooter marshalling you can hear the
pellet striking the metai face plate where
you score a point.
A lot is down to the actual rifle or pistol
you use as well as personal choice, whether
2. (lper chamber
angle¿iventrd brskc Mr' ilil;F

to go for a brake, an air stripper or a

moderator. Ail my hunting rifles have
moderators and all my target rifles and
pistols (apart from the HFT LG-l10) have
brakes or air strippers. A lot of 3, Baftlc Ch¡¡rber
manufacturers fit muzzle brakes or anglcd rcal.-d brake

moderators as standard now. I have a 1ot of

time for even the simplest of brakes, such as i:rllilL:ii+r

'pepper pot' versions whlch are now :i!;+r!¡irilii$1:iri1ili|N¡i:liiil¡:ii+i::i¡r'iliilÁiÍÍiiiliiii{iri:'nrir'i

the
being used by the likes of Webley, FX and
BSA. I have similar types fitted to my
rimfire and fullbore rifles and, although the
simplest of the entire muzzle brake designs
out there, they do work. Holes are drilled in
lines around a cylindrical body, and there is
no real need to index the holes to line up
vertically if they are spaced close enough, so

vcnted
5, Coñc íisight
muzz-lebr¿kc

6 OPen uone ungled

!rnted lT!\¡zllsbfaKe

7. Open c*¡c PfF

ad,iustablccone muzele brake

8 Moder.tfo¡ rvirh haffles

?. Pepperpot hrake