MURRAY — A Utah team is challenging the 110-year reign of baffle suppression technology in firearms.
While the traditional suppressors offer some protection to firearm operators, the baffle system also brings a slew of negative effects along with the benefits. Murray-based
Operators Suppression Systems, led by U.S. Special Forces veteran Russ Oliver, has developed a solution with its flow-through suppression system.
A video introducing the new technology quickly gained traction online, garnering more than 1 million views so far. It took the better part of a decade for the flow-through suppressors to go from proof of concept to its current stage.
"You have a design that creates better signature reduction, without the adverse effects," said Oliver, the founder and president of OSS. "What that does is take an aspect or capability that was, and has always been, very limited and makes it available to every soldier all the time on the battlefield."
The technology
The underlying issue with modern weapons is that the baffle system retains pressure inside the barrel and then increases the operating system's speed as it cycles, according to Oliver. He said ultimately that reduces the life cycle of the weapon system, but more importantly it also affects the operators themselves by exposing them to high-velocity gas being blown backward out of the chamber into their face.
Due to these negative aspects, suppressors are only used for very specific missions even though all soldiers and members of law enforcement could benefit from reducing signatures that give away position like heat, sound and flash. The OSS team hopes its technology will eventually be procured by the military, allowing more people to benefit from suppression.
OSS suppressors provide reductions in sound and flash, without decreasing the life cycle of the weapon system and releasing gas. This is because the flow-through technology allows gas to expand forward through a series of channels to come out of the muzzle, according to the company. One physicist described the technology as being "like a jet engine in reverse."
"We're big on the science here," Oliver said. "The whole thing is based upon basic physics, just applied in a little different way than traditionally in suppression or firearms."
OSS recently started a large push into the civilian firearms market, with multiple
dealers in Utah carrying the flow-through suppressors. The company presented its tech at the Las Vegas
Shot Show in January, providing the opportunity for people to try the suppression technology with about 90 types of weapons systems.
The inspiration and teamwork
Oliver, who has spent most of his life in Utah, has been a firearms dealer for more than two decades. He said he worked his way through the industry, going from fixing guns in his garage to working with wholesale distributors and large-scale manufacturers. While working as an adjunct firearm instructor for a group of Green Berets preparing to go to Iraq about 11 years ago, he was impressed by the life they led and decided to join the army himself.
At the age of 31, Oliver entered basic training. He worked on his designs for a new type of suppression system from Fort Bragg, sending the drawings to a manufacturer in Utah and enlisting a friend who was a SWAT sergeant in South Salt Lake City to test the suppressor.
"He would shoot it and get back to me and tell me, 'Hey, this works and this doesn't work' and really helped me to continue the evolution of the design while I was gone," Oliver said. "Local law enforcement, SWAT guys all throughout Salt Lake Valley, also had a lot to do with where I came from and getting to know firearms... what worked about suppression with them and what didn't."
The support Oliver received from local law enforcement and others from his firearm distribution and training days has led him to credit a large number of people with the flow-through suppression system's success.
"If there is one thing that I had to say makes OSS, it's the combination of personnel that have been here and really pushed this to realization," he said. "I've seen a couple of comments online (saying) the engineering is genius, and actually as much as I take that as a compliment the truth is we're just incredibly stubborn here. We had a thousand of them that didn't work before we found the one we did."
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Originally Posted by JeffinNZ
