One Can to Rule them All | The Gemtech ONE

October 1, 2015  
|  3 Comments
Categories: Guns

 

We don’t particularly care if you say suppressor or silencer, but we like laughing at people who passionately argue about it. It’s like drunken kindergarten Fight Club. Here’s the rundown on one muzzle muffler and a boatload of mounts. Mad Duo

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One Can to Rule them All: The Gemtech ONE

So you want a silencer for your rifle, but can’t seem to make up your mind? Maybe you don’t wanna hafta buy a new one for your 300 Win Mag after blowing a week’s pay on a 308 can?

My golden rule on this subject is that every serious shooter or silencer aficionado only needs three: a rifle can, a centerfire pistol silencer in 45 ACP and one for rimfire (note–need and want are two separate things). While the pistol and .22 cans are the most fun (and the ones most commonly seen at Nancy’s Squat’n’Gobble), a rifle suppressor of at least .308 in diameter is undoubtedly is (in my mind) the most useful. The guys over at silencershop.com recently put the latest model from Gemtech into our grubby paws and trust me — it is aptly named “The One.”

This is the one can that will fit most of, if not all your needs for quiet time with your rifles, unless you’re talking .338 Lapua, .458 Lott or .50 BMG.

The One measures 7.5” in length and tips the scales at 16.3 oz. making for one of the lightest suppressors available (among those intended for rifles up to .300 Winchester Magnum that is). Finished in black Cerakote, the tube and end caps are Titanium with Inconel baffles and the silencer attaches by means of a Quick Mount.

Gemtech has it as part of their Extreme Duty line, meaning it was specifically designed to meet or exceed SOCOM standards and will function on short-barreled rifles.

Silencer Shop shipped us (meaning me, the Mad Duo, and this surprisingly hot homeless chick hitchhiker they picked up on the drive over) the first model that they received for a test and review. Being decent fellas with superb taste in friends (and beer), they also set us up with a set of mounts.

Said mounts replace the rifle’s flash hider and allow the One to be moved from host to host. We ran it on a Mossberg MVP, IWI Tavor, Stag Arms 300 Blackout and a DPMS LAR-10 in 308. Unfortunately, we had no test rifles with short barrels or in 300 Winchester Magnum on hand, but these four long guns worked plenty well for a decent overview.

mount

Mount for THE ONE

Range Day

Range Day

Percipient Appraisement

We first ran into problems with the Mossberg MVP. The front sight touches the ass-end of the threads on the muzzle and thus prevented the silencer from pushing down and locking onto the mount. A quick call to Gemtech had an extended mount sent overnight and we were back in business the next day.

Mossberg MVP Patrol with Gemtech ONE

Mossberg MVP Patrol with Gemtech ONE

There are those who might question the wisdom of a .30 caliber can on a rifle with a .223 bore, but the extra volume of the silencer makes it more effective than a dedicated 223/5.56 can because there is more room to trap the gases. Much as with the dancing waitresses at Nancy’s, this is probably the equivalent of throwing a hot dog in a hallway. Most importantly though it’s about that quiet.

The MVP was pleasant to shoot suppressed as there was no back pressure like you would find in a semiautomatic rifle and it measured an average of 96 decibels on our Sound Meter phone app.

Next, we moved up to the Stag in .300 Blackout. Here we quickly realized one of the benefits of this type of silencer overrunning a 9mm or dedicated .300 can is that we could safely and quietly fire supersonic and subsonic ammunition without risking injury to ourselves or damage to the rifle or silencer. As expected the subsonic was notably quieter, but the supersonic ammo was not that far behind.

Stag Arms in 300 BO w Gemtech ONE

Stag Arms in 300 BO w Gemtech ONE

We had a bad experience running the Tavor with silencers in the past due to the gas leakage from the “sealed ejection port cover” on the non-ejecting side of the rifle, but have since upgraded to the FLEX mount adapter by Gear Head Works to fix that issue. We detected more noise from the rifle’s action (which makes the Sound Meter app kind of useless with semis) but the actual shots were almost as quiet as the MVP.

The ONE mounted on an IWI Tavor

The ONE mounted on an IWI Tavor

Lastly, we tried it out on the DPMS in 7.62 NATO and found the can to be completely hearing safe. We were itching to try it on a 300 Win Mag, but alas had to get the One back to Silencer Shop to make it available for another reviewer and so were unable to do so.

Conscionable Conspectus

More than just a glorified range toy, an effective rifle suppressor confers numerous benefits and is probably the most practical and useful of everything confined by NFA regulations. While most of us agree they should be unregulated, at this point they’re not; thus it is the one accessory we think every serious shooter should consider, despite expense, paperwork and approval timeline.

Speaking of paperwork, excluding the drafting of a trust (if you go that route), the total effort required by a Form 4 is that necessary for the buyer to sign his name on a form the dealer fills out. The “too much paperwork” nonsense was created by people who know two things about the subject (“Jack” and “Shit”) and are the same types that repeat the other NFA RUMINT so often bandied about. You’ve heard it before. “That gives the Feds the right to come into your home 24 hours a day without paperwork!”

Nothing could be further from the truth. If you ever hear someone repeat that, wait till they fall asleep and then beat them with a baseball bat.

 

Gemtech lists the One with an MSRP of $1025. Actual price will probably be a little cheaper. There is an insane amount of value packed into this model and an exhaustive list of calibers that the silencer can be used on, so our considered opinion is it’s well worth the money. It should be noted that many of the calibers it fits are traditional hunting calibers and not necessarily what we would consider a tactical rifle; meaning that this would be a good option for someone who wants to hunt with their suppressor where it is legal.

View of THE ONE from the front

View of THE ONE from the front

Me and the Mad Duo and that hitchhiker they brought (she actually cleaned up real nice after four showers) would like to give a special Thank You to Silencer Shop for allowing us the opportunity to take the One for a test drive. They are changing the way NFA works for everybody via their ordering system and the steps they take to guarantee our 2nd Amendment rights. They make the whole process extremely retard proof, which is great for us!

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Mike Searson

Mike Searson

About the Author

Mike “the Mook” Searson is a veteran writer who began his career in firearms at the Camp Pendleton School for Destructive Boys at age 17. He has worked in the firearms industry his entire life, writing about guns and knives for numerous publications and consulting with the film industry on weapons while at the same time working as gunsmith and ballistician. Though seemingly a surly curmudgeon shy a few chromosomes at first meeting, Searson is actually far less of a dick and at least a little smarter than most of the Mad Duo’s minions. He is rightfully considered to be not just good company, but actually fit for polite company as well (though he has never forgotten his roots as a rifleman trained to kill people and break things, and if you look closely you’ll see his knuckles are still quite scabbed over from dragging the ground). You can learn more about him on his website or follow him on Twitter, @MikeSearson.

3 Comments

  1. Mad Duo Mike

    Thanks guys. Makes sense on the sound meter app now that I think about it with what you both said. GemTech does promise a 32 Db reduction with the ONE. Guess my quest for a reliable sound meter less than the cost of a transferrable MG is back on!

    Yeah I didn’t realize the Tavor was that bad until I tried it with the SAS cans about a month ago and my face felt like it was on fire for 2 days! GearHeadWorks little device makes all the difference there.

    Reply
  2. Knownothing

    Hey man, just to let you know, I do not think the sound meter app is able to effectively capture the actual decibel level emitted due to limitations of a phone’s microphone. I say this partially because I’ve used the app and it has maxed out at 96 dB when it should’ve been louder and I have heard of this happening to other people before. 96 decibels also seems pretty low for a center fire round. Other than that great article and I did not realize the tavor had that problem.

    Reply
    • Mad Duo Merrill

      This is true. Microphones on phones and video cameras are optimized about for the range of the human voice with a small envelope of volume and that’s about it (if they weren’t, you’d go deaf when watching a youtube video with someone shooting).

      Reply

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