It is hilarious how bad the media is about guns, but understandable when gun people for the most part are also bad about guns.
It looks to me like a subcompact with no booster in the can. He is already dropping the gun to rack after the first shot, he knew it would need it, but it isn’t the welrod’s twist and pull.
You seem to know what you’re talking about. I have no clue or idea whatsoever about firearms. Why is he racking it each time? I’ve never seen that before in my extremely limited knowledge of guns.
Here's my understanding. Semi-automatic pistols predominantly rely on recoil to cycle the action, in one way or another.
If you are firing subsonic ammunition, to avoid the loud supersonic crack, then you typically get less recoil[1] compared to a firing supersonic ammunition due to the reduced speed of the bullet.
In some firearms you can replace parts such a recoil springs to get the weapon to cycle reliably with subsonic ammunition, but if that is not done you will need to manually operate the action[2].
A few firearms even supports disabling the semi-automatic action, as the sound of the action cycling can actually be quite loud in comparison to a suppressed subsonic shot.
It’s possible he really downloaded some 158gr+ to get it as quiet as possible. To the point it wasn’t supposed to cycle.
Typically, though, you don’t necessarily get less recoil with subs. You get different recoil.
A 115gr 9mm at 1300fps as a sharp recoil. More than enough to run the gun.
A 147 / 158 / 160+ 9mm at 1000fps, has a lot of of the same energy, and typically a slower burning powder is used. It’s also enough to run the gun, the recoil is a lot longer and pushier instead of snappy.
I don’t know. If it was me, I would have my ammunition ready to cycle the gun. Yes, it’s a little bit louder, but the chance that I need to fire more than a couple of shots in order to achieve my goal and escape, outweighs the absolute sound reduction to me.
But, there is something to say that if I filled my silencer with wire, pulling gel, it was a big can, I have some ammo that I know won’t cycle, and I didn’t think I was gonna be in a place with cameras, yeah I don’t know. Maybe it was intentionally downloaded ammo.
Your rage is misattributed: the media stories were based on what the police were saying. The reason they were at that gun shop in Connecticut is because _they_ thought it might be an unusual type of gun which would be extremely useful for narrowing down a suspect pool measured in millions.
That doesn’t mean it was a serious theory - if you have the resources of the NYPD, you might have a couple officers working on any possible angle for a case this high-profile – and it certainly wouldn’t be the first time “sources” was someone spouting off to impress a reporter.
It looks to me like a subcompact with no booster in the can. He is already dropping the gun to rack after the first shot, he knew it would need it, but it isn’t the welrod’s twist and pull.
Good for B&T sales though.