After following the design development of forum member wired’s Wild Bill integral suppressors over the past year here on the CFF, I contacted him about doing a one-off custom on a Buck Mark stainless. He was great about making a couple of modifications to the front end cap design used on his OSS High Standard replicas that I requested and also slightly upping the baffle count. Cost struck me as quite reasonable, particularly given the machining standards depicted in some of his online videos, and the extremely simple user maintainability of the sealed stainless baffle system.
I’m an equal fan of both the Ruger Marks (two stainless Mk2’s, one a scoped Gov’t Target) and the Browning Buck Mark platforms (three), but the 4” bbl. Buck Mark struck me as the perfect candidate, given the design’s interchangeable barrels. He was able to bead blast the tube to match the factory slide/barrel finish. I also plan to fit it with either a factory or Tactical Solutions rear sight pic rail so I can easily add a dot sight or scope as needed. (If I hadn’t already had the SS Buck Mark, I probably would have asked wired to build one on a Mk4 stainless for me. As pretty as high polish blue is, I like the looks and ease of care of stainless.)
Given that muzzle cans like the Dead Air Mask, Rugged Oculus, and SilencerCo Switchback are so staggeringly quiet and easily maintained today, why would anyone spring for an integral that’s tied down to one gun or platform?
Well, there are still reasons, but first, a little history.
I bought my first .22 muzzle suppressor from Lynn McWilliams at AWC in 1989, around the time Doc Dater was moving on from their partnership. For comparison, I shot AWC’s then-current Ruger Mk2 stainless integral with the 7” tube, heavily ported barrel, and Chore-Boy copper mesh packing. It was a thing of beauty. It wasn’t quite as quiet as the .22 Exeter muzzle can I ended up with, but out behind Craig’s Firearms near Knoxville it just went “Snap! Snap! Snap!”, making you giggle like an idiot. It was quieter and much nicer looking than the legendary John Norrell’s equivalent model at the time, which I shot beside it. As badly as I wanted the integral AWC Mk2, I went with their Exeter, which was a .22 version of the artificial environment 9mm Invicta AWC had recently developed for the Beretta M9/Model 92. It cost less and I could use it on multiple platforms. Plus Lynn was willing to give me a $75 discount off the regular $425 price of this new model. (IIRC, the integral Mk2 Ultra cost around $750 at the time while the then-new, top-of-the-line, used-by-SEAL-Team-6 Amphibian integral was $999.) Why would I cheap out on what I wanted way back then? What you have to realize is that my top-notch $350 muzzle can plus $200 tax stamp in 1989, when adjusted for inflation, was equivalent to $1400 in 2024 dollars. Compare that to the cost of a top tier rimfire muzzle can from Dead Air or Rugged today plus your tax stamp and any sales tax, and you’ll get my reasoning. Suppressors have grown vastly cheaper relative to the average American’s wealth in recent years.
So, a top-flight muzzle can really does make the most sense for almost everyone in the .22 market: You can remove it when you don’t need it or can’t use it, you can use it on multiple hosts, and the best designs are ultra-quiet, easily maintained, and nearly indestructible.
But…there’s something incredibly seductive about a quality, integrally-suppressed .22 pistol you can pick up and take out with you, that you can feed pretty much any ammo you have on hand (short of the hottest hyper-velocity rounds ) and know that it’ll still run subsonic, that has a great iron sight radius with the extended tube for precision shooting, that is equally easily maintained, and that you _never_ have to check to be sure that the can is still screwed on tight (a big one for me). Plus, I think it’s really good looking…
It only took me 35 years to get around to scratching that itch.
Anyway, here’s where it started and where it ended up:
(No, the barrel isn’t bent upward. Given the limited space and lighting angles at my local dealer, I ended up with some unavoidable lens distortion. Waiting on the Form 4…)
If you enjoy a good smile, here’s wired’s “advanced testing facility for .22 integral silencers” in action:
I’m an equal fan of both the Ruger Marks (two stainless Mk2’s, one a scoped Gov’t Target) and the Browning Buck Mark platforms (three), but the 4” bbl. Buck Mark struck me as the perfect candidate, given the design’s interchangeable barrels. He was able to bead blast the tube to match the factory slide/barrel finish. I also plan to fit it with either a factory or Tactical Solutions rear sight pic rail so I can easily add a dot sight or scope as needed. (If I hadn’t already had the SS Buck Mark, I probably would have asked wired to build one on a Mk4 stainless for me. As pretty as high polish blue is, I like the looks and ease of care of stainless.)
Given that muzzle cans like the Dead Air Mask, Rugged Oculus, and SilencerCo Switchback are so staggeringly quiet and easily maintained today, why would anyone spring for an integral that’s tied down to one gun or platform?
Well, there are still reasons, but first, a little history.
I bought my first .22 muzzle suppressor from Lynn McWilliams at AWC in 1989, around the time Doc Dater was moving on from their partnership. For comparison, I shot AWC’s then-current Ruger Mk2 stainless integral with the 7” tube, heavily ported barrel, and Chore-Boy copper mesh packing. It was a thing of beauty. It wasn’t quite as quiet as the .22 Exeter muzzle can I ended up with, but out behind Craig’s Firearms near Knoxville it just went “Snap! Snap! Snap!”, making you giggle like an idiot. It was quieter and much nicer looking than the legendary John Norrell’s equivalent model at the time, which I shot beside it. As badly as I wanted the integral AWC Mk2, I went with their Exeter, which was a .22 version of the artificial environment 9mm Invicta AWC had recently developed for the Beretta M9/Model 92. It cost less and I could use it on multiple platforms. Plus Lynn was willing to give me a $75 discount off the regular $425 price of this new model. (IIRC, the integral Mk2 Ultra cost around $750 at the time while the then-new, top-of-the-line, used-by-SEAL-Team-6 Amphibian integral was $999.) Why would I cheap out on what I wanted way back then? What you have to realize is that my top-notch $350 muzzle can plus $200 tax stamp in 1989, when adjusted for inflation, was equivalent to $1400 in 2024 dollars. Compare that to the cost of a top tier rimfire muzzle can from Dead Air or Rugged today plus your tax stamp and any sales tax, and you’ll get my reasoning. Suppressors have grown vastly cheaper relative to the average American’s wealth in recent years.
So, a top-flight muzzle can really does make the most sense for almost everyone in the .22 market: You can remove it when you don’t need it or can’t use it, you can use it on multiple hosts, and the best designs are ultra-quiet, easily maintained, and nearly indestructible.
But…there’s something incredibly seductive about a quality, integrally-suppressed .22 pistol you can pick up and take out with you, that you can feed pretty much any ammo you have on hand (short of the hottest hyper-velocity rounds ) and know that it’ll still run subsonic, that has a great iron sight radius with the extended tube for precision shooting, that is equally easily maintained, and that you _never_ have to check to be sure that the can is still screwed on tight (a big one for me). Plus, I think it’s really good looking…
It only took me 35 years to get around to scratching that itch.
Anyway, here’s where it started and where it ended up:
(No, the barrel isn’t bent upward. Given the limited space and lighting angles at my local dealer, I ended up with some unavoidable lens distortion. Waiting on the Form 4…)
If you enjoy a good smile, here’s wired’s “advanced testing facility for .22 integral silencers” in action:
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