At my advanced age, I fairly recently acquired my first rifle with a real muzzle brake....specifically a KDF on a Shilen Custom .300 Win Mag. It is a wonderful device making the gun recoil about like a hot .243 or similar. I am sold on them for heavy recoiling rifles.

However, there is also no question but that it is LOUD. Reading the various ads, I see that Vais claims to be the quietest of the brakes.

Does anyone have any real knowledge of which brake is best? Has anyone on here used the Vais brake that has also used another brand?

This is not meant to be a poll on whether you like MBs or not. I don't care if you don't like them, I love mine, so I'm interested in learning from people who do like them for what they accomplish.

I have a Vais on my M70 Classic in 338 WM. I cant say if it is any quieter than any others but it does dramatically tame down the recoil. It will still leave your ears ringing if you shoot it without protection.

There is a fellow who posts here, I think his handle is Bill C and he has the Vais on a couple of the short Lazzeronis and he has consistently said it is a good deal quieter than the KDF style brake.

But to me less noise/blast would mean a reduction in the effectiveness of the brake. For me personally I would rather have more noise and more recoil reduction because irrespective of the brand of brake I will be wearing hearing protection.

The only type of brake I would ever fire without hearing protection would be magna porting and even then only in a bigger bore, not a "cracking" small bore magnum. But magna porting does not reduce recoil very much.

Lazzeroni use the Vais and Weatherby use the KDF style.

Mike

They are all loud, that is the trade off, but wear ear protection, solves the problem, then have a thread protector and you can take the brake off when hunting if you like...

I have found that when a person uses a muzzle brake they get very comfortable with their gun and if they will take the brake off every so often and fire a few rounds off hand, in time the will quit using the brake at all..It takes a while so don't get in a hurry, just let it happen....

I use them on the real big bores 458 Lott and up because I have bursitis in my neck and shoulders from shooting the really big ones...

Magna port does only one thing it drives the gun straight back into your shoulder and eliminates barrel uplift pretty much altogether, not for me...Vias and KDF are about equal, I like either one.

If you want a good brake that doesn`t blow your hat off everytime you pull the trigger try a Tony`s Powderhorn T-brake sold by brownells.I first had a KDF and hated it .Bought a T-brake and man, what a difference.No more muzzleblast in your face.

I recently got a Magna Ported 300 Win Mag. I have had several KDF braked rifles. No doubt the KDF breaks work very well. They were just too loud for me, and when shooting prone they kicked up too much debris. I really like the Magna Ported bbl. It does not seem any louder than a standard bbl. It takes all the "slap" and muzzle rise out of the 300.
It has no ports on the bottom thus it does not kick up any debris.

N E 450 No2

I have used a lot of magna ported rifles a mate of mine had many done. Actually he had what we call double magna porting done with some rifles and extra two slots are put in.

I found magna porting seems to "disguise" recoil for the first couple of shots and would think it should be ideal for the way Americans hunt in the sense that very few shots are fired.

But I do find it louder and need muffs on, although for a couple shots out in the open it is OK and especially in calibres such as 375 H&H. My mate had a 300 Ultra magna ported and I can assure you that rifles is bad without muffs on.

To cut a long story short my mate has moved away from magna porting to muzzle brakes. Volume of shooting is one issue and then in either case you need muffs on.

After having owned two 460 Wbys with the older Pendleton Dekickers I would never again own any rifle with any form of integral brake or porting. What use to annoy the hell out of me was those rifles when reduced loads were being used a brake was not required. However, the reduced loads were still too noisy for unprotected ears and it would have been good to remove the brake.

Mike

Another option would be Jim Brockman's on/off muzzle brake. I have one on my 416 rigby. For load development or bench/ practice shooting you can use the brake, or just dial it around and you have a regular barrel. It is a bit larger than the barrel and some might find this esthetically an issue but for the best of both worlds it is hard to beat. Wear hearing protection for all centerfire shooting. Our hearing is going to go anyway if we live long enough. Why hurry things along? Good Hunting.

Another interesting brake is the the Venturi-accelerator bu BP Technologies, www.bp-tec.com. Reduces muzzle lift as well as recoil.

Bill Wiseman makes a muzzlebrake that has the holes drilled from the bore away from the shooter. It significantly reduces recoil but is much quieter than other brakes I have used. I have one on a .375 Ultra Mag and a .338 Ultra Mag and they work great.

I think Ray[Atkinson] summed it up beautifully! Increased noise is the trade-off for less recoil. All I can say is it seems[?] some brakes have less of a "crack" than others. I have had some guys come in and have mine installed in place of others and say mine are quieter. Who knows? I can`t and won`t say. I have problems similar to Rays and the big bores hurt worse every year. I tell ALL guys who have brakes to take special attention to their surroundings when using brakes as they can really hurt others standing close by. We shooters owe it to the rest to make sure they know we are using a brake and not be in a place where the blast will deafen them. Well done article Ray.

Aloha, Mark

Everyone is searching for the magic bullet, let me know when you find it...Everything is a compromise and it comes down to how much of a compromise you need to reduce recoil as opposed to muzzle blast...the more blast the less recoil, plain and simple fact...

But smart money goes to the guy that uses his brake sighting in, testing loads and experimenting at the bench and practicing on the range, then at the end of each session takes it off, replaces the thread protector and fires some shots off hand and goes home, When he hunts the brake is in his pocket, he won't feel recoil when hunting....

Some tell me the brake changes the POI when you take it off, that has not been my experience, but I don't doubt that it could on some guns...

I have installed many muzzle brakes in the last few years, quite a few differant brands and designs. Yes, all muzzle brakes are loud but the one with the least noticeable increase in noise is the Vais, very high quality too. I think the loudest is the KDF.

I dont use muzzle brakes on my rifles but I love them...........customer comes in and says can you rechamber my 300 Remington Mag to a 300 Remington Ultra Mag? Yes I can.......Ka-Ching. Then he comes back and asks can you install a muzzle brake? Yep. Do they really work? Yep. Ka-Ching Ka-Ching. Well what about those Kick Eez pads, do they really help? Yep. Ka-Ching Ka-Ching Ka-Ching