.300 Whisper

[Shadow]

Anyone have much experience with the .300 whisper cartridge? I saw a picture of a Thompson Center with a suppressor mounted on it that looked like something I need. Any idea who builds the best ones?

 

[Vigilante]

I was thinking of doing an AR build in this caliber too. Here is some info on it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.300_Whisper
If you dont mind me adding a question to your post, does anybody know if these rounds will fit into a regular ar15 magazine?

 

[Nwcid]

The Whisper is very very cool.

Here are 2 of the best links I know of about it:

http://www.quarterbore.com/300whisper/index.html

http://www.quarterbore.net/forums/index.php?f=27

The .300 Whisper will fit in an AR mag as that is WHY the round was made. It uses ALL standard AR parts other then the barrel. It was made as a reliable way to suppress an AR with a bullet that will still be effective.

As anyone that reads here much knows it is very hard to get a .223 round to be subsonic and cycle. If you do get a .223 round SS the is not much power over a .22lr round.

I got mine built right about the time the weather hit well below freezing here, now it is just a muddy mess so I have not had a chance to play with it much. In the pic it has a dot sight on it that I had laying around so I could at least have a point to aim with while sound testing some rounds.

My plan is to use all OD stuff with this gun since it does use a different round I dont want to get things confused with .223 mags. Magpul was going to have OD stuff out in Dec of '08 but then Nov 4 happened. I plan on running 20rd OD Pmags and using an OD UBR stock with this set up. I have a 3-9x40 on it right now but not sure what kind of glass I am going to put on it until I have a chance to shoot it some. According to the ballistic tables there is about 100" of drop at 300 yards so you need to either build a custom reticle or get a scope with lots of adjustment.

 

[Shadow]

If my memory is correct it started as a .223 cartridge necked out to take a 0.300" bullet. The first one I read about was around fifteen years ago and it was an AR-15 with a standard upper with a 0.300 barrel. It did use standard AR mags but I can't remember anything about the barrel. I am not sure if the guy made a barrel or rechambered an off the shelf AR barrel. I beleive the one in the article had a valve on the gas tube so you could shut off the gas and not cycle the action if you needed the shot to be super quiet. They are suppose to be super accurate but I don't know what it is about them that makes them accurate. It seems you could down load a .308 and get the same results but if so there would have been no need for the whisper to be developed, unless specifically for a AR 15 / M 16 type weapon. I think they use heavy bullets in order to get good penetration. I'm wanting to do something suppressed in an action with no moving parts just to see how quiet a suppressed shot powerful enough for hunting can be.

 

[Nwcid]

If my memory is correct it started as a .223 cartridge necked out to take a 0.300" bullet. The first one I read about was around fifteen years ago and it was an AR-15 with a standard upper with a 0.300 barrel. It did use standard AR mags but I can't remember anything about the barrel. I am not sure if the guy made a barrel or rechambered an off the shelf AR barrel. I beleive the one in the article had a valve on the gas tube so you could shut off the gas and not cycle the action if you needed the shot to be super quiet. They are suppose to be super accurate but I don't know what it is about them that makes them accurate. It seems you could down load a .308 and get the same results but if so there would have been no need for the whisper to be developed, unless specifically for a AR 15 / M 16 type weapon. I think they use heavy bullets in order to get good penetration. I'm wanting to do something suppressed in an action with no moving parts just to see how quiet a suppressed shot powerful enough for hunting can be.

I am not sure about the original ones but current .300 Whisper is either made from necked up .221 Fireball brass or shortened then necked up .223 brass.

There are some different style gas blocks that can be used with this set up including a 3 way. The 3 way is set up for standard, SS, and shut off gas levels.

You can load the same thing in a .308 but it will not fit in a standard AR, which is one of the major points of the .300 Whisper.

Well the heavy bullets are used to get good ballistics. Since you are set at a max fixed speed of 1050 fps the only thing you can do to get more energy is to increase the weight. The basic formula for energy is Mass x velocity x velocity. So that is on big reason why light, small fast moving bullets can do so much damage.

Read the links I posted and they will give you some very good suppressed calibers to run. If you are not wanting a semi auto look into the .510 Whisper. It shoots a 650 gr bullet SS and is MOA accurate out to 600 yards......

 

[pcso112]

I messed around with subsonic 308Win for a while and could never produce any reliable results. The 300 Whisper can be difficult to zone in on what load your particular gun likes but is well worth the effort. With lots of trial and error I got my 16” 1:8 twist Rem 700 with a YHM 762 Phantom shooting .5” groups while creating about the same sound you would expect from a BB gun. One shortcoming is the bullet has a similar flight path to a softball pitch. I am waiting on a scope base with a 45 moa built in to it so I can get out to 400 yards with the scope I have now.

 

[MunsonMan]

http://www.sskindustries.com/ Check out the site. This is where it originated.

Ed

 

[WhisperFan]

I kinda like the Whisper ...

Get a fast twist if you want to shoot heavy bullets - I use 220gr and 240gr Sierra HPBT MatchKings. My Remington 700 has a PacNor 1-in-7.5 twist and my SBR-AR has a 1-in-8 twist.

 

[Garrett]

I did an SBR Contender in .300 Whisper. It makes a pretty compact, effective package. You have a number of options with silencers. If you want something that is a little more flexible, you can get good results using a 9mm silencer with subsonic ammo. Or you can spend a little more and get a dedicated .30 caliber can. With those you get the added weight, as they were mostly all designed to shoot full-powered .308. Some people have had custom lightweight .30 cans made just for the Whisper.

By far the quietest one I've heard was a Form 1 can that a guy did on a Remington 700 action. It was almost pellet gun quiet.

I use an SWR Trident, Bowers CAC45, or a Triple-X Warrior on mine. The Trident and Warrior sound about the same, and the big .45 can is a little louder, but still quite manageable.

 

[Shadow]

Those are four very nice weapons. Any such thing as a scope with a bullet drop compensator for this round? Is there a better way other than just aiming above the target when shooting beyond where it is zeroed in?

 

[Nwcid]

Those are four very nice weapons. Any such thing as a scope with a bullet drop compensator for this round? Is there a better way other than just aiming above the target when shooting beyond where it is zeroed in?

The drop when using the heavy SS rounds is very similar to a .22. There are a couple of .22 scopes with drop reticles in them but they only go out to 200 yards and I want to go 300 with mine.

I am thinking about trying one of the BSA Sweet .22 scopes on this since it has a BDC cam on it and is numbered. I have one on a 77/22 now and while a very inexpensive scope it has held up very well.

Short of that I am looking at maybe a Burris and having a custom drop reticle put in it after I get some range time. For me I am looking for a low profile scope like a 2-7x32 but might not have enough range for either BDC cam or drop reticle in it. The reason I want a low profile scope is I want this to be a light handy rifle. I have a "tricked out" target AR and while it shoots like a champ it is NOT light and handy.

 

[Garrett]

I've got one with mil dots on my Whisper. While it might not be tailored to the .300 Whisper, you can get a pretty good idea which dot the gun is hitting at for a given distance.