If you are wondering; How does a muzzle break work you are at the right place. A muzzle brake is an attachment that goes onto the end of a barrel and reduces recoil. It does so by directing some of the propellant gases escaping from the muzzle in a forward direction, thereby counteracting part of the force pushing against the shooter’s shoulder (and preventing that force from being transferred into his body). The rest of it comes back as felt recoil, of course.
In effect, when shooting with a proper break installed on your rifle, you’ll feel less push against your shoulder—at least proportionally speaking—than when wearing no break at all. That will be especially true if you’re using hot loads or shooting powerful rifles such as large-caliber magnum cartridges out of lightweight barrels.
The amount of recoil reduction you’ll feel when using a muzzle brake depends on the particular model and the ammunition. For example, large and heavy breaks can reduce recoil more than small and lightweight ones, all else being equal. Also, some designs are better at reducing felt recoil specifically than others—some are meant to minimize perceived loudness and felt recoil, for instance—and some work better with certain types of cartridges than with others.
The mechanics of Recoil Reduction
Muzzle brakes reduce felt recoil in two ways of ways:
• First, they allow some of the gases escaping from the muzzle to be channeled forward and down, rather than being pushed upward or sideways; this directly counters muzzle rise.
• Second, they tend to redirect some portion of the escaping gases downward once they’re past the muzzle, which produces a sort of cushion that helps push the rifle back toward its original position as you shoot it again. (This is known as “compression recoil reduction.” Some types of brakes also produce a similar effect by directing gas forward instead of down.)
The result is that the amount of force felt at your shoulder will be less than it would be without the muzzle brake. Usually, it will be quite a bit less.
