Some folks with lathes will have quite a surge in business if suppressors and SBRs become easier (an likely less expensive) to get.
Not everyone's cup o' tea, but don't rule out the possibility of becoming a convert. It's much easier to rationalize lack of need with the egregious impositions attached to owning one legally - cost, wait time, invasion of privacy, concern over under-educated people who are frightened by them, etc.
@RicinYakima 's point about quiet varminting is a big motivator for me. Varmints/vermin have been waging a constant battle with me and my property for decades and usually (though not always), they show up in the wee hours. I and my neighbors are accustomed to hearing gun-fire in the daylight hours. A dairy farmer and his brothers just a couple miles away shoot some big stuff and some class III stuff, there is the occasional "pop-pop-popper," who burns up a box of fifty nines in a minute or two, but gun-fire at night can be worrisome and disconcerting to those around me. Besides, I don't care for the attention and hate noise. I've always avoided big boomers anyway and the older I get, the more averse I am to noise.
The arm does not HAVE to be long and bulky. This is where the SBR thing is important. A 6" or 10" 32-20. 357 Mag/38, 9x19 barrel is PLENTY for sub-sonic use. Remember, if you want it quiet, you want to stay sub-sonic. Longer barrels just add velocity. My 18" 357 Mag barrel is too long to make many 38 Special loads sub-sonic. A 10" barrel and an 8" can sums up to an 18" overall length for the tubular portion of the arm. My 18" 357 Mag Contender Carbine, with a 18" barrel, is only two inches longer than my 24" 30/30 Contender Carbine, and it's a tad lighter. I WANT to find a 10" 357 Mag barrel and make it shorter overall, but that'd be whatever the barrel costs, another $100-plus for threading, $200 for a SBR stamp and all the associated hassles thereof.
The "PFUTTT" report does not alert and warn other nearby varmints/vermin and the ones who are on the receiving end seem to be much less dramatic about expiring. I think one could almost see a parallel with archery-hunting in some respects.
Gas checks may or may not be OK in a can, but I won't do it. Since I intend for my suppressed loads to be sub-sonic, there is no need for GCs. I don't use them on a lot of super-sonic loads anyway - at least handgun rounds. I took up PCing when I submitted my paperwork for the can and got wonderful results - very pretty bullets. For me, it's more hassle than tumble-lubing, but I'm not going to argue about that and I don't have room for baskets in the oven I have. I also ran into rather weird and dramatic problems with PC, which I cannot explain, but which finally TOTALLY went away when I stopped using it in the suppressed carbine. It was a "cleaning issue," which I'll try to share at some point, but it was a long and involved process sorting it out.
Lead in my can? Well, not so much that I can't deal with it fairly quickly and easily. Since I don't clean the can spic and span, rather just enough that it won't be able to disassembled at some point, the built-up carbon crates a layer that seems to keep the lead from sticking and building up. In a spotlessly clean can, yes, lead will stick tenaciously - to the face of the first baffle and that's it. No PC, NO GCs - no problem.
Several people to whom I've handed a suppressed 357 Mag carbine to looked at it doubtingly at first, but humored me and shot it. At the first shot, they all turn and look at me with a huge grin and want more. Not folks here, but many, MANY who don't handload (let alone cast) have no idea how effective slow cast bullets with the right nose profile can be. I RARELY (actually never any more) have a need for bigger, faster, louder loads for pretty much anything I do. It's dead-flat here, with few terrain features and more and more houses keep popping up (where do they get the money??) all around, which makes me less and less inclined to shoot anything very fast or flat-shooting any more.
If I get a free five minutes and take a notion to shoot a few rounds, I don't have to warn my wife that I'm going to shoot. Stuff I used to shoot was LOUD, even in the house and even when it was 50 yards away from the house. Even when shooting with a bunch of people, I'm sure we've all been caught off guard when someone lets one go when we weren't expecting it.
These reasons TO may not be enough for many or most, but they work for me. I'm enjoying the crap out of mine and don't think I've shot anything BUT the suppressed carbine in the two-plus years since I got it.
