Silencerco Scythe-TI Lightweight Hunting Suppressor: Review

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Not everyone is happy about the cost of a full-auto-rated suppressor. Oh, not the financial cost, but there is that. No, the weight is a big thing to some shooters. The SilencerCo Scythe-Ti tips the scales, with its direct-thread rear cap, at a smidge over seven ounces. Is that light? A reasonable comparison would be Silencerco’s own Chimera, which weighs more than twice as much. If you are looking for a hunting suppressor and have no need whatsoever on your 6.5 Creemoor/.308 bolt gun for a full-auto-rated silencer then the extra 8.4 ounces would just suck, even though the Chimera is a superb silencer. Save the Chimera for your AR-10 and the future zombie hordes.

How’d Silencerco do that? Simple, the Scythe-Ti is an all-titanium suppressor, and an all-welded one as well. Obviously from the external appearance, the tube is constructed by welding the baffles together, a way to both make it strong and to cut down on weight. Not having an external tube saves the weight of that extra metal. (Even Titanium adds up if you get profligate with it.)  In the process of designing and constructing the Scythe-Ti, Silencerco uses two different grades of titanium, each selected for their utility in application. No one-size-fits-all approach here. As an all-welded and thus not disassemble-able tube, Silencerco suggests that you not use lead bullets in the Scythe-Ti. Or any other sealed silencer, for that matter. (I don’t know of anyone who would even think of using cast bullets, or paper-wrapped ones, in a silencer, but Silencerco has to say so just to be sure.)

What you do get is a silencer that is rated from everything from 5.56 up to .300 RUM, with no barrel length restrictions. So, your AR-15 pistol with a 7.5-inch barrel? No problem. Your .300 RUM carbine, with its 16" barrel (now that’s just wrong) sure, no problemo. The sweet spot I can see here in a non-hunting application would be an AR-15 pistol or SBR in .300 Blackout with an eight-inch barrel. The lightweight Scythe-Ti, and the short and handy Blackout would be a super combo, short and light and handy. It should go without saying that anything smaller than 5.56, with jacketed bullets, would be OK as well. However, the Scythe-Ti is meant to be on a hunting rifle or a long-range target rifle. Again, the lighter the silencer the better in those applications, because you’ll be carrying it a lot more than you’ll be shooting it. The Scythe-Ti comes to you with a passel of goodies. The rear cap is a 5/8x24 direct thread cap, also made out of titanium. You’re good to go with all those .30 rifles in your rack, right out of the box. If you want to use it on a 5.56, then you simply order up the same cap in 1/2x28, and you are golden. The question, “A .30 silencer on a 5.56, won’t it be noisy?” always comes up. Yes, kinda-sorta. If you were to take an otherwise identical suppressor and put a front cap on it appropriate for use on a 5.56 instead of a .308-something, yes it would be quieter, but it would be quieter by two to three decibels, and it takes a pretty good level of hearing to discern three decibels. In actual fact, it doesn’t make a difference, so using a .30 suppressor on a 5.56 rifle you get two for one, and at no cost.

On the front end, the Scythe-Ti comes with the Silencerco .30 Single-port Anchor Brake. The regular Bravo Anchor Brake is a three-stack brake, and while it does a good job of cutting down on felt recoil, it does add length and weight. So Silencerco makes the Single-port model to reduce both. And the Scythe-Ti comes with it already installed. Now, if you want more reduction, you simply order a Bravo and swap brakes. The Single-port Anchor Brake is a super-short and flat muzzle brake, taking the last of the exhaust gases and using them to cut down on felt recoil. You also get the Radial Tool, Bravo Tool and Basic Tool with your Scythe-Ti, so you can properly do the wrenching needed to tighten the Scythe-Ti to your rifle, tighten the front and rear caps, and any other maintenance or installation you might need or want to do. Inside, the Scythe-Ti is a baffle stack with turbulence notches machined into the axis clearance edges, to knock the sound down as much as possible. Each baffle is machined, then welded into the stack, and then the alignment is checked, and if need-be (like that’s ever a thing in modern manufacturing) corrected. Now, if you want to have the ease of a QD system, you can order up the Silencerco ASR muzzle device and rear cap and have a QD-swappable from one rifle to another system. You’ll need an ASR on each rifle, of course, and that ASR muzzle device can be an open or closed-time flash hider, or a muzzle brake of the single port or full-size option, or their Thread Over Muzzle system, again, muzzle device and rear cap. You can be bare-bones and ultra-light or you can add in a few conveniences and decrease felt recoil and increase convenience. This is after all, America.

I’m not old enough yet that recoil is an impediment, so I just screwed the Scythe-Ti in its direct-thread version onto my Remington 700 .308 in its Magpul stock. The added weight didn’t significantly change the balance nor make it enough heavier that I’d notice. One of the nice things about running a suppressor on a bolt gun is, you guessed it, no gas in the face. Since the Scythe-Ti is not meant to be a nard-duty self-loading rifle suppressor, I didn’t test it that way, but at some time in the future I’m definitely going to put it onto a .300 Blackout, even a ,300 Blackout SBR, and see what results I get. The wispy weight of the Scythe-Ti meant shooting offhand was no different than without it, and it cut the muzzle report down to a level that could be considered hearing safe. The generally accepted threshold for “hearing safe” is 140 dB, and the Scythe-Ti in this review knocked the muzzle blast down to 139 on average. This was with the test ammo, SIG 150-grain FMJ. Other loads could shift that 2-3-4 dB due to the powder used and the amount of the charge. (That’s a test for another day.) For a single shot, or a shot and follow-up in hunting in the wide open, I’d be fine with that, but for a day of practice, and especially at my ranges which have covers and walls, and other reflective surfaces, I’d still have some kind of protection in or on. This is not to dis the Silencerco suppressor here, I’d do the same with many, if not most, suppressors that clocked in at 139. My hearing has survived more than a million rounds, and eight years of radio broadcasting by my being cautious. That said, as a hunting suppressor, or a long-range target suppressor, the Scythe-Ti is hard to beat, especially since it is easy to carry.

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