I will freely admit that I love guns, cans and a little competition every now and then. So when I found out about the new products from upstart Jesse James Firearms Unlimited that was billed as an industry game changer, I was rather curious. Thanks to the vitality of Facebook and the internet in general as well as some reporting by fellow TTAG contributor Nick Leghorn, I was anxious to see the results of a startup challenging an established player in this business. Remember that many looked sideways at Apple when they said they were going to make a phone. I had a chance to talk to Brent Taylor from Liberty Suppressors about the goings on involving his company and Jesse James in a TTAG exclusive . . .
I’ve known Brent Taylor from his time at AAC and he’s always been a real professional. I’ve never had any issues with him and we get along pretty smoothly so when I contacted him last night for a TTAG exclusive on what went down at SHOT Show 2015, he was more than happy to chat on the record about what went down and settle some of the internet scuttlebutt that’s floating around.
After the conclusion of one of the days at SHOT, Brent went over to say hi to the JJFU crowd. After hearing some of their claims, he offered to put his product head-to-head with theirs in a friendly competition. I know Brent to be a polite professional and Jesse James seemed to act in kind and accepted his invitation to put their products to the test. The internet got a hold of some of the smart phone screen grabs and the comments commenced to fly.
After a phone conversation with JJFU earlier today, Brent Taylor reports that JJFU declined to go through with the head-to-head challenge since they had some scheduling conflicts. Adding to the mix, it seems that Jesse James didn’t seem to like all the vitriolic personal attacks floating around the internet and that was a factor in his decision not to participate.
Seems to me that this challenge was over well before it started. What started off with some friendly banter and competition seemed to go way off the tracks thanks to the characters of the internet judging the book by its cover.
“Product challenges like this happen with a handshake and a smile, not with a pitchfork,” Taylor said, and I’m inclined to agree with him. With the internet looking for a knockdown drawn out fight when it was really just a handful of gun guys wanting to just goof off and test out some product. I’d be reticent to saddle up for that goat rodeo as well.
Taylor adds that “Anyone that wants to have a friendly metering event, we’re open to that. It’s entertaining for people to see that sort of thing and it adds to the betterment of the community.” It seems that if any of the readers wants to try putting together a better can and put it head to head with Liberty on the range and see how it reads on the equipment, the invitation is always open. He also added that he contacted JJFU via email yesterday to let them know that if they ever change their minds, the invitation still stands.
So, that’s how the Tale of Two Silencers abortive wild west showdown.
On a personal note, I was rather anxious to see a known, well-respected product go up against a newcomer, not in a “Hey, I hope X person gets crushed at their own game” way, but rather in a Mars Rover Curiosity sit-back-and-see-what-happens-for-science way. Full disclosure: I may also have 300,000 British Airways Avios that are about to be devalued and I love some Texas BBQ so take my curiosity with a grain of salt.
One lesson to be learned here is that if the people of the internet want to see products go head-to-head against each other, they may want to press the mute button until AFTER they get the results.
Disclosure: FirearmConcierge is a dealer of firearms and has in the past done business with Brent Taylor when he was employed by Remington/AAC/Freedom Group and has a social relationship with Mr. Taylor. FirearmConcierge is not a client or dealer of Liberty Suppressors or Jesse James Firearms Unlimited at the time of this publication and has not received any type of compensation (including SHOT Show swag) from any party named in this article. JJFU wasn’t contacted for this article.
Yeah that was a lose lose for JJFU, so they show up:
Best case his can is maybe 1-2db quieter than the Liberty, but millions of trolls who will probably never own a silencer in their lifetime will take to the internet with verbal torches and pitchforks and demand that JJFU be drawn and quartered for daring to make such claims.
Worst case, his can is nowhere close to the liberty and….. millions of trolls who will probably never own a silencer in their lifetime will take to the internet with verbal torches and pitchforks and demand that JJFU be drawn and quartered for daring to make such claims.
So its looking like he is taking the easiest option, politely bow out, yeah the trolls are still calling for his head but he saved on the cost of hosting liberty and still nobody knows what the cans meter at which means he’ll sell a couple to well heeled curious people who dont mind dropping a tax stamp to see if his claims are true.
Further I will note, FC you do a good job of trying to portray Brent from Liberty as a good guy caught in the crossfire but honestly he did himself no favors with the comment (from the second link you posted) “The point is that that silencer community is a family and a culture all it’s own, Mr. James hasn’t learned that yet.” Sounds a little butt-hurt and spiteful to me.
Wow. A JJFU fan boi that has a suppressor…. Maybe if JJ didn’t fill everyone with the BS like “his can lasts longer than the common suppressor that only is good for 2500 rounds” and claim unrealistic db numbers… And MAYBE if he wasn’t such a D-Bag, people would take him seriously… He will always have his fan boi’s…
My mother always had a saying, if you throw a rock into a dark alley, the dog that barks is probably the one you hit… ie sometimes her generic accusations alleging wrongdoing or some other mischief would strike a little too close to home and have the guilty party proclaiming innocence before charges were ever levied.
“millions of trolls who will probably never own a silencer in their lifetime will take to the internet with verbal torches and pitchforks ” (should have ammended it to trolls and people who spell fanboy with an “i”)
1 down… 999,999 to go
FWIW, I don’t own a silencer/suppressor or anything NFA, and when I do it likely wont be a JJFU can, mainly due to price and looks as well. Its funny because if he took the baffles out and just left a slightly larger than caliber tube down the middle so that it didn’t classify as a suppressor and add a pilot hole to pin weld it on the threaded end, he could have probably sold this thing by the thousands to all the kids who like Zombie, Alien Spider, or Punisher roll-marks on their AR receivers, BCG’s and Glock slides.
Well since FC is a pretty big d-bag himself, they would probably get along pretty well.
FTW
Don’t worry, you’re not alone. The claims JJ has on video and on his site proves beyond a doubt that the guy is clueless of the firearm and can industry. He must have learned what he knows about suppressors from a book written in the ’70’s and/or video games. He deserved the internet rabble rousing.
“Test fired with 5.56 ammo, sound was 78 decibels at the muzzle.” Tested with Mr.Microphone
“Testing has also shown that the Aero Sonic equipped guns to be MORE accurate, showing no typical suppressed round drop.” In Modern Warfare 4. Got it.
“This is why many suppressor manufacturers are now porting the front on the suppressor in an attempt to bleed off air.” Wat? Who?
“With the muzzle pressure reaching 1500 psi …” JJ’s barrel must have been 80″ long.
So… JJ did some things that would make logical people question his character, then got pissed that those people talked about it on the Internet, then pulled out of the ‘competition’ because… Butthurt? Got it. JJ should know that products are tied to the people who make them, and conversations about those products will inevitably lead to discussions of the person/people who make them. It’s just how it works, bro. Especially in the gun community, people talk, and a premium is placed on character.
Lots of truth in this article. Well done.
Also, personalities aside you cant really blame Jesse James from being scared to put his toes in the water with the established manufactures. Even if the industry has collectively grown up in the last couple of years, it only takes about 5 minutes of googling to find examples from when AAC put up pictures of a blown out and re-welded/ repaired surefire can against a brand new M4-2000 core fresh off the CNC welder to try and prove AAC cans were better than SureFire, and then the resulting take no prisoners lawsuit that SureFire filed against them in retaliation, or that youtube video where they blew up a Gemtech G5 allegedly “replicating” a US SOCOM test but then refused to say what type of ammo they used, conditions etc. Just cruise over to Silencertalk or Arfcom and look at what huge pricks the AAC reps were on those forums when anyone would try and talk about competitors on the boards. This was only a few years ago.
And Brent from Liberty is trying to say that the Silencer industry is all just a big Kumbayah singing happy family? All evidence seems to point to that not being true.
AAC do something shady back in the pre FG days? Never! (sarc)
Now lets sit back and see how it goes at SIG, with all the key players there now.
Well AAC is pretty much completely gutted now via the acquisition and everyone being fired or leaving. AAC is no longer a threat to anyone. This must make you pretty happy.
That’s too bad. I was looking forward to some good science.
A ‘tale of the tape’
Very well done. The world would be a better place if people didn’t judge until the facts were in.
I work with Engineers, there is very seldom “game changing” development from people within any industry, because they just keep working along refining the existing product. Your Apple example is spot on- they brought the heat in a way that established players denigrated.
Casting rocks on someone’s character has nothing to do with the product they can envision- JJ knows metal, he knows fabrication, he knows exhausts, he knows flair….Give the guy a chance.
The personal insults and such weren’t relevant to the topic, so maybe it would have been better without all of that. However, you can judge the ridiculous claims of 78 dB volume 3 feet from the muzzle on the facts that it’s literally impossible. On FB, JJFU claimed it was an AR-15 shooting standard 55 grain supersonic ammo. They stated that specifically. Not only is 78 dB quite a bit quieter than just the bolt cycling and locking on an AR-15, but the supersonic crack (sonic boom) of a .223 bullet breaking the sound barrier is significantly louder still. Even if JJFU’s silencer were the best one on earth and it literally silenced 100% of the gunshot noise absolutely and completely, there would be no way to measure anywhere even remotely close to 78 dB because the action of the gun and especially the sonic boom of the bullet would be many, many times (many orders of magnitude) louder than that.
What JJ posted on FB was:
Wait. 200 meters per second bullet velocity increase?!?!?!? YEAH FREAKING RIGHT. Even if the ~10″ of silencer length were actual barrel that sealed 100% of the gasses behind the bullet, you wouldn’t get an additional ~656 fps on top of the ~3,000 fps you’d see out of a 16″ bbl with 55 grain 5.56. This is another ridiculous claim. No way in hell does the silencer add 22% to the bullet’s velocity. In my own testing, I’m used to a suppressor adding up to 2.4% to the bullet velocity, but usually less. Maybe he put a period in the wrong place and turned a 2.2% increase into a 22% increase.
Don’t get me wrong, I still think his claims are… hogwash. But the majority of insults I was seeing had little to do with his silencer and a majority to do with his cheating on Bullock. Or they are mad about his comments about OCC.
I would love to see the real world head to head comparison between all the silencer makers. Give them all the chance to reach into the same ammo can and pull their own rounds out, load them in mags and shoot their own rifles. If his claims were even close to 100dB with supersonic ammo(say he had the can side isolated from the bolt side) I’d call it the most impressive technology to hit the silencer market, and it would be worth the massive price tag he has for it. I’d say there was a good possibility he might have stumbled on a revolutionary silencer technology by accident. He has worked with exhaust and performance for quite some time. So maybe something he came across was a miracle cure for the silencer.
I don’t care about his personal life. Heck the M1 Carbine was invented by an ex-con.
I refuse to buy anything from Jesse James for a simple reason:
I don’t contribute to the income of known douchebags unless it’s necessary or unavoidable.
The facts on Jesse are in, so no pity for him personally. That said, I’d have like to have seen the competition happen.
Firearmsconcierge acting as the arbiter of level-headed reason?
No comments about price gouging / tophat and monocle robber barons / douchy customers?
Well played sir.
My thoughts exactly!
On a separate thought… if JJ uses his name recognition to sell products then why should we not take his negative reputation into account as well?
No S.
So, a guy with a somewhat sketchy reputation who’s never made a suppressor before makes one and puts unbelievable claims on it, then gets an offer to prove such claims but declines because random people don’t believe his unbelievable claims at face value. And that is somehow our fault for not blindly believing. Got it.
I think the moral of this story is we should of shut up and let JJ dig his grave deeper before the ripping began. Just wait until someone’s so deep in the hole they can’t climb out before you start to bury them.
Those were my thoughts. Here’s a simple solution: don’t make unbelievable and unverifiable claims. Of course that would give politicians nothing to talk about. If you claim to make the best product, and run away from testing, that simply puts you into the douchebag category. Don’t expect sympathy from me. I get that crap out of traffic stops every day. The people who tell the truth are worth giving a break or a warning, not the pathological liars.
There’s plenty of products I will never own. That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t enjoy a legitimate test of their capabilities. In this JJ has earned his negative reputation – again.
It would have been a whole lot easier to just say hey look I made a silencer that looks like a muffler. And that’s that’s that.
SHOT show is the grand stage to announce/demo your product. Especially NFA toys. If JJ truly had something that revolutionary, no amount of internet flack would’ve stopped him. That’s like saying Steve Jobs canceled his iphone announcement because of some negative banter and criticism.
Mr James, the BA w/ outlaw blood? Bowed out on a “duel”?
Pa nz. Y. Lost some respect there. Good bike builder, womanizer… now a few percentage points off of cool.
If he keeps backing down, he might give up on guns an go back to making bikes..
Badass Jesse James got bullied by the interwebs? Go figure.
That suppressor better do a lot more than suppress for $4500. To my eyes, even if it does everything they say it’s just ugly. Kind of like the overpriced weaponry sold on the JJFU site. I’m guessing the FU really means something else.
The physics of a silencer is to contain and cool the expanding gasses exiting the barrel, rather than let them into free air and make a BOOM. Practically anything that will do that will silence the report to some extent, even a Pringles can with a .22 rifle. A large enough volume with sound deadening material enclosing it will act as a silencer. It won’t be very efficient, but it will work. I waited 9 months for my Form 1 Tax Stamp, built a Maglite silencer for my AR-15 5.56 and it gets rid of the BOOM quite well, especially with subsonic ammo. Supersonic ammo also, but still have the sonic crack.
Somebody was able to get the cover they needed to bow out early.
What a goofball.
FUJJ.
It would have been interesting but I don’t really care. Life is not like a “reality” show, sometimes deadlines are realistic, stakes are not too high, and everyone has a good time and learns something.
So a punk is told to “put up or shut up”. He first said he would put up and then tried to shut up acting like it wasn’t his fault that he had to back out. I don’t feel sorry for Jesse at all. He is a designer, not an engineer. sure is product looks different (design) but he can’t say that it is engineered so much better than other people’s product that have been in this game a long time. I don’t deny that improvements can be made but not light years past everyone else. I can say that my unsurpressed rifle is rated at 10db, and given enough yards between me and the listener, I would be correct. I refuse to follow on something a “salesman” tells me unless they have proof with a little science behind it.
Well if ego equaled money, then Jesse would be one very wealthy guy.
Oh my, we’ve offended JJ’s sensibilities! I thought he was supposed to be some kind of outlaw tough guy Instead, he threw a fit, took his ball and went home. My guess is that he’ll never put up his can to a head to head test, and he found a perfect excuse to back out. If he had such a great product, would some internet haters stop him? Of course not. I’d like to see his product perform well, even if it ends up ridiculously overpriced. But given that it’s a JJ FUUUU product, I’m not surprised by this all talk and no walk. How does he fit through doorways with that ego?
For $4500 it better have a “fleshlight” adapter for the ride home from the range. JJ is a w a n k e r.
What else can you expect from a maker of tacky, overpriced firearms. That rifle looks like something I drew in middle school. Oh but its game changing that’s right. I’ll wait for the Ed Hardy cerakote edition to come out before I spend a few grand on one.
Either that or Affliction. For d-bags by d-bags.
I’m SO sorry. I never knew he was so sensitive. My assumption was he was hard core biker dude that wrapped his arms around truckloads of women and didn’t care what everyone else thought. Who knew??
That’s not a lesson. That’s a whiny baby response. TTAG or any other gun site can easily have their own independent comparison if they wanted. Who cares that Liberty and JJ(FU) didn’t want to hook up and hang out with biker chicks, do their special silencer handshake, and follow up with their supposed “silencer comparison.”
Lastly, we apologize, FirearmConcierge, that you didn’t get to see the comparison (this time) because us “internet people” were critical about JJ’s product and character. If JJ wanted to stick it to us – he would have demonstrated how effective his product was – not withdrawal from the comparison.
So what youre saying is:
Intertubez – 1 , JJFU – 0
I really enjoyed the facts Jeremy presented up top, and am confused why anyone would make such a claim that could be so easily, readily proved false.
JJFU is just too cute by half. Oh so clever in a 7th grade kind of way. After looking at the prices on his website I think it is directed at the customer.
They don’t really have a tag line, so maybe they could use “nevah been done bafor” or “one born every minute”.
I totally get making 1911s since they are the Harley of the gun world (ducks). The ARs I just don’t get – I never thought of an AR as pretty, they are pretty much form follows function. And JJ’s ARs aren’t pretty either
With the big big money custom Harley thing falling away, I applaud JJ for hopping in the firearms world with both feet.
Despite his “whad up wood” look and actions on TV, he is quite the fabricator. I have also seen that tough guy persona mellow out. We’ll see….
Perhaps those in the firearm and suppressor industry may embrace the essence of humanity which includes compassion and extend a warm hand to JJ. I won’t. The man has too many character flaws for me to embrace anything associated with him. Practically speaking, there is nothing JJ is going to produce that will be earth shattering or ground breaking. He’s a snake oil salesman, the only difference, he makes his own snake oil.
I don’t think he’ll be selling too many to his WN bros as they almost all have records. Cute logo though. It’s almost clever. Well, whatever . . . .
Is it just me or is that scope backwards?
This is BS. If JJFU’s product actually performed as claimed, the negative word of mouth would be a reason for JJFU to honor their commitment, not pull out of it. No marketer in their right mind would pull out unless they were certain the results of a shootout would do more damage to the brand. By backing out, JJFU just validated the critics.
The only rule is to not blame the internet trolls for backing down.
Hey, FC, nicely done article.
I was kinda hoping you would pwn yourself again, for cheap entertainment,
but you didnt- there is hope for you, Sir.
Jesse James- well, they are learning a lesson too. Or at least I hope so.
“All hat, no cattle” as they say in some of my favorite parts of the US…
Of all the hobbyists/tech geeks/passionate users, if there is one group that is more detail obsessed on the truth in the technology than the POTG, I cant think of it. In this innertubz connected world there is a lesson there, too…
Cant stop the signal, Mal.
so Jesse James makes a bold claim on which his (future) product and then doesn’t have time to back it up because people were mean on the internet?
sounds like someone just confirmed all those theories about the fictional qualities of said product.
I hate Jesse James with a passion. I have hated him since Monster Garage and his stupid bike show.
I am an engineer, 11 years in school, three degrees, literally thousands of hours in class and research time. I get up in the morning, go to work, and design things. I study the materials specs, run calculation after calculation, do finite element analysis, test to failure, re-design, and test again. It takes years for an idea to become a product and it goes through the hands of a lot of well educated people in the process.
This pile of turds and tattoo ink flies by the seat of his pants with a CNC and TIG welder. Maybe he’ll sketch something out, but that is it. It drives me insane how slapdash bullshit his stuff is. It is a gross distortion of how items get made in the real world.
I felt the same way about the Sons of Guns assholes and a just and loving god made sure that Will went down in flames. I pray for the day Jesse has one of his $4000 rifles go kB! while he’s holding it and takes out his ability to use a TIG.
My reaction is on my website (link provided below). It’s a true, honest reply – and one I’ll be making directly to JJFU. Has he actually done what he claims? Well, folks once said the world was flat…..only an honest field evaluation will tell.
I’ll put the $$$ up, Jesse – but YOU have to stand behind your claims with a money-back performance guarantee.
http://texasshootingsports.com/forums/index.php/topic,1292.0.html
If you are making something or providing a service to people, that has life or death kinds of consequences, and measurable results, there REALLY isnt much sense in trash talking the competion, becasue the facts are gonna come out soon enough.
This is a pretty simple learning point, but for some surprisingly large number of young businesses , it has to be learned the hard way.
The older and bigger your company and industry, the more this is accepted as a given. Bad mouthing the competition just makes you look dumb, with poor judgement. Hardly the folks I want to buy critical safety gear from, in other words.
Nonsense.
The test not happening had nothing to do with hurt feelings from Internet people or scheduling.
Jesse James is using his new status as a “silencer” manufacturer to game the NFA.
Now he can legitimately own all the Post sample machine guns his heart desires at wholesale pricing. He just has to claim to be working on a silencer for whatever gun he wants next.
He’s marketing a FIVE THOUSAND DOLLAR suppressor held together with screws.
He clearly has no intention of selling these.
But if you found you had made a silencer that quieted the report of a supersonic 223 to the same level as a normal inside conversation, the only marketing you need to do is hand a couple out for testing. They will sell themselves.
What military or swat team would be without such a product?
His story from top to bottom is nonsense. Who is foolish enough not to see this, and how can I get your contact info so I can let you in on an incredible investment opportunity that THEY DON’T WANT YOU TO KNOW ABOUT?
Found this.
http://vimeo.com/82914786
Don’t forget he has “pay up sucker” tattooed on his palm.
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