To answer some questions. All the shooting I do is at paper, steel and plastic bottles full of water. I do not hunt. I wear hearing protection 100% of the time, except for an occasional oops, and those are for one shot only. The number of shots I would take at any range session with a .308 would probably be 20 or less. I typically take several guns to a range trip, and try to shoot everything I take, so no one gun gets shot a lot at any one range session. I’m retired, and the cost of .308 ammo would probably limit how much I shoot it.

I’ve never shot with a muzzle brake nor have I been around anyone shooting with one, but I’ve read enough and talked to people about them, and I do realize they are loud. Standing off to the side and a few feet back does give one a different perspective on noise. One of my Mosins, the one I shoot the most, is a light short M38 Carbine. The muzzle flash in the day is impressive, but if I am standing about 15 feet in back and to the side of someone else shooting it, I get quite the thumping. Much different that being behind the gun and pulling the trigger. I will definitely shoot the Hog Hunter as it comes out of the box. No scope, no brake. I will be adding a scope, but as for the brake, I’ll decide after I shoot it, but I do like the idea of having the option to add a brake.

I found a video on YouTube last night where a guy tested 35 different muzzle brakes. Very interesting. He did the test with 5.56, but if I can directly correlate his results to muzzle brakes for a .308, then I have his 5 best performing brakes written down. The video is about 35 minutes long, but well worth watching if you are in the process of trying to decide on a muzzle brake. He has charts with the results at the end of the video and a separate web page with a full writeup. Let me know what you think of this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FD-Rou9-9A