Issue 47 The Novus: A Different Kind of Modular Silencer Dave Merrill Join the Conversation At RECOIL, we review every product fairly and without bias. Making a purchase through one of our links may earn us a small commission, and helps support independent gun reviews. Learn More Introducing the Novus From the Enfield Rifle Company A lot of engineers, entrepreneurs, and inventors all start the same way: exclaiming that something out there must be better. And it was no different for Michael Tiziani. Years earlier while serving in Ranger regiment, Tiziani got his first taste of silencers; he fired suppressed Glocks, SCARs, and an M110 sniper rifle or two. While he noted the benefits, he didn’t like the perceived limitations of his issued equipment. After he left active duty, Tiziani went to college for engineering and eventually became a full-time aerospace engineer. It was the combination of his background and education that ultimately became the impetus for the Enfield Rifle Company and their first mainstream product: the Novus silencer. Before your mind fills with images of the godawful SA-80, this new American company doesn’t have any relationship with the British rifles or the Royal Small Arms Factory (RSAF) that produced them. The roots of the owners land firmly in both Enfield, North Carolina, and Enfield, Connecticut. When searching for a name, they found another Enfield Rifle Company; upon learning the owner was about to retire this Enfield Rifle Company, they bought the rights. Please bear in mind that the example we have is a preproduction model; there’ll be some changes prior to full production, and we’ll note differences between the two as we go along. A DIFFERENT KIND OF MODULAR Right now when we think of modular silencers, images of removeable baffle designs such as the Dead Air Odessa or Torrent Suppressors Orthus spring to mind. While these silencers ship in the longest possible configurations, separate baffle sections can be removed or installed to customize length for the given application. That’s not what the Novus is. Nor is it a silencer with different large module sections such as the SilencerCo Hybrid 36M. And while the Novus has replaceable endcaps, that’s not how they do it either. The Novus controls gas not with length, but with the apertures inside the silencer itself. Admittedly, when we first heard about this project we weren’t sure how they’d go about it, but go about it they have. Each Novus silencer can be configured with baffles rocking a .45, .30, or .224 aperture size — all without any spare parts that would make the BATFE give them side-eye. Pistols or rifles — the Novus doesn’t care so long as you have the right mount and caliber configuration. DESIGN The Novus doesn’t represent Tiziani’s first attempt — he went through several design iterations, including 3D printed and homebrewed design prototypes, before ERC began CNC operations. Nor is ERC a fly-by-night company using prefabbed parts from internet retailers as we’ve recently seen more of. Everything is made on-site; we’ve seen the lathes and CNC machines for ourselves in their Georgia production facility. The body of the Novus is constructed from titanium and is 6.5 inches long, and the skeleton and baffles are cut from 17-4 stainless steel. All of this adds up to a weight under 15 ounces in a dedicated configuration and direct-thread mount. As it ships from the factory, inside each Novus is a skeleton or core with 18 baffles nestled inside. You can shoot it in this configuration with .224 or below; but you’ll probably never shoot it in this arrangement. An engineer by trade, Tiziani has no problems going hands-on at the shop. All you have to do to change baffle apertures is pop out all 18 baffles and choose six in the desired caliber. The skeleton is designed so that these Russian matryoshka baffles can be installed all together or six at a time. Each baffle has a clip that we’re told should all be installed facing the same direction (more on this later). Our preproduction model had an endcap with a .45 hole, but the company indicated that other endcaps such as caliber-specific ones or a flash hider/brake are likely to come in the future. Instead of making their own proprietary mount, which is a market-killer for many a new silencer company, ERC went with the nearly universal 1 3/8-inch x 24 thread pattern designed by SilencerCo for their Omega suppressors. There are at least a dozen companies making adapters, mounts, and boosters with this pattern, giving you nearly endless options. With that said, the Novus will ship with 5/8×24 and ½x28mm direct thread adapters included to get you going right away. Here you see the progression of the Novus, from 3D printed concepts to hand-built prototypes to initial preproduction to what you see here today. ENDLESS NERDERY This suppressor isn’t necessarily for the nerdy, but boy can you really, really play around with it. Want to try out half 5.56 baffles and half .30-caliber baffles on a 5.56? There are endless combinations. Get really weird — want to install an upside-down .45 baffle as the first and then offset baffle clippings the rest of the way? You can do that too. If you like to tinker, then undoubtedly this is the silencer for you. With many silencer designs, the blast baffle itself is specially reinforced because it takes the brunt of the damage. While that isn’t present on the Novus, its longevity is incredibly high simply because you can rotate out your blast baffle whenever you want. This level of modularity is the greatest strength of the Novus and will also be the subject of the most calls to customer service — namely, a consumer using the wrong baffles for the wrong firearm and causing strikes as a result. Always double-check your work before putting rounds downrange. Our preproduction model doesn’t have aperture size markings, so we had to rely on our eyeballs, but production baffles will have machined markings and will also be different colors (silver, gold, and black) to help prevent this sort of mishap. AT THE RANGE The Novus sounds exactly how we’d expect it to. A 5.56 rifle with a Novus in a 5.56 configuration would fit right in with its peers, as would a Novus in a 30-caliber setup. Even the 30-cal on a 5.56 sounded exactly as we’d expect. The performance of the Novus with a 9mm host and 45-caliber baffles was louder than most, except the smallest dedicated 9mm silencers, though we think a 9mm endcap (hint, hint ERC) could make a large difference here. It’s pretty safe to think of the Novus as a rifle silencer that can also play on a pistol rather than the other way around. QUIRKS Something a potential buyer will notice at the retail counter right away is that there’s a rattle if you shake the Novus. That rattle is for a reason — there has to be enough clearance for you to take out the baffles to reconfigure them. This happens in both the 18-baffle and the caliber-specific six-baffle arrangement. However, the rattle quickly goes away with a little use. Five .300 BLK subsonics were enough to eliminate it the first time out. We can tell you with certainty that not every 1.375-inch x 24 device or adapter will fit, for two reasons: Some devices may simply be too long, in which case the first baffle can be removed, or the mount itself may be too long, running into the base of the skeleton core, such as with our Gemtech bi-lock adapter built for a Dead Air Nomad. Because there are so many companies making mounts and devices, you’ll be bound to run into some compatibility issues. However, this is one of those key differences between our preproduction prototype and the production model: The production model will be far more accommodating and will fit SilencerCo ASR and Dead Air Keymo mounts. Furthermore, you’re unlikely to run into an issue with a muzzle device that’s too long, because you can simply remove the first baffle if you need to. LOOSE ROUNDS We applaud Tiziani and the crew at ERC for designing a truly unique silencer. Normally, in order to achieve this level of customization the end user would have to be an NFA manufacturer themselves. While there are a lot of “do-all” silencers in the world, the ERC Novus is the only one out there with this kind of flexibility. Our preproduction model wouldn’t eat from every adapter — but production models will. Enfield Rifle Company Novus Caliber: .224 / .45 / .30 Length: 6.5 inches Diameter: 1.5 inches Weight (caliber-specific, direct thread mount): 14.2 ounces MSRP: TBD, expected to be around $1,000 URL: enfieldriflecompany.com Explore RECOILweb:Historic Louisiana Flooding ContinuesRECOILtv Shot Show 2017 Constant Coverage: Crye Precision LVSWhat Is .277 Fury: Basics, Ballistics, & Army AdoptionGutter Ball: EAA Imports a Turkish Take on an Iconic American Carry Gun NEXT STEP: Download Your Free Target Pack from RECOILFor years, RECOIL magazine has treated its readers to a full-size (sometimes full color!) shooting target tucked into each big issue. Now we've compiled over 50 of our most popular targets into this one digital PDF download. From handgun drills to AR-15 practice, these 50+ targets have you covered. Print off as many as you like (ammo not included). Get your pack of 50 Print-at-Home targets when you subscribe to the RECOIL email newsletter. 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