I was at the local public range yesterday shooting my 10/22 at 50 yards when a blast goes off next to me that almost blows my hat off and leaves me with my ears ringing even though I have plugs in. I look over and see a younger guy(around 20) with a AR with a large brake on it. I was a somewhat grouchy when I asked him why he needed that on a 223.
Are you
sure it was a .223?....
A .223 AR with a brake isn't going to come close to blowing your hat off, unless you have your head close enough to be a safety violation.
And... There are MANY, many other options out there for AR chamberings, today.
About six feet from me, while I type this, you'll find a .458 SOCOM and a .475 Tremor.
They may look like heavy barreled AR carbines with gaudy muzzle brakes, from a distance. But upon closer inspection, you'll notice that they say ".458" or ".475" on the barrel, and there's a
really big hole at the muzzle.
.458 SOCOM is roughly equivalent to traditional .45-70 or standard .460 S&W loads (325 gr bullet at 1,750-1,950 fps), and .475 Tremor is just a larger diameter bullet at a theoretically marginally higher velocity (30-50 fps). ...But in an AR style rifle that weighs less than 7 lbs.
Without the muzzle brake, recoil is too much for most shooters and will even leave experienced shooters with bruises. (Recoil of .458 SOCOM is even enough to strip the detents in buffer tubes, or shear stop pins for adjustable stocks.
) Muzzle rise is also substantial, and increases follow up time by quite a bit.
But the brakes tame them.
The brake turns those rifles from brutal, comical beasts into controllable mid-range hammers.
And, of course, there are other big bore options for either the AR15 or AR10/LR308...
.510 WSM
.500 Phantom
.50 Beowulf
.45 Raptor
.450 Bushmaster
.44 Fury
.416 Hushpuppy
.375 SOCOM
...And a plethora of boutique wildcats.