Tim Bixler (SCRC) was the first to come out with a successful 3 lug suppressor mount.
This was a brilliantly simple design which locks up rock solid and doesn’t use any springs that are susceptible to wear or heat. I have not seen or heard of any issues of these loosening up even under heavy full auto fire.
You don’t need any tools to tighten the nut either. Hand tight is fine.
Gemtech used to license this design for several years until Greg Latka (previously of Gemtech) came out with a novel 3 lug suppressor mount design of his own.
This design is a little more complex in that it uses a cylinder which compresses a spring. This is what you more commonly see used on 3 lug suppressors these days.
Due to age, both patents are expired. Most manufactures seemed to have gravitated more to the Latka design.
Pro’s to the Bixler mount:
- No slop with the Bixler mount: There may be a slight rotational movement but no up/down or side-to-side slop that you can sometimes encounter on various implementations of the Latka design. I don’t think this is a slight against the Latka design. More an issue with variances in 3 lug mounts out there. However, the Bixler design seems more tolerant of these variances since you can just tighten the collar and remove any slop….EX: I have some combo’s where a Latka mount may have a considerable amount of slop but if I put a Bixler 3 lug mount on the same 3 lugged barrel, it is rock solid.
- Nothing to wear out on the Bixler design: no springs or o-rings to wear out on this design.
- Nothing to get seized up from fouling which can happen on the Latka mounts – again, this may just be due to manufacturing tolerances
- Possibly stronger as the original Bixler design had a steel nut
Con’s to the Bixler mount:
- Slower to mount/dis-mount
- Requires you to access the rear nut for installation / removal which may be an issue if you want to tuck it really deep inside of a rail…where you don’t even see the end of the barrel….(however, see my pics below where I have one tucked with just enough room to get to the nut).
Some various cans using the Latka mount.
Notice the two MK9K’s at the top are using two different Latka 3 lug mounts. The one on top being older than the skinnier ones they were starting to use during that time period. It was easier to make one mount for all their cans but myself and others were having POI and fouling issues with the skinnier mount. They later went back to the fatter mount.
The older mount disassembled from the inside but was sealed against fouling while the later design leaked gas into the mechanism.
Picture below summarizes some of these variants.
When I had Joe at Curtis Tactical make my custom hybrid MK-9K suppressor, I told him that I wanted him to use the old SCRC 3 lug design. He had never heard of it so I sent him a bunch of pictures and ultimately let him borrow one of the 3 lug nuts for cloning.
Pictured below is an old Bixler design MK9K mount and nut made from aluminum and licensed from SCRC. Original steel SCRC nut on the right.
This view compares the aluminum Gemtech 3 lug nut to the more intricately machined steel SCRC nut. While I admire the machine work, I don’t think it is required for proper operation / performance. So Curtis Tactical cloned the Gemtech style of doing round holes.
This view shows how the inside of the mount is tapered to reduce weight.
In this picture I’m showing that I’m using an 8″ Midwest Industries rail and SS 8″ custom barrel for the CMMG RDB system.
The lugs are almost all the way tucked into the rail.
Now all the push turn Latka mount variants I have would be too wide to fit inside this skinny rail but the Bixler nuts fit just fine with good clearance.
BTW, this is using the Bixler style nut made by Curtis Tactical fabricated from Titanium.
Another application using the Bixler nut on a 3 lugged 300 BLK upper where the lugs are completely inside the rail.
This is an innovative idea for a direct thread option using the Bixler design from Joe at Curtis Tactical.
He made a Titanium nut that is threaded for a direct thread barrel so you can leave the rear mount intact. He also added an ‘anti-fouling sleeve’ to go inside the rear mount so there would be no carbon buildup when using a direct thread barrel. Great attention to detail!!
