Episode 123: Curving Bullets
Air Date: June 10, 2009
A shooter can curve a bullet around an obstacle by swinging or flicking his or her arm. (Based on scenes from the movie Wanted.)
busted
The Build Team first went to a shooting range and set up a target with a wooden obstacle halfway between themselves and the target. Grant, Tory, and Kari each attempted to imitate the movie characters and shoot a bullet from a handgun around the obstacle by swinging the gun in an arc as they shot. No one was able to accomplish the feat. To continue testing, the team created a robot that could swing a gun at superhuman speeds. They set up a row of five large planes of paper, each parallel to the others to help determine the bullets’ paths. After each shot, they used a laser pointer to see if all five of the holes lined up. Even with the gun being swung by the robot, the bullet paths were completely straight. Finally, the team tried modifying the gun and bullets. With a de-rifled gun barrel and unbalanced bullets, the bullets tumbled through the air but still flew along a straight path.
The sonic boom or shockwave from a supersonic bullet can break glass.
busted
To test this myth, Adam and Jamie used a .50 caliber rifle capable of shooting bullets at 1,984 mph (3192 km/hr), well above the speed of sound. They set up a series of glass panes, stemware, and light bulbs surrounding the path of the bullet. Even with the bullet passing within inches of the glass objects, nothing broke as a result of the passing bullet.
The sonic boom from a supersonic fighter jet will break glass.
busted
Adam and Jamie teamed up with the Navy’s Blue Angels to test this myth. Adam first received some subsonic flight training in an FA-18; despite passing out and vomiting at various times, he enjoyed the experience. To operate at supersonic speeds, they had to go to a restricted zone due to FAA rules. At the test site, the MythBusters built a small cabin with a glass window in addition to parking a car and leaving a table with lots of glass objects on it. When a Blue Angel jet, with Adam aboard, flew by at supersonic speed and with 8,000 feet of altitude, barely a sound was heard. At 2,000 feet, a loud boom was heard but no glass was broken. The jet continued to make lower and lower passes, ultimately making five passes at just 200 feet. The house’s window was broken from these passes, but nothing else was broken. Because of the extremely unlikely circumstance of a 200-foot supersonic jet pass, and the minimal damage observed, this myth was declared busted.
Newer: Episode 124: Car vs. Rain
Older: Episode 122: Prison Escape
Hi everybody!
HOW TO BEND A BULLET……a large enough magnetic field would cause the trajectory of the bullet to bend. Gravity is mild compared to what can be created in a particle accelerator such as the one in Batavia Il. called Fermi lab. Super strong magnets that’ll bend bullets….I got a buck on it…..
I bet John Hutchison can do it…..
a bullet is made of lead and lead is non magnetic!
any conductive material moving through a magnetic flux will generate a current within itself that causes it to be influenced by the current-field interaction. think of an electric generator, the coils are copper, not magnetic. as they move past the magnets in the generator, they generate current, and due to conservation of energy, they experience an opposing force which acts to slow the armature
If you payed more attention to the movie WANTED, you notice none of the assassins could bend a bullet without it’s required training. Also they had a hypersense to know
when to pull the trigger and knowing where it would go. So the Mythbusters team did not necessarily use all the possible methods to pull of a curve.
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Umm….the Mythbusters already tried this and only with steel bullets and very very strong magnets was it possible. The “curved bullet” myth was from the movie “Wanted”.
Somebody here is a noob who doesn’t watch enough mythbusters, or know anything about bullets, or magnetism. Also, you call gravity mild, then how come every time you shoot a gun in the air, gravity bends it ~180 degrees.
Gravity is mild compared to magnetism, Kyle. Otherwise, you couldn’t stick magnets to the side of a refrigerator, because gravity would pull them off.
Kyle I hate to burst your bubble ,but gravity is one of the weakest forces in nature.From our perspective it appears quite strong. But man made magnetism surpasses gravity by far in strength
.Does anyone else want to chime in on this one?
without gravity no universe, we could all live without magnetism it’s not even strong.not as strong as a quasar as least.
If the magnetic force could be applied to it for an extended period of time, then it could definitely have a major impact on the trajectory of the bullet. But when you have a magnet that sits in one place, it can only exert force on the bullet for a very very small amount of time.
So even with a very strong magnet, the amount of trajectory change will be minimal. Gravity has no problem affecting the trajectory because it’s constant force on the bullet.
Jeff & Slave, look at the magnetic properties of bullet materials (lead and copper are common). These materials are not significantly affected by a magnetic field. Therefore, the magnet should have no impact on the trajectory even if applied over longer distances. This assumes that the bullet is neutrally charged. If somehow you could apply a static charge to the bullet (and keep it there during flight), the Lorentz force would apply and you might see something interesting with sufficiently large E and B fields applied over a sufficient amount of time.
It is not realistic to put a static charge on a bullet. You will need a large amount of charge to curve a bullet even in large E and B fields. Even if you were able to create this charge on a bullet,
I bet the bullet wouldn’t be able to leave a gun, because the charge on a bullet would induce the charge on a gun.
Curving a bullet with a magnetic field is also problematic even if you make the bullet from steel. First, Jeff comment is correct. Second, the conventional static magnets create magnetic fields decaying much faster with distance than Coulomb field (magnets are magnetic dipoles, field scales as 1 over r^3 with distance r). So not only you need a huge magnet but you need to keep it very close to the bullet.
I guess, the only reasonable solution would be to make a bullet with wings and use aerodynamics.
I know this is off the topic but what about the part about the bath of wax? does it really stimulate white blood cells?
the Germans in WW2 invented a rifle with a curved barrel so they could shoot around corners , so in theory the bullet did curve
youre still wrong, the bullet only curves through the barrel because the barrel is curved, u caveman
Btw this show is terrible. But Gravity is one of the strongest forces depends on what measure you use. It can have an effect over the longest range of all the forces. But yes, its close range effects are not as dramatic as the nuclear force or the electromagnetic force. But overall, if you take measurements at a certain distance, gravity could be considered longer. And someone being a noob because they do not watch the horrible show that mocks science every episode is a good thing form my point of view.
forces in order of strength:
Strong nuclear, weak nuclear, electromagnetism, gravity.
it is most definitely the weakest, and by a huge factor. it’s field is continuous tho, and decreases according to the inverse square law
well if you learn sciene from MB only then you wouldnt know how large a universe is.gravity power is so great that it can inverse time bro..can any electromagnet or nuclear bend time?gravity is still a mysterious force that we couldnt combine a single formula for nuclear with gravity not like electromagnet with nuclear in quantum physic.
Hey every one the subsonic jet breaking the glass is possible in Billings Montana a jet flew be well under 50 feet it blew out hundreds of car windows put hundreds of people in the hospital i know cause i was there and the key of breaking glass is breaking the sound barrier RIGHT above the glass mythbusters was going about 2000mph and not actually braking the sound barrier above the glass but miles back
way to go man.yeah, you are totally right.they dont actually sketch their move before they experimenting.plus,hey this is high frequency sound..human voice alone can break a glass how can sonic boom not?
Can you try the supersonic boom from a bullwhip?
Has anyone tried a round bullet,I know in the movie they were regular bullet shape but it would be interesting to see what happens.Think of a pitcher throwing a curve ball.Of course you might have to control the velocity of the round to get the result your looking for.I think this was the problem with your testing,the speed of the bullet was just to fast to effect it.Maybe thats why they shoot it in SLOW MOTION !!
you are very close to the secret of curving a bullet. but it does not have to be round. the baseball pitcher example is close enough to be right. in short a bullet can curve based on your theory of a pitcher. i know i do it at competive shooting contest as a sport. i am a professional trick shooter if myth busters will pay me enough i will personally curve a bullet 12 inches at at 80 yds. i do it all the time and have met only 2 more shooters that can curve a bullet 1 of them is a 17 yr. old girl but they can only curve around 5 inches in that distance.
it smells like a cow patch, actually more like bull…
unless you mistaken deflect and curve,your story are not making sense.
the only way to justify you make a curve is not how long “the curve” because a curve will return to originate and continue to oppose original direction.
are u kidding me? anyone who shoots will in some way shape or form curve a bullet. ITS CALLED TRAJECTORY
How much sound and explosions can Kari’s unborn child take?
There’s a theory that says:
If you are a pregnant woman and you want a calm and intelligent child, you should play classic music while you’re pregnant. That’s because the fetus can pickup up sound from the surrounding. It recognizes the mother’s voice and the father’s voice (if he’s been present during the pregnancy). The fetus is totally surrounded by liquid. And what happens in liquid? The sound and shock waves is traveling much easier and faster than in air. So Kari’s stomach acts like a big drum for the fetus inside.
So far, Kari has been doing gunshots and really big explosions with ear protections. That’s despite the fact that she’s been pregnant and carrying a 6-7 months fetus without any chance to wear ear protection on its own.
So I ask the question…
-How bad is this for Kari’s child. Will it sustain any problems while its growing up?
In theory, lets take the bullets and replace them with a baseball. If you were actually able to slow down time immensely, the only way to make it curve, is to spin the actual object to compensate for the wind. People throw sidearm and still trow the ball straight. In theory you could curve a bullet, you it would have to have an amount of spin(not spiral) on it in order to curve, at that point I doubt it would be effective.
When jet fighter breaks sound barier, it WILL BREAK all windows in the area, window breaking is not 100 percent but, it is at 80%. How do i know that-i happened to live in Sarajevo, Bosnia and in the begining of the conflict, mid april two MIG 29 jet fighters flew over my area of town and broke sound barrier. Very few were left with windows. They did flew very, very low.
I guess “Mythbusters experiment research team did do much research in the real world”
they just stupidly making havoc.seriously,what the heck with a cramp of glasses on one spot.are they thinking they are pro that can launch sonic boom at any point as they please?
The size of the jet matters when causing a sonic boom. next time try a B-1b at 200 ft and see what a difference that would make.
The only way to curve a bullet is to apply a force on it. No matter how much you wave your arms, the force during flight will not be affected, so it won’t curve.
Gravity does indeed curve flight (toward the centre of the planet), and a very very strong magnetic force and ferromagnetic bullet would work to pull it in any direction.
true..you are just right.
Yeah, I saw you, Syn, and some other FR’ers + friends on my list, but you guys are never on. I had to letensialsy learn and play with the Wave by my lonesome.
I agree completely with Tony !!!
A Baseball pitcher throws a curveball by gripping the ball a certain way. This grip, combined with the orientation of the ball’s stitches, determine how the ball will react in flight.
Large storefront windows can break by a jet flying at supersonic speed above 30,000 by aiming the nose of the jet toward the window. I remember a town that gave a speeding ticket to a jet pilot years ago that lost a large window. It may have something to do with the resonant frequency of the larger windows.
So this episode just came on recently and the thing that drove me CRAZY was that they said it was not possible when they were not even doing it right! I was fully expecting them to prove it wrong, but I expected them to at least flick their wrist yet not ONE of them did. It had nothing to do with how fast the bullet was supposed to go, but everything to do with how you flung your arm and wrist at the same time. They all flung their arm, but kept their wrist straight! GRRRRRR!!! Do it right next time. =(
@brittany.. don’t worry. it’s physically impossible so it doesn’t matter if they flick their wrists at superhuman speeds.
I couldn’t help but notice that some of the people here seem to think that gravity is one of the strongest forces. This is simply not true. Here are two reasons as to why: first: when you lift up your foot, you’ve got the entire mass of the Earth pulling against you. Yet you still can. That alone should be enough to prove that gravity is a weak force. Second, the distance that gravity has an effect, has nothing to due with how strong the force is. It has to due with the mass of the object. I have my own gravity, but things aren’t attracted to me because the force I exert on them is minutely small. The only reason that the Earth exerts a strong enough pull to keep an object like the moon in orbit, is because the Earth is massive.
As to the sonic boom myth, I’d imagine that the frequency of the sound produced, is more important then how loud it is. You might get glass broken due to shaking, but not much else.
Sonic Boom: I am surprised that very little was heard from 8000 feet.
I have experienced 2 Sonic booms from the ground and both were very very loud and were both accompanied by quite a shock wave.
The first was at the Overberg Military airshow (South Africa), aircraft was a Mirage F 111 CZ at 25 000 feet. The 2nd was at the Africa Aerospace and Defence Show (Cape Town, South Africa) by a Lightning at over 20 000 feet. “the Lightnings broke through the sound barrier over the airfield, above 20 000 feet, creating two terrific sonic booms. While this had been announced and was expected, many did not expect the ferocity of the booms and the shockwave. It evidently rattled windows as far away as Durbanville! There were a number of complaints about this, but on the day, the “fors” were far greater than the “againsts”. “ from: http://www.saairforce.co.za/news-and-events/710/aad-2008-airshow-report . My view is that if it can rattle windows from 20 000 surely it can break them at lower altitudes.
Apparently though the hearing of a Sonic boom is very dependant on atmospheric conditions.
Two rebuttals:
CURVING BULLET:
It’s simple physics. Once the bullet leaves the barrel it will travel in a straight line because there is no sideways force to change its direction. On top of that, barrels are rifled to spin the bullet so the gyroscope effect helps ensure they maintain a straight line. It will curve and eventually fall down to the ground because of the verticle force of gravity.
Baseballs have been shown to curve sideways because of the spin. The aerodynamic forces generated by the spinning ball can produce the needed side force. I doubt very much that sufficient spin could be applied to a spherical shot in a smooth bore gun.
SONIC BOOM:
In the 1950′s, the Canadian air force were demonstrating their new CF-100 fighter. This was totally designed and built in Canada and bore no relationship at all to the American F-100.
It was intended for high subsonic speeds, but as the pilot pulled out of a shallow dive the plane briefly went supersonic right above one end of an administration building. This 1-storey buildind was arranged as a simple rectangle with a straight central hall and offices opening off both sides of the hall. The shock wave blew the glass doors inward. It then travelled down the hall, blowing out the windows of any office whose door was open, until it blew out the glass doors at the other end of the hall. The building itself suffered significant structural damage.
I would suggest that a strong factor here is that the plane was never intended to go supersonic (for example, straight instead of swept wings) and so the shock wave would be quite a bit stronger than current fighters would produce.
I would suggest
The best way to curve a bullet is to use the CornerShot Weapon System! Although it doesn’t curve a bullet it does however give you the same advantage.
i think you all should stop mouning geeeeezzz the boys put on a gud show if you want to proof them wrong get your own show and do it and Peter R if you dont like the show dont watch it and we dont realy care bout your opinion either go watch oprah or something, but for heavens sakes ppl either the myth is true or it aint so get over it .
oh and btw the best way to curve a bullet is to put your dvd player on and watch wanted !!!!!!!!!!
Steve I totally agree with you! M-Busters is great program. BTW, A chopped up version of our CornerShot is in the movie Wanted, but you probably know that already.
Sonic Boom ..
It is possible for Windows to be broken by the Shockwave. I’ve seen Videos from loads of different countries, USA,AUS,RUS,UK,GER,FRA all showing windows being shattered by the shockwaves.
It is also possible for windows to shatter from Subsonic aircraft under power, B-52s in the USA, the Avro Vulcan in the UK and F-111s in Australia have all done it.
Lucky G*t for getting to fly with the Angels !!
Good show and it was good to see the result of the Wanted myth, I haven’t seen this episode yet.
And for my two cents on the gravity strength argument, I’d say gravity is weak. When you pick something up with a magnet, you have to overcome gravity, and the magnet’s only the size of a finger. Imagine a magnet the size and mass of earth…
Here’s to all of the people having problems with the curving bullets…watch the scene, and the bullet actually moves upwards…that deifies physics in itself. Just forget about everything anyone’s said about a magnetic field…the mythbusters have already tested that, and it requires about 13 rare earth magnets to affect the trajectory of a bullet. The whole point was that the motion of a person’s arms can curve a bullet…the bullet moves too fast to have any affect as it escapes the barrel, so myth busted.
The blue angels themselves, broke every window in an eight block radius while practicing for a demonstation in Kelowna B.C. Canada in 1969
http://archives.cbc.ca/science_technology/aeronautics/clips/1220/
With regard to a supersonic jet breaking windows: In 1959, at the opening of Uplands airport, in Ottawa, Canada, a pilot of an F-104 inadvertantly broke the sound barrier, breaking a number of windows in the new terminal building. The story can be found in Wikipedia, under the entry for “Ottawa Macdonald-Cartier International Airport”, as tit is now known
The bullets do curve, in fact in two directions. One direction is downward …same as gravity. The second direction is the tangential direction created by “sweeping” the pistal from right to left (or left to right). The reason why Mythbusters could not prove or show a curving of the bullet using five layers of paper walls as a trajectory “tracking” device is that the walls were too close to the shooter relative to the bullet’s actual trajectory as affected by gravity and the tangential vectors. Consider an apparently flat surface area on Earth; yet, if you continue to extend that flat area to the horizon and beyond, you discover it actually curves (just like Columbus) …all the way around the Earth. I believe the trajectory tracking walls would show the curving due to gravity and the horizontal tangential vector if the walls were positioned at a much further distance …say a total of 1 sm. Of course the myth that even a superhero could curve a bullet the distance of more than the bullet’s width for every 100 feet of travel would still be busted.
HAHAHA How do you function in life believing crap like this?
you guys are the coolest on your experents i liked the water experiment and the shark.
In theory, a bullet could be curved. That is if it was round. The friction of the air, causes a normal bullet to fly straight. But, if a round bullet were used, then shot at the right angle, there wouldn’t be a single point where the friction of gravity and drag would affect it. Thusly, it would be curved.
engineers… what can I say, why dont you people hire some one who has actually done some of this stuff for real.My friend and I did go right over the swing right around, with wittness.Your science books are not part of the real world.We get you engineer type underground all the time. and they say [it cant be done] and we prove them wrong half the time.The trouble is none of you has ever worked for a living, real work.A regurgitation of a tex book does not cut in the real world. sorry to bruise your over inflated egos. some of us know better, all that schooling and you guys really dont know squat.
so gravity doesn’t exist and magnets are magic? textbooks give a generalized situation. science can only give the same. in ideal situations, yeah, you can do alot of stuff. the world isn’t ideal.
i think you meet the wrong engineer coz i never say so.but as you proudly speak,in any event you did curve the bullet,fell free to share a video link with us..
Sonic boom- I noticed that the vehicle was parked directly in front of the only window that broke (front to rear with the rear in front of the window). Is it possible that the sound waves followed the aerodynamics of the car and focused them on that portion of the house with greater force? Could that be why only that window broke? Keep it up, your awesome!!
simply the guys where only throwing there arms around, and not rotaiting the gun at the same time…
i wonder if in the movie wanted if the way the bullet were made made a differnce. By this i mean more then just unblanced but have a certain spriel that would cause the air to twist around it in such a way that would make it curve?
Well, bullets’ paths CAN be curved…they ARE curved by gravity. The kicker is, though, gravity is acting on the bullet even after it leaves the barrel. Swinging the gun around can’t affect the trajectory of the bullet after it’s left the barrel.
If the gun is moving when it fires, the bullet won’t go in a straight forward path. It’s like if you’re running sideways and throw a ball straight in front of you. it’ll go on a diagonal path from your motion, not perpendicular. But it will still fly straight diagonally, you wouldn’t be able to curve AROUND anything.
good explanation.true.that’s why to make it bend your force must be applied when the bullet reach end of muzzle.with that,the natural force from muzzle wall are no more to counter your applied force.
it just like your bullet hit an obstacle by it SIDE (not tip) and there you go a curve (not a deflection).
Sonic Boom.
It looks like they flew past the window already at speeds above Mach 1. At that time sound is traveling in a coneshaped pattern. If you want to break the windows, you need to break the soundbarrier near the window. Now all the soundwaves are exactly focussed in one point, which makes it ampified and a loud bang will be heard, and your window is gone.
About 12-years ago at the RAAF Edinborough Airforce Base situated in salisbury/Adelaide South Australia.
During an Air Show at the Base one of the pilots on a low alttitude run unlawfully broke the sound barrier.
This boom created a major uproar in the local papers as it destroyed dozens of market garden green houses in Virginia.
A market garden growing area which was in the country side approx 5 miles away from the RAAF Base.
The green houses looked as though they had been in a giant hailstone storm.
The market gardeners were on the television news that night, furious, that there livelyhood had just been destroyed.
So much for Yanks and ballistics!
A bullet/projectile does not travel in a two dimensional trajectory, it travels in a spiral.
That means that looking at the trajectory in plan view the bullet is traveling in a horizontal curve.
The bullet is a gyroscope,due to the natural
frequency of the rifle barrel it gets flicked sideways as it exits.When you apply a force to a
gyroscope it precesses / wobbles, check out Wikipedia for the mathematics.
To get a horizontal curve/spiral you would need to move the barrrel at a speed of similar magnitude to its natural frequency/ bong it with a hammer, and also shoot over several hundred yards.
nice reading but not understanding.its spiral is not a projectile but its movement (consider earth rotate while orbiting the sun).but yes,due to this movement,some applied force might result differently but the main reason the experiment (and most of self tried experiment) failed is because the bullet can only bended if you can tap its side after it get out from muzzle (within muzzle,the muzzle wall will counter any force and make the bullet move in a straight line).how to tap it,your timing must same with the bullet speed as it reach muzzle end and tap it with muzzle edge.
I remember this back in 1969…The merchants of Kelowna were not happy with the Blue Angels.
http://archives.cbc.ca/science_technology/aeronautics/clips/1220/
thats was the dumbest movie to to be relased in the past 2 yrs. i dont why u would even test it. even the dumbest meth-head redneck knows that u cant do that(in a real world situation;not w/ magnets or static bullets or whatever u guys wanna dream up)
Sonic Boom breaking glass..Is it possible that temperature, as well as altitude (lower altitude of test objects would be higher density air)could both have a huge effect?
Yes, the Blue Angels broke all the downtown store windows in Kelowna BC in 1969.I was a small child, but my father was in the EAA, and we got to hang out at the airport. I was told that one of the pilots fell behind and cracked the throttle to catch up, accidentally breaking the sound barrier.
Mythbusters busted.
Is there a way to constuct a gun to spin a round bullet in the same spin as a baseball? I was thinking of roughing up the right side of a smooth bore barrel and leaving the left side smooth. Wouldn’t that spin the bullet like a top instead of a regular rifled barrel? What would happen? Would it curve the bullet after it left the barrel? Mythbusters is a good show. They cannot try things over crowded areas (sonic boom) or buildings in which people may get hurt. This is one of the gray areas in which they cannot test due to regulations. So for all which they do, this is a great small scale model, of which the test cannot harm anyone.
I also agree with tds of the diagonal trajectory when the gun is in motion. It maybe a Einstein equation, due to which observer…of who sees the bullet curve. But most of these is due to EXTREME differences in the velocities of the bullets, observers, guns, other eyewitnesses. Since we normally as observers aren’t travelling faster than another observer or aren’t going faster than the bullet itself, it will always appear to move diagonally and always in a straight line….
ok nick i dont care if you can curve a bullet or not but quite frankly this movie is amazing and there were plenty of movies released in the last two years that were far dumber than Wanted such as speed racer, untraceable,funny people, and the day the earth stood still
Un-Busted
I figure that I achieved about a 120 foot horizontal radius, using;
- round bullet
- smooth bore barrel
- a short barrel extension that spun the bullet about an axis normal to that of the barrel.
Specifically:
Gun – 6mm air pistol,
Advertised muzzle velocity – 300 ft per sec
Bullet –Round plastic, 0.12 gram
Barrel extension:
Length – 3/8 inch, about 1.5 diameters
“Rifling” – Row of 1/16 inch wide transverse notches along the length of the extension, about 1/12 of the circumference
Using three paper targets, 30 inches apart, holes from five shots showed a consistent curvature with a radius of about 120 feet. A one hundred and twenty foot radius seems uselessly large, but, it means that 40 yards from the shooter, the bullet is moving perpendicular to its original trajectory.
Different width/length of the “rifling” and/or a dimpled ball might reduce the radius, but I’ll leave that to others.
air gun and normal gun are different.but since while giving your result you include supposedly unknown bullet speed you are actually BSing based on theoretical only.
like i have mentioned (and Paul Malley did) to bend a bullet by reckless swing is useless.even if u use air gun..because gyroscope or what so ever,your swing force will actually neutralise by normal force exerted by muzzle wall.
Bending bullet
Not quite the same, but a similar concept: Paintball’s “flatline” barrel gives it backspin, making the trajectory flat (flies longer, most paintball fields have restricted velocity < 300 fps). The barrel looked like a banana with an upward sweep towards the muzzle and then going horizontal. The bore is large to allow the paintball to roll unobstructed (as opposed to other barrels that try to get an accurate fit to increase gas efficiency).
If you turn this gun around, it'll bend considerably sideways. You could shoot around bunkers :) Unfortunately, paintballs are notoriously inconsistent and inaccurate, so hard to replicate shots.
So, if you used an old style firearm with round ammunition, you might be able to use a similar device.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tippmann#Flatline_Barrel_System
I simply would like to know if it’s true or not , that a RN bullet will defect less then a SP bullet when shooting through grass or brush?
Bullets from a high powered rifle over distance will move sideways, and this must be compensated for by adjusting the aiming point. The phenomenally high speed rotation of the bullet,from a rifled barrel. will cause it move laterally,this is known as drift as opposed to windage, which is the lateral movement caused by, naturally, the wind. Drift, at long range could result in a target out of the line of sight being hit. Such is the speed of the spin imparted by rifling, small calibre HP bullets, from an overloaded case can totally self destruct in flight from centrifugal forces. Just as a matter of interest!
curve the bullet:
I gotta say everyone here has some good views on this myth and i have read everything you all wrought(sorry if spelled wrong) but there are some crucial things people are missing.
1. To “curve” an object is to add an arc to it seeing as it is impossible to manipulate the the path of the bullet after it leaves the chamber it is impossible to add said arc.
2. if and when you are shooting a bullet in a real experience what really is the chance that there is gonna be a friggin magnet of doom to move the bullet for you…
3. The myth is if you can curve a bullet just meaning change its trajectory completely not just move it over, curving the bullet would cause it to go from say fired north north east to east with the magnet it would still be north north east. it would be completely impossible to “curve” the bullet with out a richocet effect and to produce said effect you would have to have a second shooter an equal distance from where you wish to cause said effect, and that is to even say the bullets don’t just collide and cancel each other out.
3. and my two cents about the myth as it is would be that the thing they never took into account would be that in the movie the bullets used were specially crafted with carvings and designs on them, i would like to know if in anyway that could attribute to even the slightest of curves? i don’t believe it would but it would still be interesting to see results.
as it stands the myth was that the bullet would “curve” around an object they were not able to produce this so the myth was classified as busted.
Using a smoothbore barrel, and a specially crafted asymetric projectile a curve could be achieved in flight initially at low speed, but it would quickly, virtually immediately, become unpredictable and tumble. You’d hardly call it a bullet in any real sense of the word and it’s hard to imagine it being usefull. Interstingly enough, if you fletch an arrow, halyway up the shaft, of fletch it at the business end, and shoot it from a bow some spectacular curves can be achieved, but thats even further off subject. Bottom line for the experiment, you can swing the gun as fast as you can, the bullet is going to go the direction it was pointing in when it exits the muzzle, and keep going in that direction.
Okay, a bullet can be curved! (not like Wanted) I had to replace the barrel on my .50 caliber muzzleloader(round bullet, so myth is still busted) but before I did I put the firearm on its side and ran etching acid through the barrel for 60 seconds to rough up one side. I then set up two refidgerator boxes (big and cardboard) and set them twenty feet apart and shot through the boxes. the etching was on the right side of the barrel and the bullet curved left almost an inch (from spinning), as proved by the laser pointer. My second shot destroyed the barrel. So it can be done, but the myth is still busted and my arm hurts
A bullet can be ‘curved’. E.g. when you throw a ball out of a car it doesn’t technically fly straight, even though you are not putting any spin on to the ball. Which is exactly what would happen to a bullet fired out of a gun from a moving car, obviously you would have to be going VERY fast for it to be a noticeable short range effect. That’s where they get the idea for curving bullets. Except obviously nobody can move there arm fast enough to do that and it’s not like it actually curves, it just goes on a diagonal path. So no matter how fast your going you can’t make it come back at you.
can a sparkler bomb blow your hand off?
What would happen if someone shot a bullet at a magnet, would it go through or just stop as soon as it touched it.
Depends on the thickness of the magnet and the material. Rare earth magnets, for example, are extremely powerful, but very brittle and would probably shatter.
Regarding the Sonic boom and windows
From experience in the middle east- The israelis fighter jets would always fly over heavily urbanized and built up areas in Lebanon with supersonic speeds and at low altitudes whenever a war breaks out (most recently in 2006- this is done mostly as psychological warfare)
This always results in windows shattering along the neighbourhoods and sometimes also in the cars
Most people soon learned to leave the car and home windows slightly open in order to diffuse the pressure and prevent the glass from breaking- which seems to work… now theyre more of an annoyance than an actual threat (it was very common for the glass to shatter and rain down on families before everyone learned this trick)
Not sure what went wrong with this episode so it didnt work
Great show otherwise
During the Iraq war, the Australian SAS (Special Air Service) worked behind enemy lines to seek out Iraqi ballistic missiles and, during the invasion, actually used a sonic boom as a weapon.
Out in the western desert of Iraq, the Kubaisah cement factory, one of the biggest in the Middle East, the Australians were ordered to clear out all Iraqi troops and to check the site for hidden weapons.
They did not want to destroy the cement factory as it was part of the infrastructure for Iraq and was needed for Iraq to get back on its feet quickly.
The scores of Iraqi soldiers guarding the factory ignored the SAS deadline to surrender. It was a difficult target to assault. The Australians did not want to risk the lives of civilians inside by fighting their way in. So the SAS called up for a ground support aircraft to carry out an unusual task.
A US Navy F14 Tomcat responded, came and did a low fly and broke the sound barrier, resulting in a sonic boom – a massive explosion. Initially thought to be detonating ammunition inside the facility, several windows were broken and people came running out with their arms up.
An SAS member recalled the idea arose from an incident back in South Australia where an Australian Air Force plane broke the sound barrier by mistake and broke a lot of greenhouse windows in the area.
The above story was reported in 2003 in a program called “Inside the Aussie SAS,” Current Affairs Reporter ROSS COULTHART – reported for the “SUNDAY” program.
On the ‘Wanted’ episode, the thing you forgot to test was the engravement of the bullet. There was a spiral on it. I really think you need to try that. Thanks.
I don’t see much point in testing the “curving bullets” thing in the first place, because the movie doesn’t even pretend that it’s realistic — I mean, it’s a “mind over matter” kind of a superpower the characters have. It’s not about swinging the gun around, that’s just a cool move done for cinematic effect.
I realize that the Mythbusters most likely were fully aware of this going in and probably picked this “myth” simply because it was a popular movie, but still.
hey umm when they shot the bullets they curved to the left.but what if they threw it to the right because a bullet spins to the right because of the rifling would that make a difference
I was astonished that you ran the tests trying to curve the flight of bullets in that manner. Any bright high school physics student familiar with Newton’s laws of motion could have told you it wouldn’t work. Perhaps the myth seems to be supported by the way a stream of bullets curves as a shooter rotates; the stream curves, but the flight of individual bullets does not. Like the way a stream of water from a hose curves when you swing the nozzle. A bullet’s flight could be made to curve if it were rotating around an axis other than axial, the way a baseball does. Of course as with applying a magnetic force to a steel bullet, this happens because another force is involved, and it all still complies with Newton’s laws.
Yeah, I was like.. WTF?
Dear Gentleman
I just have seen the episode of breaking glass by going supersonnic.
I have 2 comments.
At first: Flying low level below a temperature inversion in the lower levels of the earth atmosphere (meteorological called, the boundary layer) will cause an enhancement of the sonic boom.
Second: Do this with a jet flying at 100ft, by the way I know RAF jets do this kind of low level flying in de Red flag area’s near
Las Vegas.
Kind regards Gerben
I’m a Navy pilot, and the supersonic fighter myth, is true, I’ve seen it, though not with a hornet. The F/A-18a model Hornet that the Blue Angels use has much weaker engines than many other aircraft that could have created the supersonic fighter myth. You can see it (or hear it, rather) happen with an australian F-111 in a youtube video very clearly. I believe the varying frequency of the engines sound will cause different levels of vibration, where glass is very brittle.
The sonic boom from a supersonic fighter jet will break glass. ?????? IT was used in a hostage situation, were a starfighter flew close above a train, and in that moment broke the soundbarrier, cnat actually remember if the glas broke, but it made alot of noise though, check it out !
mythbusters the curving bulets episode was busted but if u take a closer look on how the wanted characters curved the bulets it was a swing of the arm and flick of the wrist the three of you only swung your arm. so what im saying is you over looked a couple of steps on how to curve a bulet. so please redo the episode
I kind of agree, a larger radius about the lenght of a human arm, with a bit of lateral motion as well if they could wrangle it, and maybe even a slower bullet, ie less charge. ;)
It wouldn’t matter, Markas. Once the bullet leaves the barrel, there is no sidewards force acting on it (except maybe the wind if there’s a strong enough crosswind over a long enough distance).
What does that mean in layman’s terms? Simple. Once it leaves the barrel, it’s going to go in a straight line… it doesn’t matter how hard you flick your wrist.
Answering Kyle and Slave, yes relatively speaking gravity is very weak compare to the other 3 fundamental forces. The Strong fundamental force (the strongest force), example: the stability of an atomic nucleus, is 100 times stronger than Electromagnetic (2nd strongest), and 1 million times stronger than Weak force (3rd strongest), like you’d find in the radioactive decay process.
BUT, the Strong force is 10 to the 43 power stronger than gravity. That’s 1,000 * 1 billion * 1 billion * 1 billion * 1 billion times stronger. Makes sense – can you imagine if gravity were strong enough to rip apart atoms? Eeep.
Guys, the question isn’t “Can a bullet curve?” thereby allowing millions of different possibilities to be set up and tested. The question simply is “Can a person perform the move shown in “Wanted” and curve the bullet?” No, you can’t. Simple ballistics will not allow it to happen. Got nothing to do with being an engineer; got nothing to do with “flicking wrists”…you can’t do it. If you think you can, then prove it. Not on paper, for real with video proof. If you can, then I’ll be the first to say, “Well frost my cupcakes; you were right.”
The curved bullet myth was about whether or not a human could make the bullet curve in a very short distance just like the movie, buy swinging your arm really fast. It was not about using a magnet or round bullets or anything like that. They even modified the gun and bullets and showed the bullets tumbling but the trajectory was a straight line. They used human test and a robot test and showed that under the circumstances of the movie it is not possible to curve a bullet. Also a bullet is not a ball. Just because you can curve a ball at 100 – 105 m/hr (I’m not sure how fast a human can throw a ball) doesn’t mean you can curve a bullet (have no idea how fast a bullet travels and to lazy to google it) buy swinging your arm really fast. Please stop saying that they are wrong buy changing the parameters of the myth itself. Pay attention to the conditions of the myth. It’s not if can you curve a bullet under any circumstance using what ever the hell you can think of that’ll make it work. The myth from the movie situation is busted.
I am a retired fighter pilot and I will tell you a story of breaking glass. On a jubilee party for my squadron we were all gathered in the mess with wives and all when the “alert crew” 2 F-104g made a pass over the mess building. It was a terrible bang and my girl friend asked me if they had broken the sound barrier. I respondet: “No, had they done that the windows would have shattered”. Then, few minutes later, they made another pass over the mess building and all the windows exploded into the rooms. The scene was terrific. Glas fragments all over everybody, girls screeming, seniors officers barking at one another, the 2 pilots removed from flying status and heavily fined (we all helped to pay them off).
they had accidentally exceeded mach 1 just over the mess building. So dont tell me this is a myth. I know better.
Dag from Norway
Curving a bullet by swinging or flicking arm is simply useless, because once the bullet leaves the barrel, it only subject to two forces: gravity and air resistence. So no matter how fast the gunner swing his arm, the bullet still no curve.
About this curving bullet, i was thinking if you drilled a curved hole in the bullet so that air entered through the tip, but curved through the bullet to leave by the rear ‘side’ of the bullet. The air being expelled might have an effect on its path. If this hole is also tapered, the air rushing through the bullet might be compressed like a jet exhaust.
The only trouble with this variation on the experiment is you would need some kind of rifling for the bullet to travel tip first through the air, which means the bullet would be spinning which means any air going through the bullet would be expelled uniformly as the bullet span. Maybe this hollow bullet in tandem with the swinging robot arm might work.
I was also thinking the direction of the rifling, eg clockwise or counter clockwise, must have a baring on which direction the robot arm swings in order to be effective. eg, left to right, or right to left, so that you were ‘unwinding’ the spin.
Did they try the robot arm swinging from the other direction, to counter the rotation the rifled bullet spins in? Did they try refiling which just reduced the rate the bullet spins as it leaves the barrel? ie. just enough spin to keep the bullet true as it left the barrel.
Nope, didn’t think so.
Supersonic fighter jet will break a glass. This is truth and depends only from a differential pressure. In your episode glasses on the table would never broke because they are open and the same pressure was acting on both sides, internal and external.
Different situation was with small building were external pressure was higher than internal. This building was not perfectly sealed but pressure during big bang was increasing so rapidly that internal pressure in this cabin was significantly smaller then external for short period.
Glass at window broke because has big surface area (the same happened to the wall) and described above higher external pressure push this into cabin.
If you would repeat this test than you can use the same home, caravan and closed aquarium. All these object will be easily damage, you’ll see
I just watched the curving bullet show on Netflix. It is quite possible to shoot a bullet around an object and hit a target hidden by the object as in the movie, but not by curving the bullet.
As the gun is swung in an arc and the bullet discharged from the gun the bullet will have a sideways velocity more or less equal to the speed of the gun. If the gun is moving at 100 feet per second (fps) the bullet has a sideways “slip” of 100 FPS. If the bullet’s muzzle velocity is 1000fps and the target is 100 feet away the bullet will hit the target if the bullet is discharged when the gun is pointing at a spot 10 feet to the right of the target, assuming the gun is moving right to left as in the movie.
The bullet does not curve, but travels in a straight line diagonal to the centerline of the gun’s barrel at the moment of discharge. A target hidden behind an object can thus be hit.
Terry,
I was thinking about this too, and I agree.
Hi guys, a bullet could curve. In cricket, a ball swings or curves due to one half of the ball being rough, whereas the other half is shiny. This causes the ball to swing in the direction of the rough side, due to aerodynamics. the same concept could be applied to a round bullet, and it would curve
Round bullets fired out of smooth bore barrels can indeed curve. Unfortunately they curve unpredictably and this was a major problem with early firearms.
Rifling in the barrel causes the bullet to spin along its axis. This means that any wobbles in its trajectory will be balanced out by the axial rotation and the bullet will travel in a straight line. The modern bullet shape also helps because the bullet can’t generally spin perpendicular to its trajectory.
Waving your arms/wrists around while firing the gun will not counteract the rifling effect and will not cause a bullet to curve.
Isaac Newton’s first law.
This myth was busted July 5th, 1687.
Why the MythBusters failed to acknowledge this is beyond me…
long barrel rifle. try it. bullet has more time in the barrel. put the rifle in the pneumatic arm and see what happens.
I can curve paintballs from a pistol with
A flick of the wrist.
However, the paintballs are
Only travelling at 300fps, giving them plenty of barrel time.the barrel is smooth bore and paintballs are not tight fitting to the bore.
Flicking away from the target curves the ball. Unlike a bullet this is a result of spin as the ball has contact on one side of the barrel.
Paintball guns and barrel add ons exist that allow you to dial in curve in any direction, they can be very effective.
The flick iproduces a gOod visible curve over 30 yrds but at paintball pistol play ranges, its useless! Months of work, wasted!
You need the training that is all.
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the training helped him curve the bullet, as did the hypersense, but it is physically possible to curve a bullets trajectory. in WANTED, they not only spun their bodies, but also their wrists. it is possible to spin the trajectory with a bored barreled gun because the bullet is already spinning, and with the spin of the wrist AND body, the curve could possible be made to go around people and/or vehicles.
I just watched this show. I do not plan on reading all these comments to find out if anyone has brought this up. Wouldn’t you having your arm swing around faster then the bullet was coming out of the barrel have some effect on the bullets trajectory? They only did twice the the speed of a human. kind of like throwing trash out the car window since you are throwing it out slower then the car it still moves forward even with wind speeds and what not. or am i thinking to simple here?
In regards to “bullet curving”, what if you made the rifling more spring like instead of like normal rilfing. More extreme I suppose is what you guys would say. Because in the episode I believe they did rilfing but they didn’t really say if they made the rifling tighter. I know it probably won’t make a differance but make the bullet spin like a Top, but if it was couldn’t you send it in a direction like the the Top and it goes then comes back at you. I doubt but perhaps the bullet would over spin with your flick and thus maake a circle type motion. Please tell me if I’m an idiot or not, cause this kinda sounds like it would wok
Actually, I have a question. Since it is possible to curve a ping-pong ball as it travels through the air by applying a spin, is it possible to curve a spherical projectile/bullet? Either by movement of the gun (unlikely) or by introducing friction on one side of the barrel, perhaps?
you would have to move the gun very fulently cos the bullets egde touches the gun barrel and that spins the bullet
Read a book one tome where. They used a cold war Russian satellite to send a solid tungsten projectile to destroy an island. How real can that be. I think it would be a really interesting. Episode. If interested please E-mail me. Because I really think it would be COOL!!!!!
It’s possible to bend a bullet coming through a barrel. It’s is just like how a baseball curves. You have to spin the actual projectile. So when the bullet comes out you will have to use the tip of the barrel to start the bullet go spinning. But the speed of rotation at the tip of barrel should be faster than the firing bullet.
Gravity and wind can curve a bullets path given enough time and or distance…try firing a bullet into a tornado and see if it curves
if you toss an orange out of a car at 80mph the orange would hit a street sign at 80mph. you would have to toss it early, this could be tested with a bullet from a gun, put the weapon in motion first, like on a high speed rail, then fire. then you have two velocities working together. this is my only explanation since we can’t slow time down. if the weapon on the rail is traveling fast enough before fired, you could calculate exactly what you could shoot “around” and you could hit a target behind a target. whoa.
You need using skills or can get yourself i suggest low velocity with. 38 caliber light weight for short distance but dangerous do that could hit yourself. My advisory do not try that at home.
Curving a bullet is definitely possible (beyond natural trajectory from gravity). The question is how much can it be curved and can it be done with any accuracy at all.
To curve a bullet:
You need to spin the bullet in a manner other than the traditional rotational effect you get from rifling the barrel—that being a rotational angle 90 degrees to the path of the bullet.
To do this, you need to remove the rifling from the barrel first. Second, you much use a round bullet and probably one with some sort of dimpling (like a golf ball) to increase air friction. Third, and most important is you need to characterize one side of the barrel so that it generates more friction against one side of the bullet thus creating the bullet to spin sideways by being “drug” slower on one side as it propels down the rifling. You could characterize the barrel any number of ways, you could have half the barrel lined with a different materal or you could simply roughen one side.
If you wanted even more curvature you could make the barrel and bullet slightly flattened to ensure the spin angle (however this could make the weapon very dangerous to fire and a remote firing mechanism should definitely be utilized).
If a man can curve a golf ball with a club, he can darn well curve a bullet if he can control the forces involved and understands the physics involved. The big question is how much curvature is achievable. If golf balls are curving roughly up to ~30+ degrees off of the original trajectory I suspect a bullet can achieve similar results, but as it travels so much faster the distance to measure the curvature needs to be significant and a 50 yard firing range in a police basement (like the show) is likely insufficient to support or disprove the trick if someone wanted to try my approach.
Flinging your arm to participate in the curvature is ridiculous.