External Ballistics / Velocity ???

26 July 2001, 05:44

<PowderBurns>

I suppose this is a "reload" topic.

Is it possible for the bullet to accellerate after it leaves the barrel? I'm thinking that it could be accellerating in the barrel and once free of the friction in the bore it might pick up velocity.

But the REAL point of the question has to do with the "Big Bang" theory. Red shift in A21 Super Novas suggests that the velocity of cosmic expansion is increasing -- after about 15 billion years. Astro-physicists are suggesting a "cosmological constant" (Einstein's term) that counteracts gravity.

Being a simpleton, I'm just betting the "boom" has not reached max velocity -- and ya gotta remember that these super novas are billions of light years away, that we're seeing "old" data.

. . . OK . . . that should keep ya cookin' for a while!

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26 July 2001, 06:31

DB Bill

Nope! Can't happen! After a bullet leaves the barrel the only forces on it are negative ones (1) gravity and (2) friction from the air.

26 July 2001, 06:34

<David E>

If you were standing on an asteroid out by Neptune, and fired toward the Sun...then yeah..your bullet would probably be going faster when it passed Earth than it was when it left the barrel.
For situations here on terra firma...no. The bullet starts slowing down the instant it is free of the muzzle.

26 July 2001, 07:21

<Don G>

Actually, the bullet continues to accelerate for about 5-15 calibers past the muzzle due to the "jet blast".

Don

26 July 2001, 07:46

Jiri

I agree with Don G. I read science article about this.Bullet is still accelerated by gases before muzzle . . .

26 July 2001, 13:19

<PowderBurns>

quote:
Originally posted by Jiri:
I agree with Don G. I read science article about this.Bullet is still accelerated by gases before muzzle . . .

That's my feeling too. If the bullet is accelerating in the barrel it MAY continue to accelerate once it leaves the barrel -- although at a decreasing rate. I've been told that bullets accelerate post muzzle for a short distance because they're still accelerating when they leave the bore.

So back to the Big Bang issue: Stars are still accelerating post Big Bang even though it's been 15 billion years. (AND, the light reaching us from distant super novas is billions of years old.)

But I'm no physicist.

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