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Physics of the Projectile
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Physics
of the Projectile
![]() Ballistics:
The physics of the bullet can be explained in
three categories: internal ballistics, external
ballistics, and terminal ballistics. I will not be
looking at terminal ballistics until the next
section. Looking first at internal ballistics, it is
the action of the bullet from the moment the firing
pin ignites the primer to the point at which the
bullet exits the barrel of the gun. When the powder
is ignited it creates expanding gas which begins to
force the bullet through the barrel. Because there
is not a significant place for the gas to escape it
transfers energy to the bullet. Typically people
will see higher velocities with higher peak
pressures in the burn. The second area of ballistics
I will discuss is external ballistics, it covers the
behavior of the bullet from the time it exits the
barrel to the time it strikes the target. There are
a lot of factors when dealing with external
ballistics, but most notably drag and gravity; drag
is what makes the bullet slow down while gravity is
pulling it to the earth. For external ballistics the
bullet’s behavior can best be hypothesized using
projectile motion equations.
![]() Figures from Lyman Reloading Manual (49th Ed.), (2008).
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