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by Santaanacanyon on July 23rd, 2004

Santaanacanyon

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How far can a bullet fired from a standard military rifle travel if it hits no target?

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  • by RJTRIES on February 2nd, 2006

    RJTRIES

    The answer to you question depends on several factors, most important of which is what do you mean when you say standard military rifle? There is no such thing as each country typically has its own type of weapon as the standard issue arm. If you mean the standard issue weapon, the answer to that question depends on the maximum effective range of the weapon involved. When the term maximum effective range is used, that term refers to the probability that an individual firing at a target at that specific range has a 50-50 chance of hitting the target.

    Why? Because no fired projectile, be it from a mortar, howitzer, cannon, tank gun, small arms (rifles, assault weapons, side arms, machine guns under .50calibers or 12.7mm) fires in a straight line. The projectile from a rifle travels in a somewhat flat arc from the point you're firing itand the maximum effective range is the point where the path of the arc meets the imaginary plane of the horizon. For this I'm assuming that you're firing horizontally to the ground

    So for example, if I have a rifle and its maximum effective range is 500 meters, that means that the arc the bullet takes begins to break the plain of my aiming horizon 500 meters away and begins to fall off. As a rule of thumb I was taught when I did gunnery exercises to use 2.5 of the maximum effective range for the maximum range.

    Alot of this also depends on the power of the propellent in the bullet. There'a really good example of this in the book "THE WAY THINGS WORK" or "FIREAMS" which is in the reference section of any library. If you can come by it, TM 9-2350-253-10 Tnk CBT FT M60A3 TTS Ch9 has a small section that deals with the ballistic capabilities of the both the coax and cupola MG's as well as the M-16.

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    • Great answer! +4

      JTP

      by JTP on August 7th, 2007

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