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5 weapon myths from the movies

In a local gunshop I once inquired about what appeared to be a heavy barreled (target weight), .22 LR with scope. The owner explained to me that it wasn't a heavy barrel but rather an integral "suppressor". He then proceeded to take it off the wall, load it with .22LR subsonic target ammo, and, standing right beside me, fire it into a steel bullet-trap at the other end of the counter (place was empty save us). All I heard was the soft "thud" of the firing pin strike and the metallic rattle as the bullet hit the trap and bounced around inside. If there was any noise created by the passage of the bullet through the air you would have had to have been insanely close to the line of flight to have heard it. The first (and only) utterly quite "silencer" I've ever experienced.

The suppressor was the full length of the barrel (about 22"), blued to match the receiver, inlet into the stock and probably 1.5" wide (which made the rifle look VERY heavy and what attracted my attention in the first place). So, basically, it required a suppressor 150 times the volume of the (weakly) loaded cartridge to completely suppress the discharge.
 
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I found this on youtube...using the guys voice as a guide to set my volume, those things are incredibly quiet. There is no 'bang' sound at all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyjRpe_o_NI

Here is one of a SCAR being fired with a suppressor / silencer thingy - it's like Tom Clancy said - at least to my untrained ear, all I can hear is the mechanism it seems much less loud than a book being dropped on a table. There is a 'ringing' sound which I guess is the coming from the ejected cartridge just vibrating.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHgYJIHBNV4&feature=related

but sadly no James Bond 'pew pew' sound!!
 
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About the only sound you cannot prevent is the "thunk" of the firing pin striking the cartridge; this can however be muffled by insulation or, if you wanted it gone badly enough, used electrically detonated primers (they do exist).

Etronix. Shot one the year before they cancelled them. Tightened my groups in half.

The main issue, other than the expense of the unique primers, was that they put the powered on LED on top of the stock right under your cheekbone.
 
All I can hear is the metal on metal - hammer hitting, slide cycling. It's also worth watching some of the other videos that are on after, the Mythbusters clip is pretty definitive since they actually record the sound and measure it.
 
Physics can be funny.

Going back to the bit about weapons having enough energy to knock the person firing it down if it could knock down the target, I found this while doing some early morning surfing. Enjoy.

High Impulse Weapon System firing.

Well, I am off to take care of the Ship's Cat and maybe scarf some breakfast.

Laterness,
Craig.
 
I wonder where that started. In the movies of the 1930's, the target grabbed dramatically at the supposed wound and grimaced before falling, or he just crumpled and fell if he were an extra. When did Hollywood decide that bullets hit you like a semi truck?

It's the movie Shane. Jack Palance shoots a guy and the crew have a wire connected to him to yank him back and slide backwards in the muddy street. I saw this in a film class. Though the director thought it was realistic, no one in my class agreed.

From Wikipeida:

In addition, Shane was one of the first films in which actors were attached to hidden wires that yanked them backwards when they were shot from the front. Director George Stevens also used a small cannon and fired it into a garbage can to create the loud report of the pistol for maximum effect. Stevens was in World War II and saw what a single bullet can do to a man.

- "Film Genre" The Western (2002)
 
I've heard that silencers aren't really that silent. Is that true?

One of the guys on our tac-team (SWAT) has an MP5 SD. It has the suppressor integrated as part of the barrel and it is so quiet when fired that it just makes a clicking sound on even autofire. Kind of a snap-snap sound with the clicking of the action. It isn't' the Hollywood phut-phut, but you wouldn't hear it from far away and you certainly wouldn't realize it was a gun unless you saw it.

And that's the way suppressors tend to work unless they are big honking cans on the ends of subsonic round-firing pistols with the action locked. Revolvers - no way, pistols, yes. You can put a can on the end and just use your off hand braced across the back of the slide to keep the action form cycling - this seals the gun and sends the maximum gas expansion down the barrel into the can to expand out. You then have to cycle the gun manually.

It is louder with regular ammo (though still quieter than without the can), so subsonic round are preferred, but really the whole point of doing this is like my friend's MP5SD - it just doesn't sound like a gun anymore and helps you gain surprise. Naturally, after the first hits are made surprise may be gone depending on your accuracy.
 
Stevens was in World War II and saw what a single bullet can do to a man.

- "Film Genre" The Western (2002)

Huh, a single rifle bullet, maybe. Still, it adds dramatic effect for today's video game-reality saturated audience.

Another peeve: I just love how whenever there is an explosion the special effects people slow it down to allow the heroes, who are peeking around the corner to see the bomb go off, have enough time to duck back and avoid decapitation. They really ought to issue something like that to the military, I mean think of how useful that technology would be to the bomb disposal teams?
 
a .22 silencer (as mentioned) can be so quiet the sounds you hear are the firing pin and slide, then the bullet hit. The .45 pistol I witnessed wasn't this quiet, but quiet enough that firing without hearing protection didn't result in much ringing of the ears (like a household stereo). The .300 win mag silencer was about the same as the .45 (maybe as loud as a .22 normally). There are, of course, different designs and quality (as well as weight/size/efficiency trade-offs)

in a modern office environment, a .22 auto pistol with a silencer could easily be concealed under a jacket, a round fired into a cubicle when no one looking, and no one nearby would notice/hear it (although whatever was hit would make an appropriate sound - ie. breaking glass for a computer monitor, etc). And many people have died from .22 rounds....ask the enemies of the Israeli's!

but what they all do is virtually eliminate muzzle flash at night, making it very hard to locate....and with subsonic ammo, there is no "crack" to help you locate the source...
 
I did see, or rather not see, one myth that seems extremely pervasive - that a katana can cut anything in half with 1 swing.

:)
 
Stop it, you're making me cry now! I could swear I saw a katana cut a Volkswagen in half on YouTube...and if it's on YouTube is has to be true!
 
At least but I’m pretty sure a friend of mine told me he heard a guy say that his friend once heard someone say that his brother’s buddy read it somewhere.
 
Katanas are rather brittle. Japan is not a country that is rich in mineral deposits. So you have to make a rigid sword with a nice fat back edge & do all that folding stuff, European smiths gave up in the C10th.
 
I'll stop being a sword nerd now.


.....and katanas are really sharp and are folded about a million times and when they've made a perfect sword the smith would kill himself and then his entire family, and also his ancestors.

All of which makes cutting through the machine gun, instead of the chap holding it, reasonable behavior.
 
Katanas are rather brittle. Japan is not a country that is rich in mineral deposits. So you have to make a rigid sword with a nice fat back edge & do all that folding stuff, European smiths gave up in the C10th.

And the folding stuff is what gives a blade strength. They're just rediscovering this now.

As for a million folds, it's really a million layers. And I believe that's less than 50 folds, which is difficult enough when we're talking hot metal here.

And I would never try to cut a machine gun with a samurai sword, unless it was a real cheap one. I'd use a hammer and duct tape, like any true MAN would. :)

(The duct tape is to tape up the machine gunners so they can't complain while your hammering their gun to pieces. Also good for taping stray ducks for dinner later.)
 
Back in the mid 1980's, a plastic device was sold to the general population that allowed one to connect a plastic two quart soda pop bottle to a .22 rifle.

This suppression device (ALL taxes had to be paid to USE said device) would silence a standard velocity .22 caliber round so much that the only sound one would hear would be the 'click' of the firing pin striking the rim of the .22 cartridge next to your ear and the 'thwock' of the bullet striking the target downrange.

As it was demonstrated to my friend and me at the time, this device was attached to a Mitchell AK-22 and the entire magazine was fired until empty.

Riik
 
Most of us use a silencer everyday...except it is called a muffler. ;)

I gave up a long time ago really trying to explain how things work, guns in particular, if asked, I usually say: "it's complicated".

edit: The katana is two pieces laminated, a work hardened edge (eg all the folding) on a high strength spine. The legend it will cut anything is from the Japanese themselves, the best story I read is of a young Lt. stationed on New Guinea, sent his back to the maker because it was defective and wouldn't cut through an anvil.
 
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