A spinning top is actually rolling on a flat surface, not flying through the air.Full disclosure, I have not read all the comments in this thread. However, earlier in the thread someone mentioned the spinning of a top and compared it to bullet spin. This seems to be a plausible explanation to me. As the top spin and slowed it would start making wider arcs, at times though, the top would spin back towards the center of where it started. Longer sweeping arcs, to shorter faster arcs, ( in appearance only) the top would actually be slowing.
Exactly.However and once again the bullet itself does not become more accurate at distance. The effect of the barrel flex can make a more accurate group at a certain distance based on the aforementioned variables in angle of bullet and velocity but the bullet itself cannot produce an improved group consistently in same MOA past 100 yards out to distance in different intervals with the same constants in load rifle.
I don't think you understand that still doesn't prove a particular rifle will shoot a smaller group at a farther distance than it will at 100 yards.I don't think most folks understand what's been proved in post #61's link and picture.
Even if the barrel was immobilized and its muzzle axis did not flex in any way while the bullet exits so the LOF angle never changes, the normal velocity spread makes the down range bullet drop spread in MOA increase with range.
For the 308 Win, a 20 fps spread causes a 1/10th MOA vertical spread at 100 yards, 2 MOA at 1000.
Some folks believe the barrel is motionless (no whip, wiggle nor back thrust) while the bullet goes through it. How many of them are chiming in on this thread?
As I asked before, please copy and paste the specific portion that "proves" smaller groups at longer range compared to the group produced at 100 yards.And if the upward swing in the muzzle is exactly right, there will be complete positive compensation as the trajectories of bullets across the entire spread of muzzle velocities all meet at the same height on the target at a given range.
You'll be better off understanding all the supporting facts why slower bullets leaving the barrel at higher angles above the line of sight will have a greater maximum ordinate than faster ones a little past mid range so both trajectories cross at target range.As I asked before, please copy and paste the specific portion that "proves" smaller groups at longer range compared to the group produced at 100 yards.
As a matter of fact it does. The physics behind this have been repeated ad nauseum in this thread (and numerous others over the past decades) and the interaction between the supporting force of a table surface vs. gravity acting on the (rotating) mass of the top doesn't differ from the decelerating force of wind resistance vs. velocity momentum of the bullet. As the initial disturbance of balance diminishes in the function of time that gyroscopic force acts on the bullet (or top, for that matter), the angle and distance between rotational axis and center axis of circular motion diminishes as well.A spinning top is actually rolling on a flat surface, not flying through the air.
A bullet doesn't spiral around some center line in ever tightening circles.
Good job. A worthy conclusion to a thread.OK.... this discussion has caused me to do some digging. Here is my report:
For a .2 degree angle of attack the radius of the corkscrew motion will be about .009 inches for a GS of 2.98
I am not a physicist, but something isn't adding up here. You're telling me an object that is off course at one hundred yards, will somehow right itself at 200 yards?
So you can't show it and just keep repeating the same thing.You'll be better off understanding all the supporting facts why slower bullets leaving the barrel at higher angles above the line of sight will have a greater maximum ordinate than faster ones a little past mid range so both trajectories cross at target range.
The best proof is in the trajectory pictures I posted. Their separation will be smaller at short range. Slower bullets are shown leaving at a higher angle than faster ones. Benchrest rifles often have weights on barrel muzzles to change the frequency the muzzle axis vibrates at so bullets leave at optimum angles for their velocity so they'll converge down range at the target, then diverge past the target.
If the "spiral" is measured in thousandths of an inch it's really a "wobble" rather than the entire bullet traveling in a corkscrew path around some imaginary line.As a matter of fact it does. The physics behind this have been repeated ad nauseum in this thread (and numerous others over the past decades) and the interaction between the supporting force of a table surface vs. gravity acting on the (rotating) mass of the top doesn't differ from the decelerating force of wind resistance vs. velocity momentum of the bullet. As the initial disturbance of balance diminishes in the function of time that gyroscopic force acts on the bullet (or top, for that matter), the angle and distance between rotational axis and center axis of circular motion diminishes as well.
So, the theory and explanation according to laws of physics is definitely there. From that point on it's up to further empirical research to confirm that this particular effect has causality between observed and repeatable discrepancy in relative accuracy at different distances.
Until someone bothers to do it, this is just a theory, but lacking a better one it seems quite plausible. Unless blanket claims that everyone who has observed the phenomenon and been able to repeat it with reasonable consistency is just full of manure are regarded as such, of course. That's the easiest way to brush it off without needing to think about it any further.
As you may now notice, that only contested your claim that it wasn't.As you said, the theory is there
When a bullet leaves the muzzle it is stable to with a fraction of a caliber, otherwise baffle strikes with suppressors would be a way of life.I think most bullets stabilize before reaching 100 yards.
Do you think barrel vibrating frequencies don't change when their tuning weight at the front is moved back and forth?I think any effect that would increase accuracy downrange is that the target is smaller and the shooter takes a finer bead