? about ammo

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horsemen61

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How and why did say 45 acp get the name "Hardball" and ball ammo how did that start.
 
Wikipedia is your friend

Hardball, a slang term used for full metal jacket bullet pistol ammunition, particularly in .45 ACP caliber


Lost Sheep
 
Because ball is solid bullet, there are grades of bullet lead alloy, and 45APC is old enough to have been originally made in LEAD BALL, which would require it be a HARD alloy. And it comes from an era where Lead bullets were common
 
Use of the term "ball" to describe a bullet is a holdover from the centuries before the advent of conical bullet design since lead round balls where the primary projectiles fired from firearms. Even the first commonly used conical bullets designed for muzzle loading rifles during the Civil War was called a Mini-"ball". The armed services being a old and traditional institution carried on the term of using "ball" to describe any basic solid bullet. Hard ball was euphemistically used to describe a lead bullet with a "hard" copper jacket.
 
Steve,
I think you might be a bit off on the mini ball history. It was called a Minié ball. A frenchman developed a rifle and named it after himself. The Minié rifle was designed to use a conical shaped bullet he developed and called the Minié ball.
 
They both sounds good. Story time it's fun. Now we need a camp fire.
 
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