how much of a speed increase makes a difference

[PT1911]

so I hear this a lot.


"Only 1200 FPS, that just isnt fast enough"
What is the real advantage of an extra 100 FPS or 200 FPS?

I cannot imagine a bullet that doesnt penetrate and "mushroom" at 1200 FPS and magically spreading wider and going farther with an added couple hundred FPS....

 

[Hungry Seagull]

Speed. Hm.

I fire a one ounce magnum slug at 1760 out of the magnum shotgun and boy does it KICK like a mule. 5 foot flame out of the muzzle and virtually NO drop at all at any distance inside that range. There is a one hell of alot of energy at that spec.

I fire a Brenneke at 1400 or so and it still is pretty heft. This time it's slightly over one ounce and has almost as much energy availible and just a little drop.

I shoot a managed recoil at 1200 and it's not so much recoil, has more energy than availible to my 45 ACP at any distance.

I fire my 45 Lawman Training round 230 grain ACP at about 830, energy falls off rapidly with range and drop. The Gold dots are slightly hotter at about 870 or so FPS.

Fire a BB gun or paint balls and you will not get very much FPS.

The energy necessary to move a mass to X velocity in a measured distance becomes greater in mutipule of itself for ever 200 fps increase I think.

It's almost like a car. You can kick a commutebox from 0 to 60 with 110 horses in half an hour... but do the same task with 500 horses in a 70's era muscle car in much less time even though you have twice the weight.

I enjoy the hot mags at 1700 fps, but they beat me to death even though all the rounds follow each other through the first hole at or near the bulls eye.

I prefer to shoot in the 1400 feet per second range for shotguns. 850 is hot enough for handguns for me. There are guns and ammo availible at much greater speeds.. and such.

Tis thinking.. a piece of rock about the size of a quarter moving at 20,000 mph (Whatever fps that is...) will give the space station a good knock.

 

[BhmBill]

Idk?

a 158gr .357 at 1200fps is roughly 500ft/lbs of muzzle energy. the same 158gr .357 at 1300fps has almost 20% more muzzle energy than the 1200fps load and 1400fps would be upwards of 40% more muzzle energy.

If the round is designed to mushroom at 1200fps, I don't think it'd hurt to have an extra 200fps behind it unless it caused problems with excessive and unmanageable muzzle flip (if we're talkin self defense or rapid target shootin)

 

[Ben Shepherd]

With rifles the difference isn't nearly as pronounced as a handgun. Pure math. Think of it on a percentage basis and you'll see what I mean.

Terminal preformance can(and generally does) change drastically with pistol projectiles between 1000 and 1500 fps.

 

[TexasRifleman]

You've got 2 versions of the same thread running for some reason......

http://thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=442971

 

[Ed Ames]

Energy equals mass times velocity squared.

Or, said another way... for every ~1.4x velocity improvement (1000fps to 1414 fps, 1414fps to 2000, etc) you double the energy, mass being equal.

 

[Claude Clay]

every one knows

speed kills

what the gun can handle and what you can control defines top end for me. couple to that the terminal ballistics of the bullet and the intended use of the bullet [ pins/pineapple/people]. criteria to help chose a cartrage/gun for a purpose.

 

[kirklandkie]

here's my analysis for the question of speed:
gravity is a constant, it'll pull a bullet downward at 32ft/s regardless of the mass of the bullet. the faster the bullet is moving the less time it'll spend in the air and thus the less "drop" it'll have from gravity.
i'd say that speed has more to do with accuracy then stopping power

-kirk

 

[jakemccoy]

You mean constant acceleration downward at 32 ft/s^2.

 

[Justin]

Duplicate topic.