[I did see that this was answered a few years ago but the answer was a little too unscientific] I’m watching the movie and decided to Google it. All the answers are really physics heavy and I’m having trouble understanding. One answer even went on to speak about long distance military shooting, the rotation and curvature of the earth, and the fact that the bullet and earth themselves are both gyroscopes. The Magnus effect was mentioned as well. I still dont understand why it’s not possible.
In: Physics
In order for bullet to curve, there has to be a difference in forces that are in symmetrical angles. The reason why a baseball curves or a Magnus effect ball off a dam curves is the sideways (not in the axis of motion) rotation of the ball. A bullet has no sideways rotation. It’s rotating axially to the axis of motion by rifling.
In order to part a sideways rotation, you would have to impart a sideways force on the bullet the minute moments it leaves the very tip of the barrel. A controllable spin. That has real human sized effects. To get that out of sidespin on a bullet that’s traveling 800-1200ft a second, you would need to apply a very large force over a very small time window. Enough that a human can’t generate and enough to probably break the bullet apart as it’s traveling.
In shooting sports there is a phenomenon that causes bullets to tumble midair, we see it in targets and call it keyholing. The bullet strikes the paper target sideways as opposed to head-on. This usually is caused by a defect in bullet or barrel. A defect that has unpredictable effects since tumbling bullets aren’t uniformly rotating in a specific direction.
There is one “shooting” sport where we do curve the bullets for effect. Airsoft is a milsim sport that uses plastic sperical bb’s shot out of a smooth barrel. To elongate the trajectory, a system called hopup is employed where a rubber stop is partially inserted into the barrel. This imparts a backspin on the bb as it travels. The bb trajectory curves up for the first 100ft or so then drops down. Some paintball markers also use this effect for extending the range of the projectile.
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