• This Forum is for adults 18 years of age or over. By continuing to use this Forum you are confirming that you are 18 or older. No content shall be viewed by any person under 18 in California.

Maximum height of bullet trajectory?

marine52 said:
Yes, Alex did get his answer. His bullet rises above the point of departure (muzzle tip) to 7.5 feet which is the trajectory max ord. He was pointing out the confusion of some shooters who reference drop from the imaginary boreline which will always be above the trajectory. This imaginary line is the source of confusion. If you focus on where the bullet actually goes (trajectory) the confusion ends.
Click to expand...
Once again, CORRECT!
Here are the Berger Ballistic Calculator Input Parameters as I entered, and the Excel Spread sheet with said parameters and results:

284W Trajectory 0-1000 B.jpg
Alex
 
Webster said:
The bullet isn't rising. It's the height above the line of sight.
Click to expand...

I thought we solved this. OK, let’s try this another way with a real-world example. Suppose you are with your buddies watching a football game (not soccer but real football) and your team’s QB makes a game-winning pass from his 20-yard line and connects with his receiver on the opponent’s 20-yard line (that’s a 60-yard pass for you Eagles fans) and the receiver runs it in for the TD. Everyone is shouting and raising their drinks but you jump up and say “you guys understand that football did not rise but was falling all the time.” If you don’t get your butt kicked, you try to explain further: “the football never went above and was falling from the imaginary line formed by the launch angle of the quarterback’s hand as he released the ball.”

See if that works.
 
Last edited:
Some of the post may have confused the issue with the terminalogy. Some guys still think the bullet rises when it leaves the muzzle. The bullet is aimed above the target so it falls down to the intended target. I feel guilty replying several times but 63 replies it seems like many guys are not convinced of whats going on.
 
You're correct. The bullet goes up (relative to the earth) a certain amount - how much depends on the range, bullet and velocity - before coming back down to hit the target. This is sometimes confused with the bullet flying upwards like a plane, but it's really jsut because you have to point the gun up a bit to counter gravity if you want to hit a target that's at the same elevation as the muzzle. It's no different than throwing a baseball.


This is easy to see with your own eyes if you look through a spotting scope from behind the line while someone shoots at long range.
 
Last edited:
I agree. This is my last post on this thread. I will only say that an object, be it a bullet, ball, or person, cannot fall from a height if that object is never at that height. The bullet is never at the height of the line of departure except for the brief moment at the tip of the barrel. After that, it starts its journey on its parabolic trajectory.
 
Last edited:
Webster said:
The bullet isn't rising. It's the height above the line of sight.
Click to expand...
Yes, the bullet does rise. It rises above the line of sight because it's aimed with a positive launch angle. It rises relative to the earth. It rises relative to just about anything one can think of. That's because the barrel is pointed upward. Your assertions that the bullet isn't rising are semantics, nothing more, and are only adding to any confusion that might have been generated in this post.

Edited to add: I get what you're trying to say, and I believe this sums it up concisely: the bullet never rises above the angle/line of sight through the bore axis. Nonetheless, the bullet does rise with respect to a bunch of other things when fired with a positive launch angle and continually stating that the bullet doesn't rise is likely confusing to some readers that may have been struggling to grasp some of these concepts already.
 
Last edited:
Webster said:
Some of the post may have confused the issue with the terminalogy. Some guys still think the bullet rises when it leaves the muzzle. The bullet is aimed above the target so it falls down to the intended target. I feel guilty replying several times but 63 replies it seems like many guys are not convinced of whats going on.
Click to expand...
The issue in not terminology as much as impreciseness when asking the question or making a statement.

In this case the scenario is shooting 180 hybrids at a target 1000 yards away. The key is to make the question 'does the bullet rise after leaving the muzzle?' explicit and specify 'rise relative to what?'.

Does the bullet rise relative to the plane at which it leaves the muzzle? - No - because of gravity. If the bullet leaves the muzzle at an angle of 0.4468 degrees, which is the same as 26.8 MOA, it will never rise above the height that a 0.4468 degree line describes between the muzzle and the distance of the target.

Does the bullet rise relative to the ground - most certainly Yes - because of launch angle. The bullet will start at a height of let's say 12 inches off the ground (if that is where the muzzle is located) and travel to an apex height of approximately 7.5 feet (plus 12 inches) before it starts falling back towards the ground. So relative to the ground it most definitely rises after leaving the muzzle.
 
M-61 said:
Line of sight
Line of the barrel
Line of bullet path

Barrel is always aimed UP
Line of sight never moves
The bullet will pass through the line of sight TWICE
Once on its way UP
Second time it crosses, right on the bullseye (hopefully)
Click to expand...
This was my post # 26
I tried to use as few words and still have it understandable.
Instead of ‘ line of the barrel’ maybe if I said ‘a sight line through the barrel’ would have been better..
The reason we have MOA rails is we have to get the barrel pointed UP in relation to the laser straight line of sight.
Just to confuse matters remember to hold LOW when shooting up OR down hill. LOL
 
For anyone strugglign with this. Point the gun straight up. Does the bullet rise? Yes. Tip it 45 degrees, does it still go up? Yes, but less. Keep lowering the bore, the bullet still rises *until* you get the bore perfectly level. then it does not rise - it starts out level and immediately starts dropping. Keep lowering the rifle - now it's pointed down. The bullet sure as hell doesn't go up now.

That's what happens - it's not any more complicated than that. The bullet goes where you point it and arcs back towards the earth as gravity pulls it down. Like a baseball. Gravity always wins. It's really not that far off high school physics when they taught parabolic motion.

You can forget about lines of sight, lines of departure, etc. You're just lobbing lead down range. If you wanna hit the target that's at your elevation, you're gonna have to aim a little bit high...
 
Vectors - max ordinate or bullet height is when point where the vertical component of the muzzle velocity ( based on launch angle ) reaches zero. Faster bullets need lower launch angle to reach a distant target than a slower bullet.

It is all in your frame of reference if it is rising or falling. It can do both depending on what your perspective is. Do not get hung up on the words and use Marine52's football pass analogy in mind.
 
Last edited:
LOL . . . I just don't know why the mystery for so many, as it seems to me to be a very simple concept. Maybe because I've delt with this kind of thing most of my life in two other sports I've been heavily involved with: Baseball and Golf? See here:
Baseball Launch Angle.jpg

Golf Launch Angle.jpg
 
Highpower-FClass said:
'the difference in height at which the bullet would be, from the center of the target, at the target, if gravity did not exist'.
Click to expand...
I believe drop can be visualized as the vertical distance between the bullet and the imaginary extended bore axis (when the bullet exited the bore) at a particular downrange distance.
-
 
Straightshooter1 said:
I've delt with this kind of thing most of my life in two other sports I've been heavily involved with: Baseball and Golf?
Click to expand...
It's been shown that the maximum Time Of Flight for a human leaping off the ground is slightly less than 1 second. What's the maximum TOF of a batted baseball, to the nearest half second?
-
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Upgrades & Donations

This Forum's expenses are primarily paid by member contributions. You can upgrade your Forum membership in seconds. Gold and Silver members get unlimited FREE classifieds for one year. Gold members can upload custom avatars.


Click Upgrade Membership Button ABOVE to get Gold or Silver Status.

You can also donate any amount, large or small, with the button below. Include your Forum Name in the PayPal Notes field.


To DONATE by CHECK, or make a recurring donation, CLICK HERE to learn how.

Classified Ads

Forum statistics

Threads
165,280
Messages
2,192,311
Members
78,784
Latest member
Vyrinn

Share This Page

Back
Top