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Show Ceiling Zero? How high will a rifle shoot? This Is a matter about which practically all shooters, at some time or other, have speculated. To boil it down into general terms, with the safety element ele-ment as a prime consideration, the answer is "A lot farther than you think." John J. O'Connor, of the physics and ballistics research laboratory of Remington Arms Company, Inc., has reduced the matter to a mathematical mathe-matical formula which reveals the rather surprising information that a bullet fired vertically upward wiD reach a height equal to more than half the maximum horizontal range of a similar bullet fired at the optimum op-timum angle of departure. Concedes Some Danger O'Connor says:' "Since aviation became popular, there has been a slight but present danger from amateur anti-aircraft men on the ground. In the early days of commercial com-mercial planes it was all too common com-mon for planes flying relatively low over the more remote hills of the eastern United States to be met by bullets. When the German dirigibles were making their regularly scheduled sched-uled flights to this country, there was at least one incident when a dirigible was hit by a small caliber bullet. These and other accidents probably reflect the lack of knowledge knowl-edge of the impressive height which small caliber bullets can attain. In other words shooters depend upon gravity to make their prank a harmless harm-less one. Unfortunately gravity, though highly effective in making a poor range guesser come home with an empty trophy bag, is rela- tivplv inpffprtivp in stnnninf a hnllpt projected skyward. No Child's Toy "For example, consider the 22 long rifle bullet, considered by many, unfortunately, to be a child's toy. As is well known, the high speed version has a maximum horizontal hori-zontal range of about 910 of a mile. Not so well known is the fact that If fired vertically upwards, it will attain a height of about 710 of a mile or 3700 feet. Even regular or Match velocity 22 long rifle bullets will travel about 3500 feet upward. The force of gravity at the muzzle amounts to only 1.63 of the total force acting. At any velocity above 280 feet per second, the air resistance resist-ance forces are larger than forces due to gravity. "Calculations indicate that under any practical conditions the attainable attain-able vertical height above gun position po-sition is more than half the attainable attain-able horizontal range, regardless of bullet or muzzle velocity. When we realize that the maximum horizontal hori-zontal range for center fire rifle bullets may be as much as 6000 yards, we see that it is extremely hazardous to shoot at high angles of elevation without being absolutely absolute-ly certain that not only is there plenty of horizontal distance available, avail-able, but also there are no aircraft in the vicinity." AAA "Old Reliable" In the closing days of the fishing season, the crisp, sunny days of late Fall, the old reliable re-liable tandem "guinea-tail" spinner spin-ner will be found to be one of the most effective of all bass lures. In fact, there are myriad oldtime anglers who assert that if they were to be restricted to just one bass lure, they'd choose the "guinea-tail." The tandem spinner shown here is Pflueger's luminous spinner and is the pioneer of all the "guinea-tail" tandems. AAA Fewer Fires Although there were more people seeking recreation in the national forests last year than ever before, the visitors started fewer fires through carelessness than during the previous year, according to the Wildlife Management- Institute. Careless smokers started 1,701 fires on national forests as compared com-pared with 1,842 in 1949, records of the U.S. Forest Service show. Incendiary In-cendiary fires, however, increased from 1,204 in 1949 to 1,724 in 1950. The majority of the blazes intentionally inten-tionally set by "fire bugs" Occurred on the national forests of the II states lying south of Virginia. AAA Wait Awhile Although you see your hunting friends getting busy with dogs and arms for the almost-upon-us hunting season, don't you anglers start racking rack-ing up for the year. There's still a lot of good fishing for crappie in ponds and even the bass, if you have the patience to fish deep water and it does take patience. Get those lures down deep, deep, deep and fish 'em slow! That is the technique most likely to produce pro-duce for the late-season basser. |