Concorde Vs Bullet

OK, i think you are looking at the problem a little too simply. It is
not just a relative motion issue. Air travelling towards the aircraft
would not be able to enter the muzzle (as it has nowhere to go). The
bullet would then travel down the muzzle at the speed of sound say (I
know it has to accelerate but lets just say it travels at a constant
speed) relative to the muzzle (i.e. the bullet would be travelling its
velocity plus that of concorde). Upon reaching the end of the muzzle
it would hit a wall of air travelling at the same speed as it so would
effectively instantaneously slow down to the speed of concorde. It
then could go one of 3 ways, it could bobble about in the space between
the end of the muzzle and the air around (the boundary layer), fly back
past the aircraft and possibly hitting the aircraft on the way past or
it could go bounce back down the muzzle.

NOt quite.

The bullet would not 'instantaneously' slow down. It has a given amount
of energy and is capable of supersonic speeds. The question would be
how long would it take to slow down to the Concorde's speed. If you
guess a second, and the bullet was fired along the flight path of the
airplane, it would have fallen 16 feet be the time it was traveling the
same speed, and another number of feet before it slowed down enough for
the airplane to catch up to it.

During WW2 some airplanes were said to have hit themselves with their
own bullets, but I think you can work out how that might happen with an
airplane diving under its own line of fire.

Finally, if you think you knew the answer, why did you post the
question?

I posted the question because i wanted to canvas opinion and spark
debate.....the very reason that these groups exist!

"rick_little99" wrote in message
ups.com...
I posted the question because i wanted to canvas opinion and spark
debate.....the very reason that these groups exist!

In other words, you're a a troll...

If its travelling at its own velocity plus the velocity of Concorde,
why would it instantly slow down to the speed of Concorde after exiting
the muzzle? Seems to me it would continue out the muzzle at whatever
its combined velocity was.

rick_little99 wrote:

OK, i think you are looking at the problem a little too simply. It is
not just a relative motion issue. Air travelling towards the aircraft
would not be able to enter the muzzle (as it has nowhere to go). The
bullet would then travel down the muzzle at the speed of sound say (I
know it has to accelerate but lets just say it travels at a constant
speed) relative to the muzzle (i.e. the bullet would be travelling its
velocity plus that of concorde). Upon reaching the end of the muzzle
it would hit a wall of air travelling at the same speed as it so would
effectively instantaneously slow down to the speed of concorde. It
then could go one of 3 ways, it could bobble about in the space between
the end of the muzzle and the air around (the boundary layer), fly back
past the aircraft and possibly hitting the aircraft on the way past or
it could go bounce back down the muzzle.


Do you have any idea how much energy it would take to stop a bullet in
an inch or two when the bullet is traveling 3,000+ fps?


Matt