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The Physics of Firearms

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Firearms are often featured on the news due to poor use as well as featured in popular culture’s television crime dramas, but have you stopped to ponder about where these devices came from, the different types, the trajectory patterns that are created their bullets and how they work? The following paragraphs are designed to address all of the following questions.
A firearm is a complex arrangement of various metals that can eject a small lead piece at high speeds, causing maximum destruction on the target with minimum energy delivery on the shooter themselves. (Definition of a Gun, n.d.) The mechanics of shooting any type of firearm; weather it be a rifle, shotgun, or pistol, includes a wide variety of physics topics working together to make the bullet hit its target including friction, force, conservation of momentum, transfer of energy, heat engines, and projectile motion. (The Physics of Shooting a Gun, n.d.) History Of Firearms
The history of firearms begins in China in the ninth century where, huo yao, the world’s first gun powder was discovered; it was created by mixing charcoal, potassium nitrate and sulphur into a fine powder. Historians are prone to recognizing tenth century Chinese fire lances, a spear-like weapon combining a bamboo tube containing huo yao and projectiles tied to a Chinese spear as the first firearm. In the year 1320, Gun powder was developed into a specific formula, 15% charcoal, 75% potassium nitrate and 10% sulphur. It was developed for the

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