[Snail]

Well functionality aside, aesthetically a revolver certainly is much more pleasing on the eye then a Glock.

I dunno, revolvers in general don't really look "G" to me if you know what I mean.

[Herra Tohtori]

An automatic, with regards to handguns, is a weapon that loads the next bullet automatically at the end of the last pull of the trigger.  A revolver doesn't do that.  You have to pull the trigger again, and it will "chamber" the next round as the pin is pulled back.  Just in case you guys thought I was talking about assault rifles or stuff.

Well, to be exact, automatic weapons will discharge the whole magazine/belt if you keep the trigger down.

Semi-automatic weapons discharge once and chamber the next round, but you have to let the trigger up (either fully or partially) to fire a second shot.

In non-automatic weapons, the operator chambers the second round manually. In revolvers, this is done by rotating the wheel with either pulling the hammer back (single-action) or pulling the trigger which also pulls the hammer back and rotates the wheel (double action). In some ways, you could consider double-action revolvers to be "semi-automatic", but they are fully mechanically operated as opposed to gas piston operated and the mechanical work done to rotate the wheel requires longer trigger press than in gas piston operated semi-automatics.

From my limited experience, I didn't much care for the handguns and machine guns, but assault rifle was nice.


Regarding suppressors: Suppressors are mostly used to suppress the sound from the muzzle blast. They don't really have significant impact on the muzzle velocity of the round, but they're often used in conjunction with subsonic ammunition in order to also reduce the second most loud component of a gunshot sound - the shockwave from supersonic ammunition.

[NGTM-1R]

I'd be willing to bet that there are automatics out there somewhere that fires a .600.

As far as I am able to determine, there is not. It is a rifle cartridge, developed to kill-stop a friggin' charging rhino or hippo, and the revolver that fires them is itself similar in size to a shotgun. It would be utterly impractical as an automatic for the simple reason that  if you keep the ammunition in the grip, your hand will not fit around the grip. The other reason is that attempting to fire a second shot in the next five seconds will certainly waste the round and probably result in getting hit in the face with your gun (actually, even odds it'll hit you in the face with the first round firing a .600 cartridge), this making an automatic action pointless; you might as well go bolt.

Why there's even a revolver that fires .600 is an utter mystery, but it does mean that you can indisputably claim revolvers are more powerful...if they're totally impractical.

[Kolgena]

Are we talking about this by any chance?

[headdie]

I'd be willing to bet that there are automatics out there somewhere that fires a .600.

As far as I am able to determine, there is not. It is a rifle cartridge, developed to kill-stop a friggin' charging rhino or hippo, and the revolver that fires them is itself similar in size to a shotgun. It would be utterly impractical as an automatic for the simple reason that  if you keep the ammunition in the grip, your hand will not fit around the grip. The other reason is that attempting to fire a second shot in the next five seconds will certainly waste the round and probably result in getting hit in the face with your gun (actually, even odds it'll hit you in the face with the first round firing a .600 cartridge), this making an automatic action pointless; you might as well go bolt.

Why there's even a revolver that fires .600 is an utter mystery, but it does mean that you can indisputably claim revolvers are more powerful...if they're totally impractical.

how about because a 50 desert eagle will break your wrist if you dont know what you are doing

[Kolgena]

That's just .50AE. Plenty of rounds, not to mention revolvers that fire them, are more powerful than a .50AE/desert eagle.

[NGTM-1R]

how about because a 50 desert eagle will break your wrist if you dont know what you are doing

That's .50AE. A .600 Nitro Express is more comparable to .50 BMG.

[headdie]

opps, miss read your post! apologies on that one, i read it as surprise the isn't such a revolver 

[MP-Ryan]

But.... no. The bullet is still passing through the same barrel, so the gases are contained in the barrel and propelling the bullet for the same amount of time. In an unsuppressed gun, once the bullet leaves the barrel all those gases will expand all over the place and make a loud noise. In a suppressed gun, once the bullet leaves the barrel those gases have to go through the baffles in the suppressor, which absorb some of the energy and reduce the sound.... but either way nothing is propelling the bullet anymore, I think...

Wait, are you saying the bullet is in contact with the suppressor?

No.

Suppressors work by providing an area for the gases to expand and cool prior to discharging from the weapon entirely.  This reduces the noise associated with the shot (it no longer sounds like a gunshot) and it lowers the velocity of the bullet prior to discharging from the suppressor.  While they don't reduce supersonic ammunition to subsonic, they do slow the bullet velocity and decrease energy delivered to the target over the same distance as an unsuppressed weapon.

The loudest part of a gunshot is the muzzle blast - the rapid expansion and cooling of the gases reduces that, and slows the bullet velocity as well.

[Nuke]

a few weeks ago i went duck hunting. we found some ducks, loaded the shotgun, and got ready. i took aim while my brother in law fired off a 22 rifle to startle them. so the ducks are flying away and i fire a shot off, i miss, so i changed ducks. there was one flying away in the direction my gun was pointing. so i fired again, knocked a duck out of the flock and into the bay. apparently i clipped his wing, but he was alive and swimming away. so i unload another 5 shots at him. they all hit, because i see little splashes all around the duck. the little ****er was still alive, despite being smack dab in the middle of the shot each time. hes still swimming away, so i swap guns, take the 22 and put a bullet through that duck's head. getting the duck's rittled corpse involved a newb golden retriever, a raft, and a 12 foot steel pole. for what that little 22 lacked in power, it certainly made up for in accuracy. the shotgun was kinda fun despite the duck's rapidly diminishing luck. that said id rather have a rifle or a shotgun than a pistol, id have never been able to pull off that 22 shot with a 9mm.

...I am weak.

brownie points for the classic image. but i did manage to bring home a duck. never managed to actually eat it, the thing was horrible. i think il stick to grouse.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

Suppressors also work by causing the sound waves to cancel themselves out somewhat.  The shape of the chambers and exhausts makes a huge difference. 

For those of you who say they aren't silencers you've never had one made by a good machinist.  My Dad made a couple for some local law enforcement.  A BB gun sounds like artillery in comparison to unloading a full clip with the suppressor. 

[Kolgena]

While they don't reduce supersonic ammunition to subsonic, they do slow the bullet velocity and decrease energy delivered to the target over the same distance as an unsuppressed weapon.

Not true, unless it has wipers, which have been chucked on most silencers since they give out after a mag or so. Give me a physical reason why normal suppressors would slow down a bullet.

The difference between speeds of fired bullets from a silenced or unsilenced weapon would be close to null. Both bullets would have the same velocity coming out of the effective barrel, after which the unsilenced bullet flies through air while the silenced bullet flies through a tube that it never comes into contact with. Nothing in said tube can slow the bullet down. If anything, it'll speed the bullet up if there's still a pressure gradient from compressed gasses behind the bullet (which is usually not the case, or would contribute almost nothing)

I'm curious about the above anecdotal account of a really good silencer. Were they like, huge and fired wet, or something?

[Herra Tohtori]

The difference between speeds of fired bullets from a silenced or unsilenced weapon would be close to null. Both bullets would have the same velocity coming out of the effective barrel, after which the unsilenced bullet flies through air while the silenced bullet flies through a tube that it never comes into contact with. Nothing in said tube can slow the bullet down. If anything, it'll speed the bullet up if there's still a pressure gradient from compressed gasses behind the bullet (which is usually not the case, or would contribute almost nothing)

There's air in the suppressor.

When the bullet leaves the muzzle, it doesn't have a gas seal any more to keep the expanding exhaust gases behind it. Any acceleration by the exhaust gases after the muzzle can be largely ignored, since velocity of the exhaust gases as they escape the barrel drops down very fast. This works in either free air and in suppressor. When the bullet enters the suppressor, the hot exhaust gases behind it start to rapidly spread through the suppressor, but they will move slower than the bullet at the muzzle (by Bernoulli's law, when the tube rapidly expands, flow velocity drops down) which means the bullet is now traveling along the suppressor's hollow inside tube, which is filled with air.

The movement of the air is restricted by the suppressor, which means it is harder for the bullet to move away from its path compared to when it moves through free undisturbed air, which means some of the bullet's kinetic energy is wasted on that, and the bullet slows down a bit.


You can demonstrate the effect by taking some ball (table tennis ball would be ideal) and appropriately sized cardboard tube - one whose diametre is slightly larger than the ball's diametre.

Then you can commence a simple experiment: Drop the table tennis ball from the height of the cardboard tubes' length, a few times freely, to measure the fall time.

Then, drop the ball through the cardboard tube and measure the fall time.

You'll notice that the ball will fall through the cardboard tube significantly slower (and if the tube is long enough you will observe that the terminal velocity is significantly smaller, too).

Same happens with suppressor and bullet, albeit in much smaller scale and with less significant effect, but the suppressor does slow down the round while it is traveling through the tube, as compared to a round traveling in free air.

[redsniper]

Huh, see I considered that earlier, but I would have thought the effect of the air in front of the bullet would be negligible... maybe not...

[Herra Tohtori]

It's not going to be very big effect on a bullet, but it's there. I am hesitant to go into any actual figures - empirical testing in this kind of cases is the only thing that produces reliable values anyway - but I would estimate a velocity drop of somewhere around 3-5%, maybe ten percent at most. There are probably high quality suppressors that have a negligible impact on the velocity of the projectile.

Does someone have actual data on how different suppressors affect muzzle velocity on different weapons?

[FUBAR-BDHR]

No but I do know that using one actually increases the pressure in the barrel so it may overcome the affect of the air pressure slow down.  Use one on a high powered rifle that wasn't meant for it and you can blow up the gun. 

[MP-Ryan]

It's not going to be very big effect on a bullet, but it's there. I am hesitant to go into any actual figures - empirical testing in this kind of cases is the only thing that produces reliable values anyway - but I would estimate a velocity drop of somewhere around 3-5%, maybe ten percent at most. There are probably high quality suppressors that have a negligible impact on the velocity of the projectile.

Does someone have actual data on how different suppressors affect muzzle velocity on different weapons?

Alas, no.  I do know that some integral suppressors (like on the H&K MP5SD5 variant) are efficient enough that the velocity drop is negligible.  A buddy of mine on another forum made a fancy graph on this very topic several years ago, but he's been AWOL for some time so I don't think I'll be able to find it again.  EDIT:  Some quick Googling yields references to velocity drop on various websites of suppressor manufacturers.  http://www.srtarms.com/selecting.htm  However, there are also references to modern suppressors which actually increase velocity, to the tune of 30-50 feet/sec.

FUBAR, I was going to mention the wave cancellation properties of some modern suppressors, but it isn't universal to all.

Truthfully, you can build a crude but effective suppressor with limited use time with nothing more than a bunch of steel wool and a pop (soda, for you Americans) bottle.

[StarSlayer]

or a pillow.


What no love for muzzle loading flintlocks in that poll?   

[S-99]

That's the thing I don't understand, I don't know why I like them better. I can find no logical reason.

They don't jam. And for a pistol, they appear to use less complicated parts and operation compared to pistols with clips.

[Flaser]

BTW there is a revolver that can be effectively silenced: the Nagant M1895.