Posted on 12/14/2017 5:22:41 AM PST by w1n1
Heres Youtuber Mark Schutzius taking down a running hog with his single shot, .45-70 rifle. Looks like he was sporting a "Trapdoor Springfield".
This heavy slug was developed at the U.S. Armys Springfield Armory for use in the Springfield Model 1873, which is known to collectors as the trapdoor Springfield.
According to gun historians the caliber accuracy was approximately at 4 inches (100 mm) at 100 yards. Because this was a heavy bullet its trajectory was an arc.
Obviously, this didnt stop this Youtuber Mark Schutzius to put his single-shot .45-70 to put down this hog. Take a look at this hog hunting footage at full speed here.
The .45-70 was used to drop buffalo with a single shot.
“Because this was a heavy bullet its trajectory was an arc.”
This is true for even very light bullets, or any unpowered projectile really, is it not?
All bullets travel an arc.
Also available as 45-90 and 45-110 (longer cartridge case versions).
One of our former geologists and his brother compete in this caliber in long range matches out to 800-900 yards on buffalo silhouettes.
A pox on everybody shooting video on a phonecam while holding it vertically! And it wasn’t one shot, either! It required a second shot!
All travel in an arc, but for light fast bullets this is negligible at most distances. For slow heavy bullets the arc is more pronounced so it does become a targeting issue. (Weight actually doesn’t matter, it’s just speed ... but a fast heavy bullet will produce intense recoil.)
The rifle he used looks like an H&R. They took their Topper single barrel shotgun & reissued it as a 45-70 rifle.
Great shot, BTW. See all that churned up soil? That’s what feral hogs do to farmers’ land. Can’t kill them fast enough; wild hog meat should be legalized for commercial sale.
Ive got a pretty good video of my 7mm Mag taking down a hog. He went to sleep instantaneously.
.45-70 has much more of an arc than many other calibers, or so I’ve been told. Supposedly the Indians took comparatively light casualties during the western Indian Wars after the army switched to .45-70 (160 at the Fetterman massacre compared to 40 or so atthe Little Big Horn) was because the sldiers shoy iver the heads of whoever they were aiming at. I thought yhat was a common problem in all conflicts, but I’m certainly no expert.
“... that’s what feral hogs do to farmers land”.
I don’t live in an area with feral hogs. That being said, later in the video you see what I can only describe as a “running herd”. So many of them! I usually complain about the number of deer in our area (especially when you hit one with a vehicle)... but I’ll take the deer over the feral hogs any day of the week.
Because this was a heavy bullet its trajectory was an arc.
This is true for even very light bullets, or any unpowered projectile really, is it not?
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Yes, all bullets travel in an arc, sort of.
The reality is that they simply fall to the ground. If you were to shoot a gun level, and drop a bullet at the same time as you fired the gun both bullets would hit the ground at the same time.
Usually we think of an arc as going up and coming back down in a curve, half a sine wave if you will but the reality is more like a quarter sine wave. This is true of anytime you shoot either level or aiming below your straight line of sight. When you aim down it is possible to reach the ground with your bullet before the one you dropped at the same time, the speed of the bullet outruns gravity.
Some people think that a bullet falls when it runs out of energy from the firing in the gun, it is not true. The bullet starts falling the instant it leaves the barrel of the gun. It gets to its target simply because it is traveling horizontally faster than it is falling vertically.
I realize that all sounds counter intuitive but it is true.
I once had a 45-70 built on a Siamese Mauser. It was not sporterized and the only modifications were a new barrel and changing the magazine box.
It was the worst kicking gun I have ever fired but I suspect it was mainly the fault of the original stock and it’s steel butt plate.
I would love to have a Winchester 1885 or a Ruger Number 1 in 45-70. Heck I would even take a Winchester 1886 lever action. A hot loaded 45-70 would have to be effective.
An 81mm shell has a pronounced arc of travel that lets you pound positions on the reverse side of a hill that are unassailable by 90mm tank guns. Just sayin’ . . .
A trapdoor Springfield is not a break action rifle. The rifle in the image above and in the video that the still was taken from is of a break action rifle, possibly a Thompson/Center.
“All bullets travel an arc.?
Correct! The “arc” depends on several things such as bullet weight, speed, wind, etc. Hitting that animal, depending on it’s running speed, made the shot a bit more difficult OR, it was a damn lucky shot. No matter, the hunter DID get his hog and that is why he was out there. Congratulations. (I’m going hog hunting soon myself).
In fact all bullets drop at the same speed. The same speed they drop when you hold one out to your side and release it.
The only question is how far the bullet traveled in that period of time.
I get that, but I always thought that, somehow, the spinning bullet develops lift which causes it to go upward a bit or at least retards its fall after leaving the barrel.
That’s the point. Fast (usually light) bullets are traveling fast enough that they don’t drop much by the time they get to the target, so the drop can usually be ignored or minimally compensated for. Slow (usually heavy) bullets take so long to get there that they fall a significant distance, hence the pronounced arc which must be accounted for.
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