Who Invented Bullets - There's no shortage of history about the guns themselves, but what about projectiles fired at such speeds? View more photos of the gun.

When people talk about firearms, they usually focus on the weapon itself — its magazine, sight, sight, trigger guard, compensator, and suppressor. They also often discuss various aspects of weapon performance, such as trigger pull, muzzle flash, and recoil.

Who Invented Bullets

Who Invented Bullets

Any weapon, however, is a means to an end, and that aim is to fire the weapon, at high speed, at the target. Today, almost everyone talks about a bot-like projectile, a word that comes from the French boulette, meaning "small ball". So did the first bullets - guided balls fired from smooth-bore guns - although they evolved into cylindrical, pointed objects released from rifle bombs. Once those things happen, things get interesting. People with guns became better weapons, their bullets traveled farther and more accurately, and their loved ones suffered serious injuries.

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Although much has been written about the evolution of firearms, little attention has been paid to the development of modern cartridges, such as the 5.56 mm rifle cartridge and the 9x19 mm pistol cartridge, both standard US weapons. Well, that's the real point of this list - walking, step by step, through the basic techniques that give firearms used today in weapons from assault rifles to semi-automatic pistols.

In the ancient world, a metaphor for a good idea could be a firecracker exploding over someone's head. That's because firecrackers contain black powder, an invention of 10th-century Chinese pyromaniacs. It didn't take long before a belligerent warrior or a jealous man discovered that he could produce projectiles using the same mixture of saltpeter (potassium nitrate), sulfur and coal.

The Arabs' earliest black gunpowder weapons - iron-reinforced bamboo tubes that used a charge of black powder to shoot arrows. This was replaced by the hand shovel, which required two people to shoot. One person holds the gun while the second inserts a glow stick or wire into the hole drilled in the strong end, or trouser. This ignites black powder, which sends a circular ball - the first bullet - roaring out of the open end of the cannon.

Over time, weapons became more sophisticated, but they continued to rely on a primitive chemical process, which scientists today describe as heat. In this type of reaction, a spark ignites a small black powder that does not explode but quickly burns to produce large amounts of propellant gas which is pushed back by a loose plug. The stopper is of course the bullet, which is securely attached to the barrel so that gas cannot escape from its surroundings. When the gases expand and encounter resistance, they eject the bullet from the muzzle.

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Most people think of the arms race as the rivalry between the US and the former Soviet Union during the Cold War. However, the world's struggle to defeat its enemies by collecting better weapons is something that has been going on for a long time. The bottom bar is just that. Early weapons consisted of small cobblestones, but these were not very effective against armored warriors. This led gunsmiths to investigate steel bullets, which were made by pouring molten metal into molds and allowing them to dry.

Iron balls were popular for a time, but they were difficult to manufacture, requiring high temperatures to melt and often cracked gun barrels trying to fire them. Then, in the early 1600s, lead balls started flying over the battlefield. Lead is slightly soluble, so it can be tossed in a ladle over a wood fire. Soldiers and hunters could reload their weapons while cooking dinner. And because they are soft, lead balls pose little risk of damaging the weapon. This bullet, also called the shotgun ball or "spin", would dominate until the 1800s and the invention of the aerodynamic projectile.

You're looking at the greatest development in bullet history - The mini-ball. According to some sources, over 95 percent of all wounds treated by World War II physicians were caused by firearms, such as the Springfield Model 1855 rifles, firing the Minié .58 caliber round.

Who Invented Bullets

Early smoothbore rifles received lead balls through the muzzle. The balls are smaller than the diameter of the holes, so when fired, they bounce along the barrel until they come out. The bankruptcy did little to justice. Later, in the 15th century, German gunsmiths developed a weapon - a method of cutting a spiral groove inside the barrel wall. These grooves are dug into the projectile as it slides down the barrel, causing it to rotate and giving it realistic flight. Rifling works best when the projectile fits snugly in the barrel, meaning the lead ball needs a cap, or patch, to increase the diameter.

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The major breakthrough came in the 1850s, thanks to a French general named Claude-Étienne Minié. His unknown bullet was still lead, but thicker, not round. When hot gases from the heat of the black powder expand into a Minié ball, it causes the soft bullet to eject and hit the barrel of the gun. This meant that professional bullets could be made smaller without compromising the range they achieved. And they don't need a patch, which makes them easy to carry.

The Minié ball -- the first cylindroconoidal bullet -- significantly improves shooter accuracy. During the Civil War, which saw widespread use of these bullets for the first time, Union and Confederate infantry troops hit their targets more frequently and over a wider area.

In this picture, you see the hammer, the raised weapon, which is about to hit a hat that is resting on the chest or breast.

As Boss said in "Dancing in the Dark": "You can't start a fire, you can't start a fire without fire." Even though Springsteen means romance, the same idea applies to bullets. For a weapon to work, there must be a flame or flame igniting the projectile, igniting the black powder. Flintlock pistols and rifles accomplish this by striking a piece of flintlock against a piece of metal. The flames from the hammer stones fell into the pot of primer. The primer burns very quickly, igniting the powder charge.

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The Flintlock weapon works well, but has a drawback: the delay between the chicken dropping and the gun firing. Some manufacturers have wondered whether fulminant salts, which explode on impact, would be a better alternative. Unfortunately, salt is very sensitive to shock, friction, and sparks, making it too uncomfortable to act on. Then, in 1800, the English chemist Edward Howard was able to isolate mercury fulminate, a stable version of the compound. When Rev. Alexander Forsyth mixes full mercury with potassium chlorate, creating a reliable and safe priming agent. In the 1820s, this first was the most important part of the hammer cap, a copper "top cap" that sat on the anvil or nipple. When the hammer hit the cap, it ignited the mercury to temper, causing the flame to enter the barrel and start the powder burning.

Gunfire and muck hung in the air as the US cavalry charged. The Army's 1st Cavalry Division forms a 'cavalry squad' to conclude the March 25, 2009 ceremony in Fort Hood, Texas.

The discovery of black powder may be one of humanity's greatest accomplishments, but it led to the battlefield. In a long battle, as soldiers throw their weapons time and time again, a full veil of smoke fills the air, sometimes rendering the enemy invisible. In the 1800s, chemists and manufacturers were looking for something better.

Who Invented Bullets

The answer comes from the plant kingdom, in the form of cellulose. These macromolecules, or long chains of glucose repeating units, are found in plant cells and can be obtained from wood pulp or short cotton fibres. In 1846, Swiss chemist Christian Friedrich Schönbein took cotton wool and soaked it in a mixture of nitric and sulfuric acids, causing the hydroxyl groups of cellulose to be replaced by nitro groups. The result is a highly flammable material called nitrocellulose or guncotton. Unfortunately, it would spontaneously decay and explode without warning. Then, in the 1880s, French engineer Paul Vieille discovered that when nitrocellulose was mixed with other stabilizers, it became less stable. This led to a new type of weapon, commonly known as smokeless gunpowder, which revolutionized weapons. Now the soldier could fire his gun and not disappear in the white smoke.

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The modern form of smokeless powder -- cordite -- contains nitrocellulose, nitroglycerin and petroleum jelly. In its final form, it looks like tiny graphite-colored grains.

The rim under the old four bars is easy to make. You don't see that rim on the modern mid-fire cartridge shown next.

Prior to the 19th century, primers, powders, and bullets were available

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