A question of realism.

Ok my question is: what woud the effects roughly be, of a .50 BMG round fired at point blank range, on any human limbs.

Reason: a character, I use for an online game, utalizes a modified Automag V, which normally fires .50 AE ammunition. However, being the profession he's in, Slade (the character) has altered the weapon to chamber .50 BMG rounds. Straight off the 21st century .50cal sniper. That segment of realism aside, he's reacted to various conlficts in the RPG 'bar' with a well placed bullet, hence.

 

Well I'd say whichever unfortunate limb that gets hit will be out of comission for a while.

 

It would simply clip the bone but not make any massive wounds to the flesh and muscle. .50BMG bullets are non-expanding and move at a velocity that allows them to zip through anything soft.

On the other hand, it is a half inch diameter bullet that will leave a hole at least that size. A lot of blood can flow from a hole that large but I don't think it would be a massive wound.

 

Don't forget the heat factor.
A bullet just exiting the barrel is hot enough to char or burn whatever it touches.

 

bullets are also not sharpe, they do not cut a bullet shaped hole as they pass through soft objects. They tear much large holes which is why exit wounds are bigger than entry ones

Plus given the speed of the item and the energy contained within it, the shock to the struck location is huge. It would probably render any limb stunned for a while and could be sufficent to kill purely out of shock. There are reports of peeps dieing from minor gun shot wounds to limbs

Also if the round hits a bone it won't cut or chip it, it would probably shatter it and the bone fragments would then cause secondary injuries in the area.

Bullet strikes are not as pretty as hollywood makes out and large caliber wounds can be horrific

FNG

 

The amount of injury will largely depend on the velocity with which it hits (I assume we are talking about jacketed ammunition here). If the bullet travels at a high velocity (such as from a sniper rifle), the force of the impact will destroy the muscle tissue and break any bones near the path of the bullet, effectively permanently killing the area hit (i.e it will begin to rot, and will have to be amputated).

 

As Christian pointed out velocity is a factor. If they are subsonic, high velocity, jacketed rounds do less damage since they don't expand and they pop right through the flesh. If they are supersonic though they do a lot of damage to tissue through cavitation effects. Much more damage than the bullet hole size.

 

Are you sure? I thought it was more scorching from the hot expelled gasses that caused the charing around the wound at extremely close ranges rather than any heat from the bullet itself.

 

So essentially, unless he hits the bone, he just tears chunks of flesh out....yeesh.

As far as velocities go, it would probably be a lower speed than a sniper, and I'm not sure if a standard BMG round is jacketed (knowing Slade, it probably is, but that would just be overkill)

 

I'm not sure about the effects on human flesh.
I do know that the contained explosion of firing a bullet generates an enormous amount of heat.
The friction of the bullet flying through air also causes a lot of heat.
And that nearly all images I've seen, in real life and in magazines/tv, of objects struck by bullets show scorch marks.

 

Bullets will be very hot when they leave a barrel. Friction as well as burning powder creates this.

All .50 BMG bullets are jacketed. Since they are designed to be used on vehicles, aircraft, equipment, etc. the bullets are dense and do not expand all that much if they hit softer materials.

BTW, if we really want to talk realism, who can shoot a .50BMG cartridge in anything smaller than an anti-material rifle such as a Barrett?

If you need something more powerful than the .50AE you should step up to the .500 S&W. It's a .50 caliber handgun hunting catridge designed for hunting bears and wild boars.

 

Heh, character flaw, tends to go overboard. I figured at leats some of the recoil ccould be managed with a forearm support, and the lenght of the cartridge, by modifiing the gun to take the clip from the right hand side and spit the spent casings to the left.

considering he exists in a sci-fi univers where projectile weapons of this sort are considered outdated and inferior, I guess a BMg round would be realitively easy to find, wich was one of the main considerations.

 

I thought a .50 AE bullet from a Desert Eagle would be enough to fell anything short of a bull moose.

 

It will if you can get close enough. As a hunting cartridge it leaves a lot to be desired since it's case capacity is limited due to having to be operated from a magazine. The longer revolver cartridges gives you more power since they hold more powder.

 

And another question-why are there so many varaitions of a single caliber bullet? There's the .50 AE for the Desert Eagle, a .50 round for the M2, plus there is the .375 Magnum and .375 H&H.

 

you mean the 357 magnum ,blaster? the desert eagle shoots a .50 bullet ,but it in no way resembles the .50 browning that is fired from the p47 ,hellcat and mustang ...caliber is merely the width in inches of the bullet a .30 is about a third of an inch , a carbine mi1 ,a 303 ,a 3030 ,a 308 ,30 06 ,.32 ,.38 ,357,7mm are all similar width but are not interchangeble

 

Some are rifle cartridges, some are handgun cartridges, and some are machine gun cartridges. As for why there are so many in each class, it's a just a matter of preference. Kind of like why there are so many cars in a particular class. Some are more suited to a certain task than others and some are simply personal preference.

 

i prefer the nine .32 cal balls all at once from the muzzel of my 12 gauge shotgun....

 

I have no idea what RPG is being played here, but a lot of Pen and Paper Dark Future type RPGs involved some forms of cybernetic/genetic/other enhancements that allowed characters to use weapons beyond the abilities of unmodified people. That said, you'd have to have unfeasibly large hands to hold an automatic pistol capable of chambering such a round fed through a pistol grip magazine, your character's hands must be about 18 inches long to the finger tips!

 

the gun's been modified to take the ammunition from the right hand side of the chamber not through the grip. Spits the spent casing out the left side.