Would a regular gun, say a .38 revolver, work in space?

Question

Is there enough oxygen in the bullet cartridge for the gun powder to burn?

Answer 1

I would say yes because the explosion inside the cartridge happens before the bullet leaves breaking the seal. Threrefore there must be enough oxygen inside the cartridge to support combustion. The only stipulation being that the seal around the bullet would have to be sufficient to prevent leaking out due to the vacuum of space.

Answer 2

Okay, yes, the firearm would fire. And I would recommend the revolver over a semi-automatic, because the recoil spring on a semi-auto is made to work within our atmosphere. I'd figure that the existance of a vacuum (which means there isn't enough atmosphere to help slow the slide) would cause excessive damage to the firearm. Also, I wouldn't recommend firing even the revolver more than once, due to the fact that a a pistol is air-cooled. In a vacuum, the pistol can't transfer the heat generated from repeated firing quickly enough to keep from over-stressing the metal. Ever fire a weapon over a long period of time? The barrel gets really hot, right? Well, without the transfer of molecules to drop the temp, the barrel/reciever will get extremely hot. Barrel will deform, etc. As far as cartridge seperating, I doubt it would just from the vacuum of space, due to the fact that I don't figure it reaches the amount of pressure needed to expell the bullet from the cartridge to begin with.

Answer 3

No reason it would not. The bullet is set in motion by the expansion of gasses within the barrel. As the muzzle (opening at the end of the barrel) is of a slightly smaller diameter than the bullet, creating an essentially air tight environment, there are no external forces or conditions that would effect the creation of that motion. Once the bullet has left the muzzle, there would be nothing (gravity, wind resistance) to impede it.

An external source of oxygen is not required. The burning of the powder creates the gasses required to fire the cartridge.

Answer 4

Yes, a gun will fire in space. Bullet cartidges conatin a mixture of gunpowder and an oxidizer. It does not require an outside oxygen source to fire. Ammunition made for military purposes is sealed for water proofing. There is no way that oxygen can enter the sealed cartridge. It would actually travel much faster and farther than on Earth because there will be no air resistance to slow it down.

Answer 5

Yes guns will fire in space. It's kinda cool too that the bullet will just keep going into it runs into something. That could take 1,000,000 years and the bullet will still keep the same amount of force.

Answer 6

A gun should fire in space, unless the extremes of heat and cold caused the parts to seize up, or the extreme heat in the sunlight cause the cartridges to detonate prematurely. The firing pin would strike the primer of the cartridge, causing the chemicals sealed in the cartridge to react explosively, sending the bullet out the muzzle at something like 1000 feet per second. The person firing the gun would be pushed in the opposite direction, according to Newton's 3rd law of motion: "To every action (force applied) there is an equal but opposite reaction (equal force applied in the opposite direction). " The bullet would continue to travel in the same direction at the same speed until it struck something or was acted on by gravity, per Newton's 1st law of motion: "Objects in motion tend to stay in motion, and objects at rest tend to stay at rest unless an outside force acts upon them. "

Answer 7

Yes. Gunpowder is a self contained chemical combination that does not require air or oxygen from the air to burn. Just like solid rocket fuel.

Answer 8

Hi. Yes, as others have pointed out the cartridge contains its own oxidizer. The interesting thing is that, once fired, the bullet will continue to travel until it hit something!

Answer 9

yes bacause if you think about it, the chamber of a gun works almost like a rocket fulled space shuttle, the only thing that is making the space shuttle move through space in the momentum of the pressured fire spitting out of the tail, if it wasn't for that, it wouldn't move anywhere, because there is no air resistance in space, same with a gun, in the chaber, theres a blast of explostion, not such a big explosion, but enough to give the bullet momentum to move through the chamber out to space... i hope you understood that...

Answer 10

NO. The weapon is not sealed so the oxygen would disperse too rapidly fro allow the ignition that propells the bullet from the gun., at least not OUTside of a spaceship.