Can you shoot a gun on the moon?

Question

By friend and I are having a bit of a disagreement and are hoping someone may know the answer...
Here is the question- If you fired a gun on the moon with no gravity would it shoot? If so without gravity what would happen to the bullet?
I know an odd question but hopefully someone knows! Thanks!

Ok... can you shoot in a no gravity room?

Ok... can you shoot in a no gravity room?
Will the bullet pierce.

Would the bullet have enough momentum to pierce through the same objects it would on earth if there was no gravity?

Answer 1

I think this is an interesting question, not odd. Yes, there is 1/6 the gravity on the moon as there is on earth so it is not zero gravity. A bullet carries its own oxygen in the gun powder (click on http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/sep99/937019405.Ch.r.html to find what gunpowder is made of) so it would fire even in a vacuum.

Even if there was no gravity, there is resistance to the bullets "kick back" provided by the mass of the gun and the shooter. Thus the bullet would do as much damage in say the space station as it would on earth. Its just that if the shooter were not holding onto anything else while in zero gravity, the equal and opposite reaction to the momentum of the bullet would send the shooter tumbling backwards.

Answer 2

1 - The Moon has gravity field about 1/6th that of Earth.

2 - Assuming the absence of gravity for arguments sake, the bullet would still fire with the same amount of force dictated by the mass and the speed of the bullet.

The person shooting the gun, again lacking gravity would be pushed in the opposite direction with the exact same amount of force. Since the shooter has more mass than the gun, it would move back far slower than the bullet would move forward.

3 - Lacking air, the question becomes is the bullet sealed in its cartridge enough to trap air inside the casing? If the seal is good enough, air would be present and the gun would fire as normal.

If the seal is not good enough, then the air in the cartridge would have leaked out and there would be no oxygen to burn. Then the gun would not fire.

4 - If a gun (any gun) fired a bullet, it would do the same thing on the Moon as it would on Earth. The momentum is determined by the velocity and mass of the bullet. However, in the smaller gravitational field of the Moon and the lack of wind resistance, the bullet would travel farther and travel truer to target.

Answer 3

The gun would fire since gunpowder already has oxygen in it.

A bullet in space would go on forever without gravity, air, or things in it's path. On the moon, there's low gravity and no air to stop it, so a bullet will travel incredibly far.

It's actually possible to make a lunar bullet fly much of the way around the globe! It'd have to be an enormously fast bullet, more than 3,000 feet per second, like one of those fired from military rifles. (you'd have to do these things on the highest mountains or otherwise the bullet might run into something before going very far)

Answer 4

Well the bullet would not fire, but not because of gravity. The gun couldn't fire because ignition cannot occur without oxygen.

However, let's say that somehow you could fire the gun. And let's say that the moon didn't have any gravity whatsoever (even though it does, it's just a lot smaller than on Earth. That's why astronauts bounce around on the moon, they don't float away). In this case, the bullet would still fire. Gravity would not stop the forward momentum imparted by the firing of the bullet. All it means is that the bullet would never fall because there is nothing to pull it down.

Answer 5

If you had a bullet with its own oxygen supply, or a bullet that was powered by some self-contained chemical or physical action (like an air pistol), it would fire just fine on the moon, provided it could handly the extremely cold temperature. It's trajectory would be less influenced by gravity, meaning you could shoot much farther (possibly even to escape velocity?) before it landed. If you fired the gun in space, the bullet would fly in a straight line forever, or until it passed close enough to a gravity field to be diverted.

Answer 6

There is gravity on the moon but only about 1/6 th that of earth.
The gun will shoot; the chemicals within the bullet cartridge do not need external oxygen. When the bullet leaves the gun barrel, it will travel much farther than on Earth due to no atmospheric resistance and the lower gravity.

Hope this helps!

Answer 7

I always assumed bullets had their own oxidizers in them so you don't need air to shoot a gun. So yes I think a gun would fire on the moon. The fact there would be no air resistance makes the bullets even more deadly on the moon since nothing would slow them down until they hit the ground.

Answer 8

Regular guns no, because lack of oxygen and inertia (the kick from the gun could send you flying way. NASA developed a "rocket gun" which uses instead of bullets small "missiles". This gun isn`t very accurate because the "bullet" has to gain speed and it's very expensive to shoot, so they discarded it.
The guns are called Gyrojet.

Yes the bullet of a normal gun would pierce through almost like it would in normal gravity, but would also send the target flying away.

Answer 9

I'll throw my hat in the ring too. There's gravity on the moon. Even if there wasn't, it wouldn't affect the gun.

Modern smokeless powder used in firearms contains its own oxidizer and therefore requires no external oxygen to fire. So, it would fire fine on the moon. Gas operated semi-automatic firearms (a rare type of cycling action on a handgun) would probably not cycle correctly due to the lack of air pressure, but other than that, modern firearms would work fine on the moon.

Answer 10

The moon has gravity. Gravity or no-gravity has no effect on the bullet firing, only how far it travels before it hits the ground, or breaks orbit.

Oxygen is required to fire a modern standard bullet, so the gun would not fire properly on the moon. However, there are firearms and ammunition being developed for such uses - such as caseless electronic firing pin ammo.