Gun nuts (Common mistakes)

[theloneassassin]

One of the kids at the lunch table was complaining about how an AK-47 or some variant jammed in a movie. His complaint was that AKs can't jam because they're too reliable and blah blah blah.
It took me forever to explain to him that no matter what, guns can and will jam. I was sunk until I remembered a real life example from the Hollywood Bank Robbery Shootout.
I hate it when people think they know guns just because they played a few games, saw the Military Channel while channel-surfing, and looked up a gun for all of ten seconds on the internet.

You can't really truly know them until you have held it in your hands

 

[Lunar Shadow]

Being totally not a gun nut, it still always annoys me (in movies) when people cock back a hammer before they shoot someone (usually the intent seems to be to add a bit of tension to the scene). Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't modern day guns cock the hammer themselves? Which is why after that initial shot they're not cocking back the hammer with every subsequent?

Also, normal guns having the power to lift people off the ground and knock them back. I'm not a gun nut, I just understand basic physics.

Yeah, cocking back the hammer is not needed for modern pistols because when you pull back on it to chamber the round it automatically cocks the hammer, and usually the pistol is all ready to shoot as soon as you pull it out and pop the safety off.

Most semi-auto pistols you can decock by easing the hammer down while pulling the trigger. It allows you to keep one in the chamber without worrying about it going off.

 

[Kolby Jack]

Also, silencers. They are not that quite. They still sound like a freaking gun.

Mythbusters says otherwise. And isn't calling them silencers as opposed to suppressors another common gun mistake?

In my neighborhood, we call that a burn. >

 

[theloneassassin]

Also, silencers. They are not that quite. They still sound like a freaking gun.

Mythbusters says otherwise. And isn't calling them silencers as opposed to suppressors another common gun mistake?

In my neighborhood, we call that a burn. >

What do you mean mythbusters says otherwise? I have heard plenty of suppressed weapons and unless it's one of the few truly silenced guns (can't say suppressed because that doesn't apply to that) they are not that quiet.

 

[campofapproval]

Pretty much the way guns are used in movies.
1) I find it hard to find a movie where they ACTUALLY reload (You fired like 30 shots from your pistol, I only know pistols that have 20 round clips)
2) When they shot cars with a pistol and or rifle, and it explodes in a huge fireball! (Don't get me started on fireballs)

i hate to say "maybe you watch the wrong movies" but maybe you watch the wrong movies. there are plenty of films that do that right, a few continuity errors aside. what i don't get in movies is whenever one dude passes a gun to another dude it always has this clicking sound, like non-toy guns actually make that sound when they move around. i realize that's there to draw attention to the gun, but what?

 

[Flac00]

Pretty much this

I knew it! Arnold is a hacker. Damnit, i need to know his codes

 

[Lunar Shadow]

One of the kids at the lunch table was complaining about how an AK-47 or some variant jammed in a movie. His complaint was that AKs can't jam because they're too reliable and blah blah blah.
It took me forever to explain to him that no matter what, guns can and will jam. I was sunk until I remembered a real life example from the Hollywood Bank Robbery Shootout.
I hate it when people think they know guns just because they played a few games, saw the Military Channel while channel-surfing, and looked up a gun for all of ten seconds on the internet.

Most people don't realize that while Kalisnakovs are notoriously reliable, they do have a tendency to stove pipe if not at least basic maintainance/cleaning , though that is largley the case if you use shit ammo in which the casing deforms from the heat. Had that happen in my brother's Mosin. Cheap bulgarian reloads <<

 

[Flac00]

One thing that's really starting to grate on me is how I've never seen an accurate depiction of a chaingun. It doesn't go "dakka-dakka-dakka" like those orks are always talking about, it sounds more like an exploding chainsaw. It's like just one loud, continuous, buzzing roar. Also, you don't spray and pray with it. Its rate of fire is so fast that you litterally cannot carry (that's why it's usually a mounted weapon, too) enough bullets to waste on spray and pray. If you just held down the trigger, you'd be out of ammo in about three seconds. When my grandpa was in the army, he said that some of their helicopters had chainguns on them, and when they loaded up the belts every fifth bullet was a tracer round. When they'd fire it, it would look like a solid line of fire. I imagine it would look pretty badass.

Well, Battlefield Bad Company 2 pretty much follows that description. In that game, when you fire the gun, everything in front of it dies. Also, the sound is perfect (for me at least)

 

[campofapproval]

The only thing that bothers me is when guns in film and TV make ridiculously loud clicking and sliding sounds every time they're handled. It's like they have a bunch of oiled ball bearing rattling around in the barrel.

My brother is far more particular and complains about everything from getting the firing rate on a Python wrong to all of the various reasons a 40k bolter is poorly designed. This annoys me far more than any firearm inaccuracies, and I just tell him to shut up and enjoy the game/movie/book.

it looks like i got ninja'd
:c

 

[Bureacreative]

Being totally not a gun nut, it still always annoys me (in movies) when people cock back a hammer before they shoot someone (usually the intent seems to be to add a bit of tension to the scene). Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't modern day guns cock the hammer themselves? Which is why after that initial shot they're not cocking back the hammer with every subsequent?

Also, normal guns having the power to lift people off the ground and knock them back. I'm not a gun nut, I just understand basic physics.

Yeah, cocking back the hammer is not needed for modern pistols because when you pull back on it to chamber the round it automatically cocks the hammer, and usually the pistol is all ready to shoot as soon as you pull it out and pop the safety off.

that's more for an internal hammer (that's your glocks). External hammers (like Beretta 92, H&K mark 23, 1911, a lot of sigs) pull back when you chamber the round, but you can decock it for safety. then gotta pull the hammer back, but the round is good to go once the safety is off. But yeah you can cock it just by pulling back the slide. I find a lot of movies miss the chambering step, might just be my inattentiveness.

 

[theloneassassin]

Being totally not a gun nut, it still always annoys me (in movies) when people cock back a hammer before they shoot someone (usually the intent seems to be to add a bit of tension to the scene). Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't modern day guns cock the hammer themselves? Which is why after that initial shot they're not cocking back the hammer with every subsequent?

Also, normal guns having the power to lift people off the ground and knock them back. I'm not a gun nut, I just understand basic physics.

Yeah, cocking back the hammer is not needed for modern pistols because when you pull back on it to chamber the round it automatically cocks the hammer, and usually the pistol is all ready to shoot as soon as you pull it out and pop the safety off.

that's more for an internal hammer (that's your glocks). External hammers (like Beretta 92, H&K mark 23, 1911, a lot of sigs) pull back when you chamber the round, but you can decock it for safety. then gotta pull the hammer back, but the round is good to go once the safety is off. But yeah you can cock it just by pulling back the slide. I find a lot of movies miss the chambering step, might just be my inattentiveness.

Yeah I don't pay attention all the time either xD

 

[Aur0ra145]

Magazine vs. Clip.

They are two ENTIRELY different things.

Also, ignorance in regards to usage and practicality of firearms.

 

[Aur0ra145]

Being totally not a gun nut, it still always annoys me (in movies) when people cock back a hammer before they shoot someone (usually the intent seems to be to add a bit of tension to the scene). Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't modern day guns cock the hammer themselves? Which is why after that initial shot they're not cocking back the hammer with every subsequent?

Also, normal guns having the power to lift people off the ground and knock them back. I'm not a gun nut, I just understand basic physics.

Yeah, cocking back the hammer is not needed for modern pistols because when you pull back on it to chamber the round it automatically cocks the hammer, and usually the pistol is all ready to shoot as soon as you pull it out and pop the safety off.

that's more for an internal hammer (that's your glocks). External hammers (like Beretta 92, H&K mark 23, 1911, a lot of sigs) pull back when you chamber the round, but you can decock it for safety. then gotta pull the hammer back, but the round is good to go once the safety is off. But yeah you can cock it just by pulling back the slide. I find a lot of movies miss the chambering step, might just be my inattentiveness.

1911's are only fired in single action mode, after each subsequent shot the firearm cocks itself via the recoil of the slide.

Sigs are a Double Action/Single Action firearms. Glocks are striker fired, and pretty much entirely different.

OT: I guess there is a big misconception about how DA firearms work, SA firearms work and DA/SA firearms work.

Let me put it this way. A Single-Action firearm has to be cocked for each round it fires, these are generally hammer fired. I.E. manual cocking. M1911

Double action firearms cock themselves when the trigger is pulled, so pulling back the hammer is unnecessary. H&K USP

Double action/Single action weapons are awesome. The first round the initial trigger pull cocks the weapon and fires it. The subsequent rounds are in single action because the recoil of the slide cocks the firearm. Sig Sauer P226, FNP-9

I'm not doing the best description of it, but they are very different in the way the firearm functions.

Rifles are a completely different story.

 

[SilentCom]

I hate it when people call assault rifles a machine gun. I also hate how people don't seem to understand the basic concept and safety procedures behind a gun. They are frickin weapons, don't treat them like toys!

 

[SilentCom]

Also, silencers. They are not that quite. They still sound like a freaking gun.

This is soo true. I was at a firing range with a buddy once and these two military guys were firing off a suppressed MP5. Sure, it wasn't as loud as many of the larger caliber hunting rifles that people were firing off, but you can sure hear it even from a distance.

 

[SilentCom]

One thing that's really starting to grate on me is how I've never seen an accurate depiction of a chaingun. It doesn't go "dakka-dakka-dakka" like those orks are always talking about, it sounds more like an exploding chainsaw. It's like just one loud, continuous, buzzing roar. Also, you don't spray and pray with it. Its rate of fire is so fast that you litterally cannot carry (that's why it's usually a mounted weapon, too) enough bullets to waste on spray and pray. If you just held down the trigger, you'd be out of ammo in about three seconds. When my grandpa was in the army, he said that some of their helicopters had chainguns on them, and when they loaded up the belts every fifth bullet was a tracer round. When they'd fire it, it would look like a solid line of fire. I imagine it would look pretty badass.

You mean like this:


and for fun this too:

 

[Gearran]

Clips are not the same thing as magazines. This is something that's bugged me for a while. A magazine is a mechanism that contains bullets while they await the glorious day that the pin comes down and they get to launch themselves toward their intended target. Some magazines are integral to the firearm, while others can be removed. A clip, on the other hand, is a disposable frame (typically made from stamped metal) used to assist an individual in loading bullets into a magazine. These are the things you see in all of those WWII movies/games holding five rounds in a little metal sleeve that gets shoved in the top of a M1 Garand or other rifle.

 

[KingGolem]

You mean like this:


and for fun this too:

That's it! See, doesn't that look badass?

 

[SilentCom]

Clips are not the same thing as magazines. This is something that's bugged me for a while. A magazine is a mechanism that contains bullets while they await the glorious day that the pin comes down and they get to launch themselves toward their intended target. Some magazines are integral to the firearm, while others can be removed. A clip, on the other hand, is a disposable frame (typically made from stamped metal) used to assist an individual in loading bullets into a magazine. These are the things you see in all of those WWII movies/games holding five rounds in a little metal sleeve that gets shoved in the top of a M1 Garand or other rifle.

It's funny because I didn't know the difference between magazine and clip, although I always used the term magazine because I knew it was the correct term. I guess I didn't know what exactly a clip was, but thanks to you, I now do. =D

 

[ALYKZANDYR]

When im watching movies or playing fps games i look for errors of how various firearms are described, depicted and how they are operated. I also usually point out these errors to anyone who is also watching/playing.

Most of the firearms mistakes that make me cringe at least in films, have already been posted id like add these game related ones.

many games devs do not understand how a belt fed machine gun works or are just too lazy/cheap to create the animation, but i noticed i many fps games, that after i have fired off the last of my ammo belt, there is still an ammo belt hanging from the side of my gun,and it is pulled away in the reload animation. wrong. in a select few games, you can watch the last few rounds of an Mg belt being pulled into the gun, just like in real life. Use a belt fed MG in any recent CoD or BC2 and you'll see what i mean. Hopefully the animation is correct in BF3.

another common error is the reload animations with magazine fed weapons. BC2 made lots of errors here. For example, the AK, when loading from empty, after a new magazine is inserted, the charging handle must be pulled back and released to chamber a round. this dosent happen, so in real life the weapon would not be able to fire as there is no round in the chamber. This is repeated with the G3, and most other assault rifles in that game.

A little attention to detail, and some research on how various firearms function would greatly benefit the video game and film industry and lead to more realistic representations of real weapons in games and films.