High Powered Rifle

Any rifle that isn't a rim fire in my opinion is high powered.

The media simply uses the term to convince people that some rifles are more deadly than others.
 
Bore size, or velocity alone, does not tell you much.

IMO the best way to tell if a cartridge is 'high powered' is to look at the muzzle energy created. Then you decide how much energy you consider to be 'high powered' for the application.
I consider 0-400ft/lbs anemic
401-900ft/lbs low power
901-2500 intermediate
2500+ high powered

Don't confuse energy with killing power. You can still have fairly low energy cartridges that have impressive killing power and visa versa. A high powered cartridge, with a bullet not suited for the job could end up doing less damage than a cartridge with half the ME, and a properly chosen bullet.
 
ft/lbs???????????????????????

Come on people, it's ft·lb, it's not a division!

It's the energy transfered by applying one pound-force through one foot of displacement.
 
I have a "high-power" springer air rifle. It propels a .22 caliber projectile at 850fps. Almost as powerful as a standard .25acp. I also used to have a BB gun that held about 100 BB's, and i considered it a "high-capacity" rifle.

High Power and High Capacity are really meaningless, and purposefully distorted by TV Opinionators.
 
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less."

(To Alice, in "Through The Looking Glass".)
 
"High Power" to me means any firearm which I don't want someone to shoot at me with while wearing say a good leather jacket. Otherwise the definition means nothing.

I'm sure several hogs, cattle and a sheep that I have butchered over the years would have argued that the lowly .22 Long Rifle seemed pretty "high powered" to them for a fraction of a second.
 
"I consider 0-400ft/lbs anemic
401-900ft/lbs low power
901-2500 intermediate
2500+ high powered"

Seems like a reasonable notion for quantifying something which is subjective in conversation. :)
 
I asked "Uncle Parker" that when I was just a sprout. He told me that is was just another way of saying high velocity. He wasn't an uncle, but he was a friend of the family.
 
..classify the calibers? High, Intermediate, Low, etc.? Where do you draw the lines?
Click to expand...

High power is a nebulous term, because it can only mean something when compared to something else. A .22LR is high power compared to a BB gun.

The media generally thinks its anything centerfire, these days. Or, at least that's the way they talk.

I use the general classification system that came about during the Second World War, and refined a bit afterwards. (this is focused on military cartridges, but can be applied to sporting ammo as well, in general)

Prior to WWII, there were pistol and rifle rounds as general groups. During WWII, the "intermediate" cartridge was developed, for the Sturmgewehr.

Pistol class rounds were those in common use at the time, 9mm, .45ACP .38 Special, etc. (.357 was included) Rifle class rounds were the standard infantry rifle rounds, .30-06, .303Brit, 7.62x54R, 8mm Mauser, etc. Intermediate class rounds were anything that was more powerful than the traditional pistol class and less powerful than the rifle class.

When speaking only of civilian sporting rounds, there is a lot of ..flexibility, because of advertising claims, and general use of terms, which differ in different eras.

As one said, at one time 'high power" and "high velocity" were used virtually interchangeably. And, at one time, anything that beat black powder speeds was "high velocity".

"Express" was, at one time, a term denoting high power, conjuring up the awesome power of a speeding express train.

"Magnum", referred to the case size (bigger than standard), originally a wine industry term. Since bigger cases meant more powder, and therefore, more power, "magnum" quickly came to mean more power, as well.

All the hunting regulations about energy requirements could be used as a basis for classifying rounds, BUT, they are hunting regulations. Game Laws. Their definitions and restrictions are not based simply on what levels of power are needed for a clean kill at a given range, but also on many other factors. Including what they believe is best for the sport, and also what the overall population of hunters can use effectively, for the game hunted.

High Power in a match means whatever the match operators say it means. High Power in the media means whatever they want it to.

Don't get you information about guns, the law, medicine, love,sex, personal relationships, basic laws of physical reality, or a host of other things, off a screen alone, and you have a better chance of not being misled.
 
OP here. Some interesting responses. I don't believe there are any necessarily right or wrong answers to this question. It is more of a question of opinion or point of view. I believe it would have to be a comparison of calibers rather than labeling one as high powered. Compared to what? I suppose there would have ONE accepted standard or a set of standards to compare to to actually be able to categorize a cartridge. As far as I can tell there are no such standards, but we still have opinions.

Also, it wouldn't sound as terrible to say someone was shot with an intermediately or moderately powered rifle or a low powered low capacity handgun.
 
High Power - The Definitive non-definition.

It exists as law for air powered rifles and pistols. In some states as the legal size for hunting various animals. The rest is meaningless propaganda and re-defining to fit an agenda. Along with other words and definitions ill used in modern pop illiteracy such as clip for magazine, decimate, perSON to replace a term deemed sexist when a perfectly accurate gender non specific term is always available. Chair for Chairman or Chair woman, Helm or Helmer for Helmsman and OMG Jarhead for Marine. :D Let's see podium used instead of rostrum, desk, lectern and the grand daddy of them all a silenced revolver. Newest terms is two party system and balanced budget.

In my near 70 (YIKES) years high power was anyting larger than .22LR by customary use. But others chose larger than .22Long or the use of a center fire primer.

Explosives is easy. TNT has a value of 1.0 anything less such as dynamite is a low order or low power explosive anything above that number is high explosive.

Don't look to the military too much for help. There it's anything the General says is the meaning such as insure when they mean ensure. Berm hower depends on whom. To a non-engineer it's pile of dirt. To a ditch digger it's the bank resulting when digging said ditch or canal. to an engineer it's the space at former surface level between the excavation and the excavated material that keeps the latter from sliding back into the former. Engineers also differentiate between rocks and dirt.

When is a rifle or pistol high powered enough? When it does the job. Same as any tool.

The rest is just Hollywood BS.

Fingers (Formerly Sergeant Fingers)




I suppose now I should go post the answer to the M16 controversy.

Salutations
 
44amp, the NRA has specific rules for rifles (caliber, weight, magazines, sights, etc.) used in High Power competition disciplines that are different than Service Rifle ones. You cannot use a bolt action rifle with a scope in Service Rifle matches. But you can use a military service rifle in almost all High Power matches. People running NRA sanctioned matches have to follow NRA's rules.
 
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I'll toss a pickle in the pie:
When I hear a media moron trying to describe a centerfire rifle,they often call it "high caliber' rather than high power.
They apply it equally to a 5.56.
Its kind of like the common media term "high capacity magazine clips"

Yawn. Drama.

I think we should probably accept that among the media and the crowd they appeal to,it is fashionable and politically correct to use these inaccurate terms.
In other words,if you use the language of the gun culture,you are suspect.

To speak with ignorance implies"I'm not one of those gun people" so I'm hip.
 
Wasn't the gun Gerald Bull built for Saddam Hussein bigger than the Paris gun? At least longer if not bigger caliber? But I don't think it was ever used, other than test firings. After it failed to work, he tried to figure out how to launch satellites into low-earth orbit with these giant guns. Didn't work either - equipment was too sensitive to handle the massive acceleration.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Babylon (512 foot long barrel - that's 6,144 inches, or the length of 280 standard 22" rifle barrels, and it's almost 5 times the length of the Paris gun).

Although .... had the Israelis not assassinated Bull, who knows what he might have done.

Oh, and don't forget that the Browning "Hi-Power" is chambered in the behemoth known as 9mm luger... confused yet? Clearly, there isn't any right, wrong, or standard definition. "Magnum" is similar.... just arbitrary really.
 
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Yes, its all rather arbitrary, but certain standards have become the accepted norm, being generally accurate when used by shooters and wildly inaccurate when used in the press and video media.

The Browning Hi-Power is a "hi-power" not because of its cartridge, but because of its capacity. In an era when auto pistols held 7 or 8 in the magazine, 13 was hi-power. High firepower.

"Magnum" is also arbitrary, and really only means the case is "bigger than standard" for the caliber. How much bigger, and what the standard is varies a lot, depending on the caliber being looked at, and the time era of comparison.
 
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