bullet

A part of a firearm cartridge, the projectile. Bullets are shaped or composed differently for a variety of purposes.

1. Round-nose (RN) - The end of the bullet is blunted, round, allowing it to penetrate solid objects farther than other types of bullets. The most common type of bullet, usually utilized in target shooting.
2. Hollow-point (HP) - The point of the bullet is hollowed out, which creates a mushrooming effect when a target is struck, causing more damage.
3. Pre-Fragmented - made up of many smaller pellets compressed into a single full-sized bullet, some are constructed like a shotgun shell, other simply break up into small pieces upon impact. Designed to disintegrate on impact with a solid object. They were designed to prevent a bullet from passing through a wall and injuring somebody on the other side. They have the least penetration ability and are only used for training or for specific tactical considerations.
4. Jacketed - The soft lead is surrounded by another metal, usually copper, that allows the bullet to penetrate a target more easily. Subdivided into:
   1. Full Metal Jacket (FMJ) - the lead core is completely enclosed in the copper jacket. The only type of bullet permissible in warfare.
   2. Jacketed Hollow Point (JHP) - The top of the bullet has an opening in the jacket, exposing a hollow lead core. On the force of impact, the bullet is forced to open up and expand, resulting in less penetration but greater damage due to the larger diameter of the now expanded bullet.
   3. Bonded Hollow Point (BHP) - Same as the JHP, but the metal jacket has been chemically bonded to the lead core to ensure that the jacket cannot separate from it on impact. This is desirable for when a bullet may need to penetrate glass or thin metal and still remain intact.
   4. Jacketed Flat Point (JFP) - similar to the wadcutter (see below), but jacketed.
   5. Total Metal Jacket (TMJ) - Same as the FMJ, however, unlike the FMJ where the metal jacket encloses the whole bullet except the base, the TMJ bullet's base is also enclosed by the jacket. Used for target shooting and at indoor ranges.

Wadcutter - usually a cylindrical projectile composed completely of lead, the front of the bullet is flattened for use in target shooting, allowing it to cut neat and accurate wads out of the target for easier scoring.

A BBS system with a talker written at UCL circa 1987 by Whalemeat and Roadrunner.

Bullet was one of the main centrepoints of the JANet online community before the Internet reached the UK.

The original system ran under OS4000 on Euclid - the central server at UCL, but was later ported to unix. Several other Bullet-based boards sprung up, the most notable of which was probably Olajier, a publicly-accessible Bullet which ran at the Imperial College Electrical Engineering department.

One publically-accessible Bullet system still exists. Telnet or ssh to euclid.earth.ox.ac.uk and login as guest with no password.

Bullet is also a character that looks like filled circle and varients thereupon.

As of version 3.2, the Unicode standard has 13 semantically distinct varients of the bullet. They are enumerated below, separated by code block.

The columns below should be interpreted as :

1. The Unicode code for the character
2. The character in question
3. The Unicode name for the character
4. The HTML entity if any. (&#xUUUU; always works)

 

General Punctuation

U+2022  •  bullet •
U+2023  ‣  triangular bullet
U+2043  ⁃  hyphen bullet
U+204c  ⁌  black leftwards bullet
U+204d  ⁍  black rightwards bullet

 

Mathematical Operators

U+2219  ∙  bullet operator

 

Geometric Shapes

U+25d8  ◘  inverse bullet
U+25e6  ◦  white bullet

 

Miscellaneous Symbols

U+2619  ☙  reversed rotated floral heart bullet

 

Dingbats

U+2765  ❥  rotated heavy black heart bullet
U+2767  ❧  rotated floral heart bullet

 

Miscellaneous Mathematical Symbols-B

U+29be  ⦾  circled white bullet
U+29bf  ⦿  circled bullet

Slang: One year in prison.

Frequent viewers of cop shows like NYPD Blue or Law & Order will no doubt have heard this term used in context. For instance, Detective Lennie Briscoe might say after eliminating a potential suspect: "It can't be him, he's doing a bullet at Rikers."

Sources are silent on the origin of the term, since it isn't obvious how a year might be likened to a "bullet." Especially when you consider that a real bullet can earn its owner a great deal more than a year in prison, depending on what it hits.

---

Sources: www.convictsandcops.com, dictionary.prisonwall.org.

Actually, the jacketed flat point that is referred to above is quite different from a wadcutter. It is basically a FMJ round but does not have a ball profile.

More properly called a jacketed truncated cone bullet, it is shaped like a truncated cone. Duh.

Although most pistol rounds can be loaded with a TC bullet it is most commonly found on .40 Smith & Wesson FMJ factory loads. The flat point (oxymoron?) creates a bigger permanent crush cavity and permanently damages more soft tissue than a round "ball" profile FMJ. .22 lr rounds also uses TC bullets, the Remington Viper for one.

Not to make fun of getting shot but just to compare, a hit from a TC bullet will sound like "THUBB!" while a ball will easily part soft tissue and go through and through and would be more appropriately onomatopeaiaized as "BLOOP!"

Bul"let (?), n. [F. boulet, dim. of boule ball. See Bull an edict, and cf. Boulet.]

1.

A small ball.

2.

A missile, usually of lead, and round or elongated in form, to be discharged from a rifle, musket, pistol, or other small firearm.

3.

A cannon ball.

[Obs.]

A ship before Greenwich . . . shot off her ordnance, one piece being charged with a bullet of stone. Stow.

4.

The fetlock of a horse.

[See Illust. under Horse.]

 

© Webster 1913.