Talk:Minié ball

message: *Keep separate articles -- The Minie ball should have its own article, and not be merged with the Minie rifle article, due to the Minie ball's separate historical significance during the U.S. Civil War.  The Minie ball was widely used in .58 cal rifles that were not Minie rifles.  It would be analogous to talking about .30-30 cartridges and insisting on only focusing on Winchester's rifles and discounting subsequent use in Marlin rifles.  Many users will be interested only in the Minie ball that was used in more than the Minie rifle. There is a good reason to keep the two articles separate. Yaf 03:58, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Merge discussion comments

message: Minié rifles could not have been issued in 1846 if the rifle itself was developed only in 1849. Duly noted in the Minié rifle article. GregorB (talk) 21:44, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dubious 

message: The article discusses an objective test and then goes into what sound like wild rumors.--Jrm2007 (talk) 13:46, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Effectiveness 

message: I've added a section on the effects of the ball compared to the round ball from earlier muskets. The source is a Confederate manual of field surgery which I believe to be reliable; the discussion of the wounds is consistent with what other sources say, and the book is easily available and quite worthwhile reading. 
I compared this against the "Effectiveness" section that used to be in the article. The source I used describes a similar test: 120 shots were fired at 500 yards against a series of wooden planks one inch thick and 20 inches apart. (The kind of wood isn't given.) 63 out of 120 balls penetrated the first board, 55 the second, 32 went as far as the fifth board and one penetrated all eight one-inch planks. I didn't want to include that in the article, however. I hope the basic premise of the new "effects" section will be clear and not controversial: Minie wounds took a straight path and went all the way through, while round musket balls were deflected and often lodged in the wound. Roches (talk) 08:25, 17 March 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Effects section 

message: Is "Minié ball" really the scientifically accepted term? I mean since it's not a ball at all, maybe "Minié bullet" or "Minié projectile" might be more correct. And I'm not asking if everybody in your nearest reenactment club keeps calling it that out of habit, but for the professional nomenclature in the firearm business. In modern English I mostly see "bullet" or "round" and can't remember to ever have read "ball", when the subject is a modern projectile.
While I know that in the English language people usually give a rat's ass about what words originally meant, as a non-native speaker I sometimes find it worthwile to ask anyways.
(And yes, the German "Kugel", meaning "sphere" or "ball" is also used for modern bullets, but the average German doesn't nearly have as much knowledge about firearms as the average American, and everyone is annoyingly imprecise about weapons terms anyways.)
Personally I would make this distinction:
"I'm not loading my musket with shot, but with Minié ball" - I find acceptable, talking about the type of ammunition.
"He got hit by a Minié ball" - No. That wasn't a ball, it was a Minié bullet. Talking about the particular projectile.
--BjKa (talk) 15:01, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes it is.  A ball doesn't have to be round. The correct technical term is conical ball. It's named after one of three engineers in France who developed it.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Digitallymade (talk • contribs) 01:30, 8 February 2017 (UTC)
replies: text:  Firstly Minie bullet is not a "conical ball" (square triangle?) and secondly statement "since the conical ball had a higher muzzle velocity and greater mass" is wrong - mas is greater, but velocity usually a tad slower or at very least on par (BP usually doing just below speed of sound). It is true however that energy was much higher (because of mass) and thus damages where more severe. Statement "entire point of the minie ball was to damage the bones" is also wrong - whole idea of Minie bullet (not ball!!! it is NOT a ball!) was easier loading because it engages rifling by means of "skirt" expanding, so before loading bullet was smaller in diameter than bore and going down very easy. Ball (real ball!) by contrast was engaged in rifling by means of cloth patching and thus require considerable force (and time) to put it down to bore. It is quite difficult to start putting patched ball to bore, so special tool required to start process; Minie bullet can be easy put down by ramrod and do not require any extra tool. Cloth patch also became obsolete with Minie bullet leading to simpler supply and simplified (and speedier!) loading process. Also should be noted that Minie do require more lubrication (this what those grooves for, not for mythical "aerodynamic stability" - stability of projectile governed by spinning and this is why we need rifling) while real balls can do with cloth patch wetted with saliva, so after few shoots accuracy with Minie start to degrading comparing to real cloth patched balls due to accumulation of residual burnt from lubricant. It accumulating to extend that it became difficult to put bullet down to bore after few dozens of shots and rifle require cleaning to continue shooting. This is why Minie was only popular with military where speed of reloading was paramount, while hunters prefer real cloth patched balls up until breech loading was invented. Please correct. 220.237.0.150 (talk) 23:37, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: "There is absolutely no doubt that "minié ball" is the common name for this projectile, regardless of its shape, and I would oject strenuously to the article being moved, per WP:COMMONNAME. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:45, 31 August 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: It was more about effectiveness, speed, reasons and other stuff rather than about stupid terminology. This is why I put it under "Effectiveness" and I did not asked you to move it around - do whatever you please in article, but please leave discussion alone. Yes I know that because at that time everyone use real balls as projectiles and there was no "bullets" they incorrectly called it "ball" simply because then "ball" means "projectile". They may became "bullets", but span of life was short enough - soon after they developed bridge loading and Minie design became obsolete. Almost actually. Because very same design currently used as projectiles in pneumatic firearms (another stupid terminology) and called "pallets", not "balls". So historically they call it "balls", but currently they called "bullets" - have a look here: http://leeprecision.com/bullet-casting/black-powder-molds/black-powder-minie-bullet-molds/ . Also I have a box presented to me by someone with such bullet from Civil War (this is why I started to dig to find if they really used Minies during Civil Was - I thought that this is later design) and on the box it says "1863 Civil War Bullet found at Kennesaw Mth. Kennesaw, Georgia, U.S.A." and I can post proof photo. Personally I believe that they should call "bullets" with reference that historically upon invention they use to call them "balls". It would be stupid insisting to call helicopter "Gyroplane" on the ground that Louis Breguet call it like that and the same applies to Minie. 220.237.0.150 (talk) 03:46, 31 August 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lemma again 

message: Could an expert please state when the Minié ball stopped being used? Thanks. 109.78.173.29 (talk) 08:24, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  When did it fall out of use?