If you shot someone’s hat, would it fly off his head like in a Clint Eastwood film? Or would the bullet just go through the hat?
Here is an extreme (and obviously impossible) example:
Mythbusters tested it. The answer was no, the bullet goes straight through. Birdshot from a shotgun did the job, but not without also hitting the hat-wearer.
http://kwc.org/mythbusters/2007/05/episode_79_western_myths_airba.html
Twice now I’ve watched Mythbusters say something was impossible and twice now I’ve watched The History Channel show someone do it and prove it to actually be possible. Once was when Mythbusters said it was impossible to split an arrow with an arrow, yet just today an episode of Modern Marvels - Sharpshooters proved that it was, in fact, possible to split an arrow in half with another arrow.
They also showed it was possible to knock someone’s hat off with a bullet. It’s also possible to shoot aspirin in mid air as well. These sharpshooters on this episode were amazing !
I concur. Mythbusters is not proof of anything to me. They use the most sketchy “science” to “prove” or “disprove” their myths.
Common sense tells me that you could knock someones hat off with a bullet. Why wouldn’t you be able to?
Inertia.
Mythbusters to the contrary, it would be easy. Selection of a high caliber, low velocity bullet and a hat made of tough material would help the process along.
The problem with splitting an arrow wasn’t so much hitting an arrow on the nock, it was getting a arrow that would split more or less evenly. Since they don’t normally make arrows of a grain that would split evenly, it was likely a trick or custom-made arrow. In oither words, it would matter how good a shot you were, normal wood arrows just don’t splt like that. Having worked an entire summer as the BSA archery Range, I can confirm the Mythbuster’s results- hit and split a little- sure, split all the way down- no way. Now, I guess one arrow in a million might have that grain.
And, when it comes to the Discovery Channel and Mythbusters vs “the Hitler Channel” and all their shows about Nostradamus, :rolleyes: I’ll take the *real science *every time.
You can shoot a hat off a head- but not without quite a bit of damage to the head. I guess if you shoot the hat from below, maybe. The problem is that the bullet just goes right thru the thin felt, it imparts almost no energy at all to the hat. If you try it at a outdoor range, you can barely get the hat to move unless you hit the ground under it and the spray of dirt and such moves the hat.
Again, if you had a trick hat or a special bullitt, maybe.
I watched the History Channel show in question, and the arrow really didn’t split the other arrow anyhow; the second fired arrow embedded itself in the first for a few inches and drove the rest of the arrow deep into the haystack backstop. Good shot, but the arrow didn’t ‘split’, maybe they should have had the first arrow driven into something more solid like a tree trunk.
(edited to clarify which show I was referring to)
The hat doesn’t offer enough resistance to the bullet. The bullet penetrates without transferring enough momentum.
Mythbusters gets a lot of things wrong, but also gets a lot of things right, and makes a good starting point. I can attest that you can’t shoot yoghurt pots off a bench with an air rifle - the pellet goes straight through. Sometimes it’ll go straight through a beer can without knocking it over. The target doesn’t have enough resistance.
Well, sure! A riot gun firing rubber batons would have a good chance against a lightweight hat, or even a paintball gun. But with a handgun or rifle, you might have to use a steel hat…
Unfortunately I can’t find any parts of that episode online. Can you describe what you saw? Were these sharpshooters professional trickshot artists?
The reason I ask is because with performance trickshots, what you see isn’t always what you get. E.g. with this “split the bullet” trickshot, I rather suspect the gun is firing a cloud of shot…
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/196528/bad_bobs_45_auto_trick_shot
And doing that (generally accidentally, not on purpose) is called doing a “Robin hood”
(even though modern arrows being tubes, they don’t split in half, but rather the incoming arrow penetrates the tube).
Gentlemen purlease!!
Of course it’s possible to split an arrow cleanly from flights to point.
Robin Hood did it, I saw it on telly so it must be true
It seems possible to shoot a cowboy hat off if you hit it near the top where all the ridges are instead of the middle where it’s just a flat piece of fabric.
No need to get so extravagant. Any ol’ .45 pistol firing a low velocity round into a leather or felt hat would do the trick.
Time for an experiment. Step ouside with me for a moment, Two and a Half Inches of Fun.
And bring your hat.
Not into a felt hat, they tried, it didn;t work. Leather might work.
spoke- can I go last with the shot gun? 
In Mythbusters, the problem they had was that the arrow that was flying through the air would wobble, as all arrows do. This prevented the arrow flying from hitting the arrow waiting in the target from being hit where it needed to be hit. Basically, missing it’s target. I don’t remember if they mentioned anything about the type of arrow, the skill level or anything. I do remember that they used one of the most skilled archers in the world to try and attempt this, but he failed. But the archer on The History Channel the other day hit it dead on and pretty much hollowed out the arrow inside the target. So obviously, mythbusters was wrong at least a little. Weird
Yes, they were sharpshooters, highly skilled I might add. Actually, just plain badass sharpshooters. lol It was a two hour episode, but I do remember a quick segment where (I think) a husband and wife team did the old “shooting a hat off the head with a pistol” act.
Yup, and again, it basically hollowed out the arrow. But in Mythbusters, the archer couldn’t even hit the other arrow at all. They claimed it was impossible because of the way the arrow wobbled when traveling midair. Then I turn on The History Channel and POOF there is another archer nailing an arrow dead center. So…who knows what to believe now, you know?
sorry for any typos…
They did. And they demonstrated that the only way they can make it work as it does in the movies (which in this case was the point - not “is it possible?”, but “is the way you see it in movies how it really happens?”*) was to have a hollow arrow in the target, made of something like bamboo, so it can go inside it, and split it evenly.
*Similar to the myth of the exploding shotgun barrel, where they were trying to emulate the specific cartoon banana-skin appearance, and not just a distorted or damaged barrel.
Kind of a meaningless myth, really. They may as well have tested if you can hover in the air if you don’t yet realise that you’ve walked off the edge of the cliff.
Nope, they made a device that would hit the other arrow exactly dead on, and they hit time after time, and it never “splt” the arrow all the way down. Sure, it’d hit and split off a bit, but it can not occur with a normal wood arrow.
http://mythbustersresults.com/episode51
"
REVISITED: An wooden arrow can be split in half through a direct hit in the tail by another arrow. (From episode 36)
re-busted
Even after multiple direct hits on a solid wood arrow with the bone nock removed, a tail-to-tip split could not be achieved. It took an arrow made of hollow bamboo to create the splitting effect seen in the movie. Because with a normal arrow, the second arrow will follow the grain, which will lead to the side before it makes it to the end. Also their tests revealed that an arrow fired from a traditional bow wobbles in the air enough that it won’t hit the end of the arrow straight."
http://mythbustersresults.com/episode36
"It is possible to split an arrow perfectly down the middle with a second arrow like in the film The Adventures of Robin Hood.
partly busted
While it is certainly possible to rear-end an arrow with another, only a fiberglass arrow can be split down the middle (known as telescoping in archery circles). With a wooden arrow, even under the most ideal conditions, the best one can do is a partial split along the grain of the wood, and even that is improbable. They clearly showed that the film’s circumstances can be recreated using a hollow shaft, such as bamboo."
http://kwc.org/mythbusters/2006/04/episode_51_myths_reopened.html
"Splitting an Arrow
Fans complained about the arrows and the bow used in the original mythbusting. Given that this was a Robin Hood myth, they revisited this myth using medieval-accurate bows and arrows. …
Initial firing
Their initial firing didn’t go so well – their medieval arrow didn’t fly very straight. They decided to go with point-blank firing instead – the tip was lined up to nock and fired. That didn’t go so well. When they fired a medieval arrow at a medieval arrow, the arrow that was fired snapped in half when it hit the nock of the target arrow. The modern arrow they fired point-blank at the target arrow also snapped in half…
Professional archer
They brought in a professional shooter, Jim Long, firing carbon fiber arrows. His first shoot split a little bit off the side of the target arrow. Many of next shots hit and deflected off the nock. After 60+ arrows, Jim was able to split the target arrow 10" down (about a third of the way down). They looked at the evidence and decided that Jim’s shot was as good as a shot could be – dead on, but still not enough for nock to tip.
Replicating the myth
They think that hollow, possibly bamboo, arrows were used in the Errol Flynn Robin Hood movie shot. To replicate how a nock-to-tip shot could be done, they replaced their target arrow with a bamboo arrow. Jim Long’s first shot split the bamboo arrow from nock to tip.
mythbusted (again)"
It’s rather more effective to shoot the cowboy out from under his hat.