Quote Originally Posted by Frog View Post
We were working out the time the pellet was in the air from the reported pellet drop i.e. Time = the square root of twice the distance of fall over g .

Fall reported as 32 feet. Therefore: twice 34 =64 divided by g (32ft/sec/sec) = 2 -> square root of 2 = 1.41seconds flight time - simples!

The error of course is the pellet was not fired at 0 degrees elevation... However given we did not know the power of the rifle a reasonable estimate.
I'm not criticising your maths when you calculate the time an item might drop 32ft under normal conditions, my point is that it doesn't take into account the projectile speed to the target. If I was to shoot the same rifle and pellet at a target 64ft lower than the firing point yet half the distance I would expect the pellet to take half the time and I wouldn't be using gravity to calculate the time taken for the pellet to get there. Of course, as you say if there is a significant difference in height there would be some inclination of the rifle barrel and therefore normal gravity calculations aren't entirely relevant.
Forgive me if I am missing your point but I still feel it is distance and pellet velocity that are the main factors in calculating travel time and perhaps as you say it has turned out to be a reasonable estimate this time.
Jim