What happens when a gun fires blanks?
Dear Straight Dope: Please explain what “blanks” are, as in “the gun was firing blanks,” as opposed to live bullets. Specifically, what is a blank? An empty bullet? Are the mechanics involved when firing a blank different from what’s involved when firing a live bullet? I seem to recall that a famous comedian accidentally killed himself by firing a blank into his head–he erroneously assumed that, because the gun was loaded with blanks, he would not be injured. What was it that actually killed him? — Joy Abbott First let’s define our terms. What most people call bullets are properly called cartridges, which consist of several parts: • A shell or casing of metal; • A bullet, the metal projectile that flies through the air; • A primer, a small charge that ignites when struck by the gun’s firing pin; and • Gunpowder, which is ignited by the primer, generating the rapidly expanding gases that propel the bullet down the barrel of the firearm. Two types of prop cartridges are used in movies a
