Jackson MS. Range

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atomicbrh
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Jackson MS. Range

Post by atomicbrh »

We put out the stakes for the berms and rails for Smallbore Silhouette at the Magnolia Rifle and Pistol Club in Byram, Ms. this morning. Dirt work should start within the next week. I will not start to build the rails until we see how long the berms actually turn out. The range is doing major dirt work to achieve the 100 meter Ram distance. Monthly matchs will not start until after the Southern Nationals in Winnsboro. We are planning to hold matchs the third Saturday Morning of each Month. I will have to be particular about how I build the rails because the Board that runs the range are requiring that the rail be able to withstand centerfire hits. This is why I do not have a definite start date. Unlike some ranges, our range is easy to find. Our range is located within walking distance of an exit on Interstate 55 just a few miles South of Jackson, MS. The range is also easy to reach from Highway 49 for the folks who want to come up from Woolmarket. We have a modern clubhouse with offices and large bathrrooms for ladies and men. So when we start matchs the ladies should not hestitate to participate. The club officers want me to use 3/4 inch flat bar 3 or 4 inches wide for the rails with 1 inch solid round spikes not rebar welded on the flat bar. I need everone's input on rail material. 3/4" is pretty thick. Do you think this will vibrate and turn animals?

Thanks,
Bobby R. Huddleston
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Post by sdwooster »

I don't know for sure if that will have enough weight too keep vibration down. I used rail road iron at my range. I turned it with the flat side up. I also welded 1x1 square blocks for animals to sit on. These are also full lenght rails ( 28 foot) with one support in the middle and each end. I shoot at another range that used angle iron and welded a flat bar on the top with the 1x1 blocks. Reason for the angle iron was to deflect the bullets downward. I could find out the size of material they used for you. I think it was 1/2 material and a 6x6 angle iron. They are using the double stacked setup with 10 targets per bank. This system seems to work good. I also go to another range that has the same setup but has 3 banks per setup. But they have trouble with fall offs. I don't know if its because of the height or the smaller material they used. I know they put some lead in the angle to try to help the problem. It helped a litte, but never solved the problem. Hope this helps, but if you can find some old rail road iron it works great.


Steve
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Post by nomad »

If the reason for the ability to withstand centerfire hits is because you have a bunch of the 'if it's downrange, it's a target' types in the club, why not build portable stands?

We have resettables on wheels, each with a frontal deflector plate angled to dump low misses into the dirt, a rear backstop plate angled the same way and 3 leveling points. We get very few vibration drops.

If you don't want to involve yourself with the engineering and work of adding the reset mechanism (I can put you in touch with the club member who built ours) then you can still use a similar setup with free-standing animals.

Stands that are not on the range except during matches have at least 2 large advantages -- nothing bounces off what's not there and they don't get shot up by those club members (ALL clubs have them!) who drifted out of the shallow end of the gene pool!

Setup and leveling takes a few minutes per stand.

Steve's suggestion for rr rail is good but, somehow, the guys with the .300 RUMs that never show much less than 4 minutes on paper have an uncanny ability to centerpunch smallbore stands repeatedly...and they seem to LOVE using the pads for aiming points! (This is, of course, ALWAYS done off sandbags since most of those types, if they ever actually picked a rifle up off the bench and looked through the scope, would suffer vertigo for days!)
E Kuney
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Post by sdwooster »

Ernie,

I was hoping that their was a range that the hunters took care of things. But thats probably too much to ask for. Sense I put the door lock system on things are getting better. Because now I can track the entries if I have too.

Steve
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Post by nomad »

Steve

A friend who runs a HP match near here was telling me that they had a lot of damage on the targets at their range prior to the last state championships they held and they had to replace them.
Turned out that a local GUNSMITH who was a club member and specialized in heavy, long range equipment was taking his 'clients' out and letting them see how his magnums could just blow through rams and turkeys 'all that way out there'! (Off sandbags, naturally.)

We've had our airgun target stands shot up while they were parked against the SIDE wall of the range. From the position of the holes, the shots had to have been fired from ON the range, PARALLEL to the firing line from about 25 yards down range. Since it's necessary to have an RO on site to get into the range one of our ROs had to either have witnessed this or done it! (There are 2 locks on the gate: an RO lock and a members' lock. The club members' keys don't open the RO lock -- so members who are not ROs have to wait until an RO opens up before their member key will allow access.)

Unfortunately, there are waaaaay too many people out there whose parents should not have been allowed to breed...
E Kuney
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Post by ajj »

Look into grader blade tips for rails. They're hardened and impervious to gunfire. Start with your state or county road crew maintenance stations. Sometimes they'll have a couple of hundred stacked up somewhere and be glad for you to haul them away.
I've visited Nomad's range and their setup is really nice, well worth looking into.
I read an article a few years ago by an American rifleman who had visited a range in Switzerland. There were nice trash barrels at the end of each target line downrange (to receive old target paper.) They were freshly painted and not a one had a bullet hole. The American asked how long they'd been there.
"Oh, about fifteen years, I suppose," said the Swiss host.
The American was amazed. "At our range those would be shot to pieces in two weeks."
The Swiss was dumbfounded. "But, why?"
The American didn't have an answer.
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jnyork
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Post by jnyork »

The grader blade is truely indestructable and cheap (free at the county yard) , you could weld the pads on then set another grader blade in front so the pads would be hidden. OR, make them portable and just spike them into the ground when you set up.. couple of guys can set the whole thing up in 20 minutes. They are plenty heavy, I dont think you will need to worry about vibration knocking down extra targets. Railroad track is ok but does get shot up, it is much softer steel.
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jackson range

Post by Jerry G »

Go to the scrap yard and get some railroad rail even if you stack them. Angle iron will not withstand a CF hit and the vibrations won't knock any animals down if you use rail.
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