First field test of portable shooting frame
News, Guns ·Thursday September 10, 2009 @ 21:46 EDT (link)
I went shooting at SVRC today and Tuesday, using just the Glock (34). Groups are a little left of where I'm aiming, so I need to figure out what I'm doing wrong or (less likely) fix the sights.
When I went today, I was mainly going to test the portable shooting lane; the test went well, but it takes longer than I'd like to set it up (maybe 10 minutes, a bit long during a cease-fire) but I have some ideas to shorten it. Fortunately, I had the place to myself today.
I only needed one of the stands; I tied the other end of the rope to an overhead beam in the covered shooting area. I also shot the thread (used to move the target back and forth); I knew it was hanging down, but figured it was highly unlikely that I'd hit it. But it can be gotten out of the way with some minor design tweaks. It was a good first field test; gives me some ideas on what to change. The binder clips tend to come unglued from the metal hangers, too; I may try again to drill through them and screw them to the hangers. But overall the fundamentals are good.
Excuse the pictures—the light was running low, should have increased the ISO-equivalent or used a tripod.
One worry is that I or another shooter (even someone shooting extremely wildly from another lane) might shoot the frame, but it's cheap ABS pipe and can be patched with duct tape. The diagonal bar in the frame did very well to stabilize it, and I never had need to weigh down the frame.
Planned improvements:
- Drill the binder clips and attach with screws (or even ties looped around).
- Twine instead of thread, mainly because it's easier to see and manipulate.
- Instead of a loop of thread/twine, just two long lengths attached to the pulley: might be easier to move off target.
- Some sort of mechanization for moving the target back and forth.
- Some way to shorten the rope easily (without cutting it) would speed setup, with the caveat that the pulley has to pass over it.
- Bring some duct tape in case the pipes or connectors get shot!
Still a work in progress, but it was great to see it working live for the first time. Suggestions for improvement are of course welcome.
DVDs finished: Coupling: The Complete 3rd Season.
