22LR steel target for upcoming Boy Scout campout ...

[wquiles]

I painted all of the rusted pieces and welded areas, and I then need to give it a full coat of paint (looks much better painted!). Then need to buy two more posts to make the legs so that it can swing.

I have never done one of these before, but I "suspect" that it is way too heavy for a 22lr. We might need to put this one closer to the shooting bench, instead of on the other side of the creek. OR, this could be a great target load for a cast centerfire load

 

[wquiles]

OK, spinner target ready. Like the other targets, since we go to the same site every Dec, I design these targets so that we leave the posts in the ground, and just take the moving parts back to storage:

 

[obssd1958]

I love it!
Looks like a lot of fun - for scouts or adults!!

 

[wquiles]

OK, made it to the range, and got to test both targets today:


And today was my first time ever shooting my CZ457:



The 5x swinger (know your limit) worked great!. At the 40 yards or so, the 3x folks that tried it got 5 for 5 with my scoped CZ457 and Gemtec subsonic ammo. Not bad, although after hitting the left most target (3") I had to adjust point of impact down to hit the next 4:



The other swing target (far right) - way too heavy for 22lr, as I expected. But with my subsonic 200gr 358Win bolt action cast lead load, myself and another dad were able to get it to rotate with two shots. Definitely MUCH harder than I expected it to be, and a lot of fun!

 

[Ian]

The little black splat on the far right square made me smile.

 

[wquiles]

LOL - I hear you man!

I was both happy and surprised I was able to hit it. Having a nice, accurate bolt action 22lr is awesome!

Close-up of those last two on the right side:

 

[wquiles]

I made a "fresh" batch of of 50x rounds of those light-recoil 358 Win green cast subsonic bullets for next Saturday

 

[popper]

way too heavy for 22lr, as I expected That doesn't make any sense unless that arm weighs more than the others with BIGGER target pad! Or the pivot has more friction.

 

[wquiles]

Well, it is my first time doing one of these from just pictures in the internet. I test it during construction, and when I tested it without the pads/targets, it spinned around and it was pretty even since it has the ball bearings in place, and rotating it time and time again showed not much of a preference, which makes sense since I was "reasonably" careful with the length of the arms, additional braces, etc..

But once I welded the top/bottom pads/targets, I could tell before shooting it that it required a lot of energy to want to make it swing - hence why I said I expected not to work well with 22lr. I suspected that the large variance from top(small) to bottom(larger) plates was going to be too much for the 22lr to overcome.

Now that I have shot it with 22lr and subsonic 358Win 200gr bullets, I confirmed my expectations. I now realize (or my current theory is) that the difference in weight between the top 3" and the bottom 5.5" plates is too much for the 22lr to overcome. I feel it has to be related to the ratio of those two weights.

I do plan to build another one during 2021, and I would try to have the bottom plate be more like 25% over the weight of the top plate (so if top plate is like 1 pound, the bottom plate probably needs to be about 1.25 pounds), as I am expecting that will want to make it easier to spin around with the lower energy from a 22lr round. I have no idea if 25% is the "right" balance either - just a hunch.

 

[wquiles]

OK, campout was this weekend, and the day of shooting sports was yesterday (Sat).

We had the 3x wood benches:


Like always, I man and support the 22lr range with the other volunteer dads:


I got my laser range finder, and the steel targets that I welded on the other side of the creek are right at 30 yards:


We had a couple of open sight 22lr rifles, which of course were the ones used for any of the younger scouts working on their rifle merit badge, but for the older kids that had the merit badge (and the adults), I brought my custom 10/22 (here being shot by one of our dads):


And my new CZ457 (with F1 silencer), being shot by none other than my own son:


During the lunch break, my son also got to learn to shoot from prone for the first time:



It was definitely a great day for sure


Edit: Forgot to mention. With the scoped CZ457, even the tiny target on the 5x singer was hit "most of the time", by all who tried, so it was not enough of a challenge. Even with the scoped 10/22 it was also fairly easy (just a tad behind the CZ).

I also had a 3x spinner target, 3x equally sizes squares, about 3" accross, which we moved way back the other side of the creek up to about 50 years, and with the CZ "every" kid that tried it hit them as well.


I definitely need to work on even smaller, more challenging steel targets for next year

 

[popper]

Been trying to find one of those red stands for a long time.

 

[wquiles]

Been trying to find one of those red stands for a long time.

Oh man. Mine is so old - I don't even remember how/when I bought it, although I think it was from MidwayUSA . Come to think about it, I have not seem them for sale either - a quick search seem to indicate it has been discontinued: