Range noise abatement experiment

[Ian]

In an effort to be a "good neighbor" to all the city folk who keep moving out here to the country, particularly right up to my property lines on two sides, I've all but quit shooting rifles and loud handguns on my own land. I have a little pistol range with a 50-yard backstop for rifle testing in a secluded canyon, but the noise reverberates quite a bit though the valleys and in the past has resulted in more than one visit from the Sheriff's dept. who were investigating complaints. I've been meaning to try to build some sort of sound attenuator to relieve the bulk of the "boom", which seems to be the most offensive noise to the several neighbors that I've asked. After spending a lot of time prowling on the internet for ideas and mulling this over for a year or two, I came up with a simple barrel full of old tires with a wood baffle somewhere in the middle. I had everything on hand to put it together, so last weekend I did. Here are a couple of photos:

The innards....


Yep, 50 yard berm is a little up-hill.....


This gave a lot of blast and noise back through the shooter's end, even with a .22 rimfire rifle, so I installed pieces of thick mud flap on the inside of both ends and cut smaller slots, about 1" x 4" tall, which was a substantial improvement. The only other thing I tried was my M1A, with the barrel inserted almost to the gas block, and the system works pretty well to muffle the "boom" down to just a mild "thump" inside the barrel. The middle tire is a very snug fit in an effort to cut down on ringing and barrel vibrations for the comfort of the shooter, that part being a success.

I'm not going to call it a success over-all, though, as the bullet flight noise itself is quite substantial, in addition to the supersonic crack. They system isn't as quiet as a good .308 suppressor, but it's really close, and being immobile and unattached to the gun, isn't subject to NFA restrictions.

I wouldn't really recommend this for most people, if you're getting complaints from shooting rifles where you are, I think a shooting tunnel with good ventilation and a muffled vent exhaust on the trap end is going to be about the only option...or suppressed subsonics, which is the direction I'm taking. I just hate the look of a suppressor on a nice lever gun.

 

[Brad]

Looks nice. Just getting the loud boom down helps but that supersonic crack can be pretty loud. Pull targets in the pits at 600 some time and you realize how loud it is.

 

[Ian]

I really don't have a lot of experience downrange of the firing line, I try to avoid being shot at as much as I possibly can! This is all pretty new to me having only really read about how to go about noise abatement from my local range's NRA range-building guides and some military small-arms tests. From what I gather, the "up" direction is of no concern, it's primarily the sides and downrange where walls, berms, trenches, or baffles need to be constructed, and really they need to go all the way to the target berm, though a shooting shed with damping panels on the side walls is a pretty good solution using minimal resources. At the cost of zero dollars and a few hours of labor it was well worth it to at least try the emplaced suppressor idea.

 

[freebullet]

That's just ridiculous that they'd send the sheriff out there.

Planting some tree or bush lines would help. Two or three row of fast growing somethings would make a big impact in just a couple years.

A friend years ago made a sound absorbing hut around his bench area. Almost like a large deer blind lined inside with padding and carpet. It was a nice set up as you shot from inside and it dampened the blast considerably. Keep it clean and dry by having screen windows with over hangs. His only complaint was lighting and he wound up put a little solar light in it.

Ps line all metal in the can for even better results.

 

[Winelover]

Come on over to Arkansas and make all the music you want. Deputy sheriff lives three properties over from me and the only time I met him was when I inadvertently set my "panic" house alarm off. Damn, key fob!

 

[Ian]

I'm shooting up a natural valley over 80 feet deep and densely lined with trees, the wind is also usually in my favor to carry any noise in an unpopulated direction (I also get all the noise from the populated are, and smoke from burning trash, it's lovely). I've done all I can, I'll just have to see how it goes.

 

[Josh]

If that doesn't work I suggest loading up some heavy 358 Winchester loads and flippin the bird...

 

[Bret4207]

I used to have a local guy, the "perpetually indignant" type, that would call in a complaint every time his neighbor would do a little shooting with his kids. Mind you the houses were 3/4 mile apart and the range was over a hill from the residence at that. Absolutely no violation of law in any way. After the 3rd time he told plainly that next time he'd be arrested for harassment. End of story.

 

[KHornet]

Years ago, I met a guy who had a private 50 yd range. He had a covered bench shend that he said that extended about 10-12 feet over the front of his bench. He said he lined the walls and the overhead with inverted cardboard egg cartons. Said he had no complaints from neighbors who lived less than a quarter mile away. Never got to see his set up, but it sounded like it might be a noise cutter. This was in south central Pa, near the Maryland border.

 

[Pistolero]

I like your idea. I would suggest not worrying about the supersonic crack. After using a
suppressor for a while, I have found that the crack, as a low energy line source doesn't seem
to propogate well and is not directional - i.e. hard to tell what direction it came from - even
on an open rifle range and only 100 yds away. Trees will just eat that kind of noise up.

I suspect that your baffle system will keep your neighbors happy. I will be setting up a
range on my country property soon and have been considering what to do along these
lines. I was thinking of bolting tires together, cheap, soft and just look like sound
catchers. In the end, I won't get too elaborate since I can hear guys shooting around me
from all directions on a regular basis. Somebody has a full auto, too.

Probably will shoot handguns without much worry about noise, but rifles will be often
tested from the bench, so having a baffle system becomes more convenient.

Years ago, shooting a 6.5 Carcano carbine with original Italian milsurp ammo near a lake
in Fla would make an AMAZING muzzle flash and boom. I would hear from neighbors from
a mile away across the lake (sound seems to travel exceptionally well over water) "You
guys were shooting that loud-mouthed Eye-talian rifle the other day, weren't you?" with
a grin. Good to have understanding neighbors.

 

[Paden]

I've long considered building a rack to hold a tube of tires about three times as long as the barrel design depicted, but without the barrels....with a sound dampened shooting shack stuck on one end. Am thinking a design like that could be tuned to produce not much more than a dull thud...

 

[Ian]

A two-room shack with a shooting room and a chronograph house/dampened expansion chamber and a long row of tires outside of that was what I was considering building if this had worked better. Subsonic .45 Colt shot through the tunnel with a break-action carbine does indeed make just a dull thump, much more quiet than the bullet whacking the dirt berm when listening from an equal distance to the side from each. A supersonic .22LR from a rifle isn't muffled at all, the sound is mostly crack anyway. I'd say for subsonics it works wonderfully just as is, could probably be even smaller, but that's only half the problem for supersonics unless you control the sound all the way to the backstop, i.e. tunnel.

I've been using the barrel a lot recently to quiet my M1A with some reasonably warm cast bullet loads and the noise beyond my property (over 250 yards to the next house, over a wooded hill) has proven acceptable, so Bill was right above even though the bullet flight noise and supersonic crack is still ear-ringing loud from the perspective of my shooting bench if not wearing hearing protection.

One other disadvantage of the barrel is it fills with smoke and takes a while to clear out if there's no breeze. Even a slight breeze will clear it in a few seconds, though. So far, no mirage, but the barrel is under the shade of a large evergreen Juniper and out of the direct sunlight in the afternoon.

 

[smokeywolf]

I'm kind of figuring that when we move, because we will certainly end up on less than a quarter-section of property, I'll be building a shooting shack. Hopefully, I'll have neighbors like Winelover, Rick, Ian, Ben or any of you kind gentlemen.

While working for Sony I designed a video & sound editing room. Sound editing rooms require design elements and characteristics that not only reduce the escape of noise, but also attenuate echo (known as clap-back) inside. Hopefully I can try some of those elements in a shooting shack.

 

[Tom]

About 25 years ago, I read an article about a sound deadening setup a guy built in his hay loft shooting room. He built a square tube with baffles that angled towards him out of plywood to shoot through. He put fiberglass insulation between the baffles and held it in place with chicken fence, I think.
Maybe a little insulation tucked into the tires might help? He did mention the possibility of unburnt powder accumumilating and maybe catching fire.

 

[KHornet]

I seem to recall someone with some kind of baffle system a number of years back having a flash fire from accumulation of unburnt powder. Seems like it was tire baffles, and it was just a falsh fire only that did not ignite anything else, but it scared him pretty badly.

 

[Ian]

I've read about the flash fires too, it seems that some guys recommend drilling a drain hole in the bottom of each tire and flushing out the unburned powder periodically. Even factory ammunition ejects a lot of unburned powder, indoor ranges accumulate a lot of it too. I'll probably pull the lid on mine every once in a while and flash out the unburned powder with some ether and a match.

 

[KHornet]

Probably a real good idea~