American Airguns Blog
Monday, August 15, 2005
Fun Targets
Most of the shooting I do is in the back yard shooting at stuff that I put on a target holder that I made a few years ago (man I love my welder!). The target holder is about 3feet wide and 2 1/2 feet tall and sits out at 50 yards from my back door. It has room for 2 sheets of paper targets and four spinners. The rest of the target holder is horizontal space for setting targets on. When I say targets, this is the funs stuff to shoot at. Shooting stuff the reacts when you hit is way more fun for me than just shooting paper. I guess that is why I like Silhouette and Field Target so much. Something happens when you shoot. I have shot at a lot of different targets over the years. Spinners are always fun as are field targets. I think my favorite though are things that when shot, fly off the target stand. It is a bit of a pain to reset them but with all the space I have on my target stand I don't have to do that often.
One of the simplest targets is just angle iron cut into square sizes. I have 2" and 1 1/2" for my standing shots and some really thick 1" for sitting. I cut some of the 1" iron to 1/2" wide just to make it a bit harder. They are tough to hit too. There is a machine shop in the facility where I work and I find a lot of scrap metal there and cut it up for targets. I use square tubing for targets as well, in fact, just about any chunk of steel can be used as a target. I even have some old nuts from a rather large bolt that I set out as a target. Any scrap yard or welding house are good places to find scrap metal.
I used to collect my shotgun shell hull thinking that one day I might reload them. Well, I never did but I still use them but as targets instead of reloading. They are really neat since they are just a tad under 1" in diameter and when you hit the brass end it makes a really neat sound that is very satisfying as it flies off the target stand. Along a similar vein, I like to shoot at .45 and 9mm pistol cases. They are really tough shooting at 50 yards but very rewarding when I hit them, especially in the wind. It doesn't take much of a hit to knock them off the stand though.
I like shooting at round targets like the shotgun shells but they fly all over the place, so I decided try shooting larger size bolts. They work great since they are heavy and give a nice thwap sound when hit. I get the 1/2" and 5/8" bolts in 1 1/2 in lengths so that the heads give a nice size target to aim at.
Other things that are fun to shoot at are paintballs, aspirin, antacid tablets, plastic figurines, fun meal toys (they don't last long), and bell targets. Probably my favorite targets over the years were some die cast metal military type figurines. They were about 2" tall and came in various poses. It was while playing sniper shooting at the bad guys that I really developed my shooting skills. They were really fun since being metal they weren't damaged by the pellet strike and I could use them over and over again. Some did break over the years of use and some were lost or stolen so now I don't have any of them anymore. I think I may have found some on-line though so I may try to buy a set of them again. It really doesn't matter what I shoot at though, the reaction targets really make shooting fun.
One of the simplest targets is just angle iron cut into square sizes. I have 2" and 1 1/2" for my standing shots and some really thick 1" for sitting. I cut some of the 1" iron to 1/2" wide just to make it a bit harder. They are tough to hit too. There is a machine shop in the facility where I work and I find a lot of scrap metal there and cut it up for targets. I use square tubing for targets as well, in fact, just about any chunk of steel can be used as a target. I even have some old nuts from a rather large bolt that I set out as a target. Any scrap yard or welding house are good places to find scrap metal.
I used to collect my shotgun shell hull thinking that one day I might reload them. Well, I never did but I still use them but as targets instead of reloading. They are really neat since they are just a tad under 1" in diameter and when you hit the brass end it makes a really neat sound that is very satisfying as it flies off the target stand. Along a similar vein, I like to shoot at .45 and 9mm pistol cases. They are really tough shooting at 50 yards but very rewarding when I hit them, especially in the wind. It doesn't take much of a hit to knock them off the stand though.
I like shooting at round targets like the shotgun shells but they fly all over the place, so I decided try shooting larger size bolts. They work great since they are heavy and give a nice thwap sound when hit. I get the 1/2" and 5/8" bolts in 1 1/2 in lengths so that the heads give a nice size target to aim at.
Other things that are fun to shoot at are paintballs, aspirin, antacid tablets, plastic figurines, fun meal toys (they don't last long), and bell targets. Probably my favorite targets over the years were some die cast metal military type figurines. They were about 2" tall and came in various poses. It was while playing sniper shooting at the bad guys that I really developed my shooting skills. They were really fun since being metal they weren't damaged by the pellet strike and I could use them over and over again. Some did break over the years of use and some were lost or stolen so now I don't have any of them anymore. I think I may have found some on-line though so I may try to buy a set of them again. It really doesn't matter what I shoot at though, the reaction targets really make shooting fun.
