What hoops to you jump through for a home range?

Oz · Post by Oz » Tue Jul 07, 2009 12:10 am

I've wanted to do this for a while. I've seen some great pics and heard some crazy stories about the lengths that we shooters go to in order to be able to shoot at our homes.

I thought I would kick it off. How I wound up here:

1) Needed 10 Meters
2) Wife wasn't excited about me shooting upstairs around the kids
3) Out of the way, basement made more sense for focus
4) Allowed me to keep my 'range' set up all the time

The 11.5 meter distance I had without a wall obstructing the distance was to shoot just from the inside of my home theater (home cinema for you UK types), through my 'secret' hidden door, through a hallway, through another doorway, into my work in progress office.

An overview of my home range.

Walking into the theater, your now see my shooting table first.

From behind the shooting table, looking straight forward, need to push open the first door.

Ah, there's the pellet trap. Through a hallway, another doorway.

Walking up closer to the pellet trap.

The view from behind my shooting table.

The video camera on the target. Maybe I should have shot a better target before I took the picture...

What does your home range look like?

guidolastra · Post by **guidolastra** » Sat Jul 11, 2009 7:51 am

I have the same problem. My wife. I use our finished basement, and this is what it looks like. I have a scatt system, and I also shoot live. I do not have a transport system, though, so I walk every ten shots.
Guido

JamesH · Post by **JamesH** » Sun Jul 12, 2009 5:30 am

No hoops, I have a centrefire pistol range 5 mins from my house :)
Only hoop I suppose is it has to be in daylight :) :)

Shooting Bloke · Post by **Shooting Bloke** » Sun Jul 12, 2009 8:38 am

Can't legally have a home range in my part of the world.

Pat McCoy · Post by **Pat McCoy** » Sun Jul 12, 2009 3:07 pm

When building a 36 x 40 storage building, I put a storage loft about 7.5 feet out from the long wall the entire length, and 7.5 feet up. Put in lights underneath and have 10M range. Built plywood box big enough for two AR5/10 or one and a half B40/4 side by side, lined with cardboard for target holder. Have to replace cardboard on occasion.

GaryN · Post by **GaryN** » Mon Jul 13, 2009 5:55 pm

I shoot in the crawlspace under the house.
One side is high enough to stand, but the other end is really a "crawl space." It is so low that I had to build a target carrier to get the target to/from the trap.
Only other problem is in the winter it gets COLD.

Steve N · Post by **Steve N** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 12:33 pm

I have basically the same problem as Oz. My basement is "L" shaped. However, I wasn't thinking of a shooting range at the time, so I put in a walk-in closet for out of season clothes storage, in the main basement where the leg of the L ties in. Wife won't let me put a door in the back of the closet to shoot thru, so I have to shoot thru the furnace room into my shop where my target is. Works fine, except I can't shoot prone as the water meter is in my line of sight in that position.

johnRW · Post by **johnRW** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 1:00 pm

GaryN, could you post some pictures or a more detailed description of your setup? I have exactly the same situation, shooting from a basement through what WAS a window at ground level into what is now the crawlspace under an addition. Did you fabricate a carrier, or purchase one?

JohnRW

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 3:47 pm

My airgun range is inside my 11 ft X 60 ft machine shop. The building is an old gutted ground set mobile home. Since I live out in the country I also have a 40 yard airgun out door shooting range. Looking out thru my shop's side door I can shoot from inside when it's too cold or hot to be comfortable outside.

dflast · Post by **dflast** » Thu Jul 16, 2009 12:06 am

Oz, shooting blind across a hallway seems (as my kids put it) sketchy, from a range-safety point of view.

My own setups are: Scatt in the laundry at 5 meters - for safety and domestic harmony only photons flying across the basement, and an ISSF regulation 10 meter rig at work - trap and target on the back wall of a 13 ft. x 50 ft. workshop.

David

GaryN · Post by **GaryN** » Thu Jul 16, 2009 2:17 pm

John
I built the carrier, I'm cheap and the height limitation eliminated the commercial carriers.

From the shooters position. You can see how low it is, each cinder block is 8" high. This vertical height limitation prevented me from using many of the commercial carriers.

The target carrier on the track. The track is attached to short wood pieces that are screwed into the joists.

The pully on the shooters end. It is simply a clothes line pully that I got from Ace hardware. I have since upgraded the pully with a handle on the bottom, making it easier to move the carrier by turning the handle, rather than pulling on the cord. I have a similar pully on the target end.

The shuttle. Got this from Home Depot. I think it was for a hanging door. I have a small L bracket bolted to the shuttle and that then bolts to an angled piece of aluminum running the top width of the target. The target is paper clipped to the aluminum. The cord is attached to a bolt. The bolt is adjusted so it pushes the shuttle against the edge of the track.

The track is used for drywall construction. I got it from Home Depot. It is somewhat flexible, so I have to use many vertical supports so it won't twist.

Oz · Post by Oz » Thu Jul 16, 2009 2:57 pm

GaryN wrote:John
I built the carrier, I'm cheap and the height limitation eliminated the commercial carriers.

Wow! That's impressive and it appears that you're in the lead for the most extreme setup in order to shoot at home.

How close are you to 55 inches (regulation height) from where your feet stand to the center of the target? You'd probably need a laser level or transit to really have a good idea.

Oz

Oz · Post by Oz » Thu Jul 16, 2009 3:02 pm

dflast wrote:Oz, shooting blind across a hallway seems (as my kids put it) sketchy, from a range-safety point of view.

Indeed! Luckily, the basement is only used by me. There's an occasional movie in the theater, but that's about it for anyone except myself. Additionally, I only shoot from 10:00-12:00 every night. The kids are in bed and the wife is upstairs. Although the cat does wander down range to see what's making noise inside the pellet trap...

Oz

GaryN · Post by **GaryN** » Fri Jul 17, 2009 12:57 am

Oz
Actually, I'm legal.
I measured it 2 ways.

#1 My reference was the floor joists above my head. I measured down to the target center, then I measured down to the tile floor I stand on. The difference is the target height relative to the shooting position. It turned out to be just right.

#2 I did use a laser level. I measured from the tile floor up to reg height, then I used the laser level, and the laser hit close to the the center of the target.

Given the situation, the fact that the target height turned out legal was just dumb luck. If I was taller and dug the floor of the shooting position deeper, then the target would have been too high. If I had more vertical space on the target end and used a different carrier, the target might have been too low.

Actually I think shooting indoors is even more extreme, because of the safety consideration. And drywall is a poor back stop for a pellet missing the trap :-(
The idea was the easy part, the hardest part was figuring out what I could use for the track and the target carrier and finding it. That took a lot of creative thinking and roaming the aisles at Home Depot.

izzy2 · Post by **izzy2** » Sun Jul 26, 2009 5:17 pm

Luckily my Wife and I both shoot. The target, back stop sits in the kitchen, and the shooting table sits in the hall way next to the guest bedroom. We both sit at the shooting table, so no safety issues here. Just move the target out of the kitchen when it is time for meals. Works for us, and its nice having an indoor range on rainy, windy days. Just finished 40 shots with my Izzy rifle.

Freepistol · Post by **Freepistol** » Sun Jul 26, 2009 5:51 pm

This is mine in my basement.
The duct tape on the floor is 10 meters.
I also have 50 ft. when I go through the door behind me and into the garage.
I didn't realize how messy it is until I looked at the picture!
The stack of carpet is from my daugher's dorm life at Mansfield University. The bedspread draped near the target is covering a bumper pool table. The desk in the foreground is my reloading bench.