calibration of poppers - what a load of *%^%$

Calibration materials

Thanks Clint.

I still don't understand how it was allowed in the context of

3. Once the supply of ammunition and the designated handguns have been tested and approved by the Range
Master, they are not subject to challenge by competitors.​

but since they were not in compliance with

2. Prior to commencement of a match, the calibration ammunition must be chronographed using the procedure
specified in Rule 5.6.2. The calibration ammunition, when tested through each designated handgun, must
achieve a 125 power factor (variance +/- 5%) to qualify.​

it seems like your approach gave the best outcome under the circumstances.

Clearly the popper situation needs some work - lots of good suggestions here, for rulemaking bodies (medium to long term) and match organizers and officials.

Snapshot
 
Gee. This brings up some intersting things from this weekend's match. I noticed many of the poppers were beat to concave, and some were blown down by wind, or conversely, did not fall after a hit. I did not know anything about challenging calibration or what not, but I did remember someone from the US telling me that in three gun, or some other discipline involving steel, most shoot .45's because they will knock down poppers if hit anywhere, while .40's tend to only reliably knock down poppers if hit in the top circle. I did not even know that they were supposed to be designed to fall only when hit in the top circle. Hmmmm.

This weekend I had a different problem with steel. It involved a small steel plate on a railroad tie. On the second half of a stage, the targets from the last round with strong hand were tipped back. The leg from the steel frame ended up being in front of the plate in my line of fire. I was shooting at the plate but dancing to the right and I hit the leg of the frame at least twice. I also didn't know about the 3 second average, so I shot two mags at it, finally knocked it down, then moved to the other side and knocked down the other plate on the first shot. Doh!

The leg was hammered up bad. It was video taped and you can hear clangs on several shots. I think I glanced the leg several times. Could I have asked for a reshoot on that??

Anyway, it's interesting to hear about all the rules and such. I'm digesting them as quickly as possible. Thanks all. :)
 
Riflman said:
Gee. This brings up some intersting things from this weekend's match. I noticed many of the poppers were beat to concave, and some were blown down by wind, or conversely, did not fall after a hit. I did not know anything about challenging calibration or what not, but I did remember someone from the US telling me that in three gun, or some other discipline involving steel, most shoot .45's because they will knock down poppers if hit anywhere, while .40's tend to only reliably knock down poppers if hit in the top circle. I did not even know that they were supposed to be designed to fall only when hit in the top circle. Hmmmm.

This weekend I had a different problem with steel. It involved a small steel plate on a railroad tie. On the second half of a stage, the targets from the last round with strong hand were tipped back. The leg from the steel frame ended up being in front of the plate in my line of fire. I was shooting at the plate but dancing to the right and I hit the leg of the frame at least twice. I also didn't know about the 3 second average, so I shot two mags at it, finally knocked it down, then moved to the other side and knocked down the other plate on the first shot. Doh!

The leg was hammered up bad. It was video taped and you can hear clangs on several shots. I think I glanced the leg several times. Could I have asked for a reshoot on that??

Anyway, it's interesting to hear about all the rules and such. I'm digesting them as quickly as possible. Thanks all. :)
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poppers that bend that easily should not be used, however, budget has to be taken into consideration. At the least the Match Director should make sure the metal is going to go down with a 125 PF bullet.
 
Substandard Poppers??

maurice said:
poppers that bend that easily should not be used, however, budget has to be taken into consideration. At the least the Match Director should make sure the metal is going to go down with a 125 PF bullet.
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Sorry Maurice, but I don't agree. A club's budget has no business being a part of the manufacturing process of "legal" targets for a given shooting sport. If the club hosting the event can't afford to build the proper targets for a given event, then either borrow the money, or borrow the poppers.

A club shouldn't be building sub-standard poppers because they don't have the money to buy proper steel.
 
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Matchlock said:
Sorry Maurice, but I don't agree. A club's budget has no business being a part of the manufacturing process of "legal" targets for a given shooting sport. If the club hosting the event can't afford to build the proper targets for a given event, then either borrow the money, or borrow the poppers.

A club shouldn't be building sub-standard poppers because they don't have the money to buy proper steel.
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Don't be sorry; I don't think they should be used either. BUT, everyone has a budget, and good intentions. Metal that bends frequently (ie: every few hits/falls), should not be used.
 
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maurice said:
Don't be sorry; I don't think they should be used either. BUT, everyone has a budget, and good intentions. Metal that bends frequently (ie: every few hits/falls), should not be used.
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Cheap steel for poppers is a false economy. The club may pay less for the steel thet gets pock marked and concave, but in the end - they'll pay far more when someone goes to the hospital with a deep riccochet wound.
 
Freedom Ventures said:
Cheap steel for poppers is a false economy. The club may pay less for the steel thet gets pock marked and concave, but in the end - they'll pay far more when someone goes to the hospital with a deep riccochet wound.
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...and more again to replace the poppers with what they should have used in the first place...
 
...it should also be noted that regarding the Nats...with 51 poppers in total...having one or two that caused a bit of a headache...isn't all that bad

For mechanical devices...it's actually pretty good...
 
If a club can't afford properly constructed poppers then they can still have very creative matches with paper until they get some bucks behind them. We wouldn't stand for an unsafe gun on the range, and we shouldn't stand for unsafe steel either. We all have way too much to loose in the event of a preventable accident.
 
I know that the beauty of steels is that they fall down (and can activate other stuff) but I remember hearing that some places once used paper targets cut into the shape of pepper poppers.
 
Riflman said:
This weekend I had a different problem with steel. It involved a small steel plate on a railroad tie. On the second half of a stage, the targets from the last round with strong hand were tipped back. The leg from the steel frame ended up being in front of the plate in my line of fire. I was shooting at the plate but dancing to the right and I hit the leg of the frame at least twice. I also didn't know about the 3 second average, so I shot two mags at it, finally knocked it down, then moved to the other side and knocked down the other plate on the first shot. Doh!

The leg was hammered up bad. It was video taped and you can hear clangs on several shots. I think I glanced the leg several times. Could I have asked for a reshoot on that??
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Put it like this ... It can never hurt to ask for a reshoot if you think that the stage has presented you with a challenge / problem that was not equally displayed / presented to the other shooters. Was the leg of this stand in the way for everyone? Was the stage reset incorrectly? If either of these are true then you may be able to argue your case to the CRO or RM and get a reshoot. If not chances are you are out of luck for two reasons: 1: Plates are not subject to calibration, 2: even if there was a question as to the plate being set incorrectly, you loose all rights to test that idea once you knock it down.

Team Darkside.
 
Quigley

I can not speak for anybody else's Range but Range # 6 had more popper problem in Nationals then I have experienced in 13 yrs of Holding a timer combined. Reshoots per squad where about two and 3, break downs ugh who knows. Almost all of it was the result of the bracket on the back of the steel. Last few shooters ports where coming apart. Your one or two concept is not accurate.
 
I worked on the "Y" stage. I was in charge of resetting it. It was bending all day. Lots of problems with that metal. SLavex won his calibration on it.
 
Team Darkside said:
Put it like this ... It can never hurt to ask for a reshoot if you think that the stage has presented you with a challenge / problem that was not equally displayed / presented to the other shooters. Was the leg of this stand in the way for everyone? Was the stage reset incorrectly? If either of these are true then you may be able to argue your case to the CRO or RM and get a reshoot. If not chances are you are out of luck for two reasons: 1: Plates are not subject to calibration, 2: even if there was a question as to the plate being set incorrectly, you loose all rights to test that idea once you knock it down.

Team Darkside.
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The stage was at our local provincials (level III) and was actually two stages that were run one after the other from the same shooting box. The targets from the first stage were shot, scored, taped, then tipped back for the second stage. Then you immediastely shot that stage. Once that stage was done, the targets were tipped back up and placed on the red outlines for the feet painted on the gravel. While they were placed up the same for each, they were not tipped back the same way each time. In other words if tipped back and right, the legs would swing left on partially obscure the plate. The leg was definitely in my way when I leaned around the hard cover. I may have been able to back up to get a better angle to avoid the leg, but in the heat of the moment I just kept shooting. It was purely inexperience, as I should have moved on after the third shot or first mag change, then asked for a reshoot. Lesson learned. I also had never Chronied my loads and ended up shooting minor. There were only three people in D class. One DQ'd and the other was my girlfriend (same loads so also minior), so we both won a trophy. :) We plan to beef up and test our loads and get more serious now. We learned a ton of stuff at this match.
 
I have noticed that when I hit poppers with factory 115 there seems to be this 1-2 second pause before they drop...where as with the heavier stuff they go down much faster. Occasionaly I have put a second round into them, when in reality they were probably gonna fall anyways.

I like poppers. Perhaps we should switch over to consumable poppers that perhaps explode.. that would leave no doubt:)
 
I think my squad was the only one that had no problems on your range Enshooter, other than I couldn't hit #### that is.

if you find that 115gr bullets don't knock the steel down fast enough, or sure enough, move up in weight, or not, that's the beauty of PF's you can play around with what you can shoot well.
 
hungrybeagle said:
I know that the beauty of steels is that they fall down (and can activate other stuff) but I remember hearing that some places once used paper targets cut into the shape of pepper poppers.
Click to expand...

They were in the Canadian Natinals back about 8 or 9 years ago in Edmonton. Rick C. was the match Director at the time
 
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