Plinking targets..beyond paper and cans. Pics of what you shoot.

Used shotgun shells off a fence rail when Im at the farm. Its fun and a challenge when you start adding distance, especially using iron sights.
 
The target on the right is a store bought knock-down field target for air rifles. On the left is one of my own making,,, LOL. Built out of 1/4 inch plate it is sturdy enough for rimfire. "Nasty Boy", as I call him is a favorite of my grandsons. After a new coat of paint (the beginning of every summer) they compete to see who is the first one to miss the target and put a pimple on his ass. Boys will be boys!

 
I know we're not supposed to shoot glass, but I have the perfect clean up place. An old garbage pit at dads farm.

I lay an old coral plank across the hole and set the little empty nail polish bottles on it. I have three daughters so have a decent supply, and if you look at garage sales or even the dollar store they're pretty cheep targets. All the glass goes in the pit where it would have gone anyway.

Some of those little bottles are very thick and surprisingly tough!

I also have some gopher I cut out of 3/8ths plate I'll take some pics of. The kids (and me of course) love that "clang"!
 
Hockey pucks can take a few rounds of 22lr. Stand them on their sides and shoot or screw a couple of eyelets on the sides and hang them with a piece of string from backstop, branches etc.
 
I also use to shoot bowling pins. Hang them from their necks with string and tie it off over head. They can take alot of 9mm rounds before they start to come apart. I just walked into a bowling range and then walked out with a dozen! They are pretty good at giving them away, when they are no longer any good.
 
JR Hartman said:
been thinking about making myself something along these lines.

how do the chains hold up? is there a better option?

do you need a special steel? 5.56 and 8mm mauser are my concerns.
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I shoot "AR500" steel plates....(google it) I hit it with 556 55gr. FMJ, and also 308 150 FMJ. No dimples at all!
I also run rope through the holes instead of chains. Cheaper and easier to replace.
 
Old potatoes are lots of fun and they blow up really good. There is potato in a fifteen foot radius circle afterwords.
 
Apples, oranges mostly. They are relatively cheap for a bag of either and make a decent lol show for ya when ya hit them. Also going to any fresh produce store and asking if they have any old or "overripe" stock can sometimes yield free targets. Personally I like using things that will break down, this not leaving glass or debris or TV's or papers or pop cans or paint cans or anything like that that I see littered around when I go shooting in the bush.
 
As a young man I would shoot just about any inanimate object at the old gravel "shooting" pit back in the 80's ie. dishes, t.v.'s 'they explode good', clay pigeons, children,s toys etc. etc. (as it was were the local Hwy.'s dept. dumped road kills, they allowed the mess of everyone leaving the old targets behind 'until the late 90's anyway' and just bulldozed it all a couple times a year). Then even these items became a little boring and I switched to full pop cans, propane tanks (just 1 litre used ones with a little fuel left inside) and aerosol paint cans etc., even shot a girlfriends clock radio and put it back beside her bed without telling her (quite the reaction LOL). Then sometime in the 90's I became politically correct (to a point LOL) and started using bio-degradeable items especially if shooting in the wilderness (no mess to clean up). Egg's, oranges, apples, pumpkins 'which .22LR is not enough to blow up unfortunately' and that's were I'm at to this day when not at the range.
Good thread btw with many quality home made metal targets. Curious if anyone has made a target that traps the expelled round (even from centerfire?) I have a store bought one designed for .177 pellet rifle, 'even has a channel to slide targets in/out of' and it captures the pellet.

Safe shooting all and luck getting Zeroed In
 
Usually just heavy steel plate hanging from chains. We have all different sizes, so they make differnt 'dings', and we like to hit them in certain orders a pretend it's a song composition. Someone else mentioned hockey pucks, I have dengled those for shooting as well, a quick coat of a flourescent colour in a spray bomb makes them good to shoot, but it's not long before chunks of vulcanized rubber are all over the place.

In the winter, we'll just set up chunks of ice from the lake, or well-packed snowballs. Free, unlimited, and they smack apart dramatically when hit too. Lots of labour involved, but you can build a snowman and have some fun with that. We put together a big one once (over 5'), soaked it down and let it freeze solid overnight, and then shot at it from REALLY far (did not measure, but I would guess between 500 - 600). That was fun, but a lot of work to get set up.
 
In my youth, GI Joes were the best thing to shoot. If you were fortunet enough you might get 2 shots out of one figure, little did I know they would be worth a fair amount of money today so I guess in hindsight they weren't "cheap" targets. I do like shaking up cheap Big 8/ President's Choice pop cans, they can be dramatic if they hold pressure long enough for you to shoot them. After enough flats have been destroyed turn the cans in to fund more targets.
 
Some gongs we shoot
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From here.


Some targets and stands I made for a rimfire shoot I have ran a few times.


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