Need ideas on how to hang steel targets.

[1KPerDay]

I bought about a dozen AR500 plates from the forum group buy a while ago.

I'm working on stands now to hang them from. But what to hang them with? All plates have a single hole drilled in them. I'm intending to use these for handgun targets at 15-25 yards. What material would:

1. not contribute to splashback/ricochets
2. resist twisting so the plates will primarily swing back and forward, rather than spin around for 2 minutes if hit off center
3. be relatively durable

Any ideas?

 

[dubbleA]

fire hose, nylon reinforced rubber conveyor belt

 

[Red Cent]

Describe your stands, please.

 

[451 Detonics]

I use a piece of pipe between two telephone pole uprights and hang the steel using re-bar bent into s shaped hooks.

 

[Red Cent]

Here is a very good do it youself stand.

http://mrcompletely.blogspot.com/2008/07/do-it-yourself-steel-challenge-target.html

This hangs the stand vertical. This will create a 360 degree splash of fragments.

Imagine a profile of a wooden chair facing to your right. Visually remove the rear legs. Now visualize that you are looking at a steel strip about 6"s in total length and about two inches wide. The back of the chair has a hole in it to hang on the above example. The front legs of the chair will have a hole also. Use a carriage bolt going through the front of the target and through the hole in the "legs of the chair. When the target is hung it will assume an angled position deflecting the bullet to the ground.

Hope that depicts the way we cowboys do it.

 

[RalphS]

I hung some AR400 steel plates at my local gun club a few years ago. To avoid twisting, they really need to have two holes. I had two plates with two holes and one with one hole.

The plate with one hole got a piece of heavy angle iron bolted to the back of it with holes drilled in the ends. The angle iron needed to be replaced about once a year.

Hanging the targets from chains is a bad idea. They will twist like crazy when hit. I hung my plates from threaded rods so that they would only swing back and forth but would not twist. I slid some steel pipes over the threaded rods to protect them from hits. This worked really well. The steel pipes took some hits and got beat up but the rods never broke. When I took them down after three years, the rods were still in good shape but the pipes were thrown out.

These targets were shot at every day for about 3 years. No damage to the AR400 steel from pistol rounds. The angle iron and pipes got beat up but they held up pretty well.

 

[Walkalong]

Carriage bolts. if the bullet hits them they will not be guided in a bad direction.

http://www.fastenal.com/web/search/...3hQts8090KQy64LYrtdy7zBsV!565669971!761349635

Bolt it (loosely) to whatever you want. Bolt it to a 2x2 steel tube to sit over 2X2 post etc, etc. Possibilities are endless.

 

[1KPerDay]

I use a piece of pipe between two telephone pole uprights and hang the steel using re-bar bent into s shaped hooks.

I wonder why I'm so dumb that I didn't think of that.

I appreciate the other ideas as well... I'd considered tires but was worried about rebounding... fire hose. that sounds good also.

thanks to all.

 

[1KPerDay]

Describe your stands, please.

I don't have them up yet but it's basically A frames of 5/8" rebar with a rebar crossbeam.

 

[bigfatdave]

I saw a really good design with eyebolts bent to an angle, the bolt end through the plate, bent up to the loop end that goes over the rod.

If you arrange it right the plate will sit at a slight angle, directing rounds down, and it can only pivot front-to-back, in theory.

 

[hso]

Try bolting a pice of perforated channel (or traffic sign post) to the back with a dome head bolt. Then use the existing perforations to attach your steel with two short lengths of steel cable or chain to a cross beam.

 

[1KPerDay]

Dave that sounds great also. And hso's idea sounds way simpler than the welded bracket I was thinking about.

 

[hso]

If you can weld you can drill or burn additional holes you can probably go even simpler.

Most of mine have holes burned with a plasma torch in the corners of my plates. I just used dome head bolts to bolt chain on the back. The plates don't hang vertically, but that helps deflect material down a little better. I used the channel post on a couple with a single hole and gave me a lot more flexibility on hanging them. Remember that square perforated channel post gives you more options than the U channel posts.

 

[1KPerDay]

Cool, thanks. I don't weld. But I might be able to bribe someone who does.

 

[Tom488]

My hangers consist of 2"x3/4" flat bar - about 12" long. This bar sits vertically, knife edge pointing to the shooter. I lop the head off of a 7/16-14x3" bolt, and weld it to the bottom of the flat bar - threads pointing rearward. At the top of the flat bar, I weld a short piece (about 3") of 2" angle iron, perpendicular to the flat bar, with the peak pointing up (like the roof of a house).

The angle iron sits on top of a crossbar (provided by the range I go to), and allows the target to swing back and forth. The target bolts onto the 7/16" bolt, and the target itself protects the nut and the threads from bullet splatter.

Looked at from the side, it looks like this:

__ /\ angle iron
| |/O\
| | crossbar (the O)
| |
| | flat bar
| |
| |
| |
==|= bolt
|
|
| Target plate
|
|
|

 

[FIVETWOSEVEN]

At dawn with a traditional noose.

 

[taliv]

you can see links to my target stands for LONG DISTANCE RIFLE at the following links:

http://precisionmultigun.com/pics/stand1.JPG
http://precisionmultigun.com/pics/stand2.JPG
http://precisionmultigun.com/pics/stand3.JPG

they're made from 4' sections of rebar and joints made from 1/2" galv pipe connectors. after using those for years, a friend started welding a version of them, which are lighter and better. he's selling them now and you can buy them here http://www.acetargets.com/


that said, they do work for handgun, but they spin when you hit them off center. so you can either hit them in the center, or keep looking for a different way to hang them. there are many advantages to this setup though, as they are very portable and it's easy to replace parts that get shot up and it's extremely rare actually for someone to miss and hit the stand.

if you use a very wide piece of leather/firehose then it won't spin as much

 

[1KPerDay]

Those are the type of stands I have. I'm just working on ideas for how to suspend the plates from the crossbeam.

Tom, can you post a pic of your setup?

 

[Rembrandt]