Wow! Lucky guy!

When I lived in Southern California, I was a member of a club that leased range space in a National Forest, from the US Forest Service. It was an improved range, with a 1,050-yard rifle facility with a covered firing point at 600 yards, a covered NRA-style pistol range for 25 and 50 yards, shootable open woodland, and a "freestyle" pistol range with a Cooper Wall, a Jungle Walk, barricades, and well-marked distance lines from seven through 75 yards.
Although it sounds like paradise, it was 60 miles (about an hour and a half) away, so it mostly got used on weekends. But I used it at least once a week, to both learn and maintain my skills. When I was still shooting competitively, and a match was coming up, I was there on both Saturday and Sunday.

That range is the only thing I miss about Southern California.

Of course, nowadays Jean and I shoot on a friend's land, less than 15 minutes away. But it's just woods with a safe backstop, and it's for pistol distances only.

i shoot outside my back door.... my backstop is called "the CASCADES".... no heat in the winter, no a/c in the summer, no fees and no other shooters....

I have ranges within 15 Min., but I would rather shoot outdoors, so I will be joining a gun club, about 35 miles away.......

Trap club is about 15 minutes away, rifle/pistol range 3 more miles past that
I spend more time on the clays than either pistol or rifles anymore........

I live 15 minutes away from my range, but I still love to shoot on my friend's land-that is just awesome-

Indoor range is 5 minutes.
Outdoor is less than 30 minutes

AFS

Indoor range is 5 minutes away. But the more I go the more I want to shoot outdoors. We have an outdoor range that is free and open till dusk everyday, and its has a 100 yd area for rifles as well as 15 yd pistol area. Its about thirty min away but I'll be willing to make the drive more often. Of course I have some friends with land about 45 min away which is the most fun to me, always cool to go with a group. Plus there is always diffrent stuff to shoot, but dont think they go out shooting near as often as I like to shoot. Guess im pretty lucky tho with all these options.

Less than 15 minutes to the indoor pistol/rimfire rifle range.

Just under an hour to get to either of two outdoor rifle/pistol ranges. One is an unsupervised public range with target stands at 25, 50, 100, 200, and 300 yards. The other is an unsupervised members-only range with 3 separate bays; 25 & 50 yard pistol/rifle, 100 & 200 yard pistol & rifle, and 300-550 yard rifle (membership is $20 a year).

I live about 5 mins (really depends on traffic and the red light). It is about 2 to 3 tenths of a mile from my drive way.

In New York (our county anyway) you must be at least 500 feet from the nearest residence. So if you have enough land you can shoot on your own property (as long as no one complains about the noise).

So two tenths of a mile would probably be OK (about 1,000 feet) as long as no one complains about the noise.

I have a gun range in my back yard ..
a dueling tree , and a few metal spinning targets ..
a paper target stand .. earth backstop that I'm still wanting to design a better bullet trap
made from old railroad ties..
any ideas ????

Originally Posted by Ricky59

I have a gun range in my back yard ..
a dueling tree , and a few metal spinning targets ..
a paper target stand .. earth backstop that I'm still wanting to design a better bullet trap
made from old railroad ties..
any ideas ????

Rent a backhoe and build a berm (a mound of soil) as a trap. It is the best you can get.

Have that ...
Want to contain ricochets better...

At the indoor range we had a sheet of steel angled at about 30 degree angle down. The bullets would riccochet off the plate and be burried in the sand at the foot of the plate.

I suppose you could do something like that. It would be pretty expensive I would imagine. You would need a pretty big plate and it would be pretty heavy to set up.

Why is it riccochetting? Is there too much lead in the berm? We use a berm at our club (about 75 yards out) and we don't have an issue with it.

Shooting at paper is no problem..
My concern is from the dueling tree and other metal targets...
Southern minnesota sportsmans club has pie plates with a cover over the top for that reason...
Maybe I'm worried over nothing....

Originally Posted by Ricky59

I have a gun range in my back yard ..
a dueling tree , and a few metal spinning targets ..
a paper target stand .. earth backstop that I'm still wanting to design a better bullet trap
made from old railroad ties..
any ideas ????

I just joined, so I'm late to the discussion. Have you come up with a solution? Any kind of wood is going to splinter and start to fall apart, even railroad ties. How about tires? Stack them up horizontally then fill them with dirt. It would take some real labor, but would be a great stop and I doubt that there's be any ricochets. Well, maybe a BB gun.

David

There is more than one range around me, but the conservation club I belong to is just about 30 minutes away.

<10min for me, best part is that I pass it coming home from work, so it is not out of the way.

When I lived on Long Island the range was about 30 miles from my house and it took about 1 hour to get there. Basically I only shot on Saturdays or Sundays.
Was that in Riverhead?

I live in the country. I shoot just about every day. In the winter I shot from my in my living room in to my shooting range. In the summer, I shoot from outside. I recycle all of my lead from my sand trap for casting. That really helps to keep the cost down to around $2 for a box of 38 wadcutters. Between my girlfriend and I, we shoot around 20,000 rounds a year and I recover around 500 pounds of lead a year.

Don <><

You forgot to add Zero minutes to the poll.

I have my own range in the back yard.

I live in the county, 50-ft outside the town line; I can shoot in the yard.

Originally Posted by Tnic

You forgot to add Zero minutes to the poll.

I have my own range in the back yard.

"Less than 15 minutes" covers that.

I hear ya. I have my own range also. I shoot almost every day. Why do some put a 20cent hole in a paper target when you can put just as nice a hole for 3cents?