Off Season Project ?

[longgun]

We have ppl here who have all sorts of opinions,   everything from goat roaping to wild horse riding, mabe even a windmill man or two.   It's winter here this cold wet day,  I wanted to shoot my Finnfire with my new sundburg barrel......  But my target stand in in shambles.   Use to be I could buy Celotex brand wall board that made excellent target holders,  but now days for some reason  it is no longer made.  Not enviornmentaly friendly I expect.

I got to thinking that I would make a target stand out of steel and have a back plate angled so that the bullets would be  forced into the ground under the stand rather than shooting half a mile down range.  So what I have in mind is using a piece of 1/4 steel plate since I have this already, rather than buying something else.   I want to have the stand set up at 100 meters from my bench.

So I need some input,  will the 1/4" plate be thick enough to deflect the bullets without damaging the back stop.   I imagine that most of the stuff that I will be shooting will be 6.5's and 7mm silhouett loads and the rimfire stuff.   I only want to build it once,  so does anyone have any knowledge about the strength of  the 1/4 plate ?  Will it deflect the bullets  on a 30 degree angle or will I need to use 45 degrees?

Anyone know of a good target carrier material ?  I have some thoughts in mind but would be interested in what you use.   Regards,  dw

[CB]

Don't know of what type metal your 1/4 plate is but I can tell you that 3/8" diamond plate (extreemly soft) out of which I cut a pig. (like you I had it laying around) will crater badly at 300yds 7-08 162's @ 2550 launch speed. 130 short line loads didn't slow down on the sow at 200. got some 1/2" of better quality and light cratering at 200. T1 or armor plating is the stuff! at 100yds your gonna need the best! Take a hit on what you have and see how it holds up.

[jbeckley]

Hey Don,
 
I am not up on the sort of angle that you need for that steel plate, but I just had to buy some pigs for our club in Mesa.  To make a long story short of the 3-4 Steel Companys that I contacted, they all said the min. should be 500 on the hardness scale.  I know there are of lot of variances in steel, so I ask where approx. where the T-1 would fit on the scale and I was told approx. 360.  The place that I bought the steel from was from here in Phoenix.  www.heflinsteel.com.   Jim

[Heikki in FIN]

Plate thickness formula:

thikness of plate (angled) / sin(a) = plate thicness (90 degrees to the shooting line)

e.g. 1/4" plate:
90 degrees = 0,25"
80 degrees = 0,25"
70 degrees = 0,27"
60 degrees = 0,29"
50 degrees = 0,33"
40 degrees = 0,39"
30 degrees = 0,50"