I need some suggestions of how one might build a backstop for a shooting range on flat land. It has to be powerful enough to reliably stop .223, ideally, strong enough to withstand 8mm.
Digging one out of the ground isn’t really an option. I could use some suggestions as to what materials we might use, or how we could configure one, and general tips like that.
Eventually, but overall, they’re pretty robust. You’ll notice the wall sagging before anything else, since the sand merely flows down to fill in bullet holes, as it were.
Stacks of tires work remarkably well. Stake them in place on wooden poles, and go with a couple of rows. You could also fill them with sand, to improve the stopping ability and to keep water from collecting for mosquito breeding.
Old railroad ties. Stacked vertically or horizontally. Make a double-layer wall and fill with sand in between.
Whatever you use, make it BIG. Go considerably wider and definitely taller than you think you need. You’re talking about rifle calibers, so I’m assuming you’ll be shooting at it from a distance. Small aiming errors, especially when testing, say, a freshly-installed telescope, can easily mean a miss on even a large wall.
If you have any potential that people or animals can or will be downrange in the target zone, I’d want to see the thing at about 12’ tall and 20’ wide at a minimum.
My father built a backstop on a 100 yard range with a 1/2" thick sheet of steel at a 45 degree angle, with a huge stack of logs behind it. It worked well for pretty much everything from my lil .22 rifle up to the .54 cal blackpowder rifle, though the 7.62x39s from my MAK-90 beat the hell out of the steel.
Rent yourself a small bulldozer for a weekend and use what’s already there – dirt. Push up a berm at least 20-30 feet thick at its base and perhaps 6-8 feet thick at its top. Set up your targets and start shooting.
Zero materials cost, zero maintenance, environmentally friendly, and will last virtually forever.
TBone, that may be an option. How much would it cost to rent a bulldozer for a weekend?
One problem being is that the soil doesn’t seem especially good for that (lots of rocks), and the land owner might not be happy with any permanent changes to his landscape.