Tom Dark (Login Kim_Carson) from IP address 24.78.165.19
Hi all... I'm just thinking of getting an air rifle for indoor use. The space I have available to me is about 6 yards to the target, which is fine for target pistol practice but I'm afraid it'll not suffice for a rifle. I feel I might be cutting it too short for a rifle, with 18 feet between my eyes and the pellet trap. Correct me if I'm wrong. I was once told that I should have at least 25ft. available to me. Are there any targets made specifically for this distance?
I have seen 10m air rifle targets scaled for 6 yards distance but they won't accurately represent the clustering of your groups if you made those same shots at 10m, i.e. the pellet which was not fire 100% straight at the bull's eye would have different margins of error at 18 and 33 ft.
Any ideas on making something like this work?
right now i am shooting/breaking in my 52 in my office. i have about 15 feet. i made a pellet trap using an old wooden (shoe shine kit) box about 6" wide by 9" high. i replaced the back( actually the bottom) of the box with 3/4 inch plywood. i filled the bottom with a putty called Duct Seal. very dense stuff. comes in bricks about 1 1/2" thick. i used four bricks. it stops the pellets cold. they penetrate about an inch or less. this is a diana 52. i think pointed pellets or heavier pellets might penitrate a lot more. right now i am using wadcutters.i got four bricks of Duct Seal at lowes for about $10.00. they only had 5 bricks in the electrical department. my trap is not very big because the distance is so close. i left the duct seal in the wrapping. i taped over it with a heavy duty duck tape. for targets i use a square avery label with a blue round (about 1/2") avery lable as an aiming point. round blue on a square white background. i had the old shoe shine box so all i really had to buy was the duct seal. i have heard of guys using three inches of this stuff but i don't think you will need that much. just in case, behind the target i have a couple of phone books. if i were shooting .22 i may need more duct seal. it works and it cost me about 10 bucks plus the cost of labels. dots to use as an aiming point probably come is smaller than 1/2". its good for practice and if i have a cranky customer i can always make an effigy. beats actually shooting a customer and its a great stress reliever. when i get the gun sorted out i will increase my distances.
i see that i really did not address your question. sorry. i think that a group shot at 25 feet is going to be larger at 45 feet. the laws of geometry cannot be denied. in fact i bet that you could figure it out using geometry. knowing the max spread at 25 feet and knowing distance (25 feet) you could extrapolate group size at any distance beyond that distance. they will surely be larger as distance increases, even if shot in a perfect vaccuum.
it will print rifle targets scaled down to 6 meters.
And they will score correctly.
Probably the best bet is to get a Match style rifle, one of the SSP's (Daisy or FWB) and practice, practice, practice! If you can get a Diana 100 or a 75, by all means do it, they are in shorter supply, though.