hedgehound
NES Member
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- Oct 2, 2008
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Recently I ran into an interesting situation with Range Equipment failure, namely, forward falling steel popper.
I was shooting PCC (load: 9mm; 147 grains; ~980fps). On one of the stages the steel popper failed to fall even though the hit was in the round “scoring” area. OK, no problem, re-shoot, still no fall. One more shot into the round area, no movement. The match folks assembled around, and found an apparent cause of the problem: the forward falling popper was sitting on the sand and, once fell, kept digging the front end of the base into the sand deeper and deeper, making it hard to tilt back to release the latch. OK, corrected the base, and I was asked to shoot the steel again. Again, hit into the round area, no fall.
The folks from the club gathered around again and found the second problem: the rear limit screw was apparently set too far, allowing popper, when hit, to tilt into the “rear” stable position. They corrected the screw and the match went on. I really appreciate the help from the folks at the club, and their persistence in solving problems.
What got me curious is the fact that the second issue could pass the 9mm pistol calibration, since the bullet would be less likely to tilt the popper into the rear position, the front latch would release and everything looks OK. Bullet from PCC has more energy and more likely to tilt the popper into the rear position.
So, with rear falling poppers calibration makes sense, but what about the forward falling ones? The calibration might actually produce false negative results?
I was shooting PCC (load: 9mm; 147 grains; ~980fps). On one of the stages the steel popper failed to fall even though the hit was in the round “scoring” area. OK, no problem, re-shoot, still no fall. One more shot into the round area, no movement. The match folks assembled around, and found an apparent cause of the problem: the forward falling popper was sitting on the sand and, once fell, kept digging the front end of the base into the sand deeper and deeper, making it hard to tilt back to release the latch. OK, corrected the base, and I was asked to shoot the steel again. Again, hit into the round area, no fall.
The folks from the club gathered around again and found the second problem: the rear limit screw was apparently set too far, allowing popper, when hit, to tilt into the “rear” stable position. They corrected the screw and the match went on. I really appreciate the help from the folks at the club, and their persistence in solving problems.
What got me curious is the fact that the second issue could pass the 9mm pistol calibration, since the bullet would be less likely to tilt the popper into the rear position, the front latch would release and everything looks OK. Bullet from PCC has more energy and more likely to tilt the popper into the rear position.
So, with rear falling poppers calibration makes sense, but what about the forward falling ones? The calibration might actually produce false negative results?
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