I have a private 300 yard rifle range, not enough strays ever hit the backstop to do much damage ( mine is staggered green treated 2 x 6's screwed together with the boards overlapping so the seams don't seep fill... they are all screwed together on broken off telephone poles... the backstop is about 10ft high & 20ft wide, & 6 ft thick & filled with both old farm junk, sheet rock & dirt... I use empty 55 gallon steel barrels ( with the tops cut off ), with a plastic 5 gallon bucket of dirt in each one ( to keep them from blowing away ) as target backers... I have barrels placed at 25, 50, 75, 100, 150, 200, 250, & 300 yards on the range making easy shooting at any distance... I did at a 4' X 4' piece of 1/4" thick hardened steel plate to the spot just behind my 300 yard barrels... none of my cartridges will even go through the steel, after going through a drum at 300 yards...
I did my pistol backstop using steel 55 gallon drums stacked 2 high & staggered like suggested for the tires, & filled with dirt, but they are starting to get pretty shot up... I've been thinking about using tires for the next one, but am concerned about close range slow moving big bore handguns ( like 45 Colt cowboy loads ) bouncing off the tires & back to the shooter... anyone with expirience with this type of backstop & shooting 45's close up ???
a pic of my range from the bench...
& my "little mule" ( makes the 200 & 300 yard shooting much more enjoyable, s far as placing & recovering targets )
