New 1000 yard range MN

[skiutah02]

The rumor is true. (although in construction).

I (and @Cakes), met with Aaron and company this afternoon for a "quick" tour. As slinger mentions above they have a operational 2 house trap area, a partially erected clubhouse and a corridor that will allow shooting potentially to 1200 yds, although 100-1000yds will be the common distances. There will also be an area for 3Gun courses and pistol and archery lanes. They are actively excavating and grading the pit area. Some trees will still have to be removed to clear a sightline. Currently planning 8 targets. I believe that they have been at it since March, and have made excellent progress. They are hoping to have a working pit by the end of this month! I can attest to their kindness, openness and adventurous spirit. A big project, to be sure. If you build it they will come..

Here are a few pictures I snapped.

The clubhouse. The trap range is just behind the truck and the 500 or 600 yd firing point is just to the right of the trap chair (in the picture, not actually adjacent) at the far right edge of the picture.

Part of the pit area. The higher wall will be the back wall closest to the firing line.. The berm will be brought to be higher than the white bags filled with sand. Each of the cement blocks is 2ftx2ftx6ft.

A view of the shooting corridor looking south. The impact area will be behind the photographer. Both rows of trees running east-west in the background will need to be cleared to have complete line of sight to the targets.

A view from the top of the pits. The start of the impact area berm can be seen on the far right of the picture.

They are eager to listen to thoughts on doing it right, so for those of you who have labored on building a range from scratch, your counsel would be appreciated. You can PM me and I can relay the info. How would you have done it differently knowing what you know now...?

Drew

 

[ericbc7]

I spend a lot of time in the lakes area so I plan to visit this range soon!

 

[Cakes]

I'll second all that Drew had to comment on, we both had a great visit They are wonderful people who have made dramatic progress on the range considering the magnitude of work involved and all the rain we've received lately...Oh by the way just 3 of them doing all this..WOW! Very neat to visit a range in it's infancy and talk to people willing to listen. Electronic targets are an option they're looking at and according to Aaron they might try and take a trip over to Lodi and talk to the rep there and get a demo on site. The cost, logistics, sweat and labor involved is astronomical so I'm hoping the shooting community, what ever venue you shoot in, will support and back these folks anyway you can! West Central Minnesota and Eastern Dakotas is in dire need of a long distance range and this is a wonderful opportunity to solve that problem. Lets all jump on this wagon! Eric in DL

 

[Baka]

I'll second all that Drew had to comment on, we both had a great visit They are wonderful people who have made dramatic progress on the range considering the magnitude of work involved and all the rain we've received lately...Oh by the way just 3 of them doing all this..WOW! Very neat to visit a range in it's infancy and talk to people willing to listen. Electronic targets are an option they're looking at and according to Aaron they might try and take a trip over to Lodi and talk to the rep there and get a demo on site. The cost, logistics, sweat and labor involved is astronomical so I'm hoping the shooting community, what ever venue you shoot in, will support and back these folks anyway you can! West Central Minnesota and Eastern Dakotas is in dire need of a long distance range and this is a wonderful opportunity to solve that problem. Lets all jump on this wagon! Eric in DL

Great another range to battle it out with you Cakes!

 

[amen]

Maybe it will help those that have an interest in our project to just jump on and answer a few questions (hopefully I'm no hijacking this thread). First, thanks to those that have started this thread and others like this to let shooters know what we are up to. Second, thanks to those that did come out and look for themselves. This has given us some insight into what we are doing right and what to avoid.
Ok, so now for what we can offer now and what will be coming. First, for the long range guys. We can shoot two shooters out to 1000 yards now. We probably will not allow 50 BMG's as they can do a lot of damage and go a long way should one get away. We have been letting shooters come at no cost so far, but would ask that if you come to shoot, let us know what you think, offer suggestions, and leave a donation that represents your experience (or at least offer, I may not accept). This way, when we get to the time that we set rates, we have some feel as to what shooters are willing to support. This could be a thread all by itself, I'm sure.

Our goal right now is to first have the clubhouse so we can get out of the weather and have someplace to meet. Then get the scoring pit set up so we can open up the other shooting lanes. We took a trip out to Lodi to see their electronic target system. It is impressive, but comes with a cost. The question I have for shooters that have done shooting around the country, is it worth it for you guys (and gals if there are)? It offers quicker response and no need for a pit crew thereby reducing the number of lanes needed to accommodate the same amount of shooters. We would have bough a single lane system now to see if more would have been worth it, but the demo unit was not for sale and the lead time to get one is close to 8 weeks. That pretty much kills this season to try and recoup some of the expense.

We will also be working on archer, handgun, and three gun shooting lanes this summer. In time we will put up skeet houses and hopefully sporting or hunting clays.

So let me know what you think, do I need to start another thread, electronic or not, what's it worth to shoot at a range that offers a 1000 yards (and more)? Oh, by the way, this is a privately funded project to help shooting sports and shooter. No DNR funds, state grants, or anything of the sort. Not even any club or organizational money as of yet. We aren't opposed to those options, they just require time and effort (maybe a lot) to tap into them and we have chosen to take the "getter done" approach, rather than the wait, hope, and see. This is the same reason we didn't go the club route with committees where the opinions are many, decisions are slow, but workers are few (I'm not slamming clubs, just recognizing the limitations of "committees" whether governmental, church, or otherwise).

Thanks, Aaron
RUSH LAKE RANGE, LLC

 

[CJ6]

The NRA may have funds also....Something to check on.

 

[amen]

Yes, there probably are funds available, but it requires time and energy to track them down. Hopefully, sometime soon I can take the time to look for some of those "money trees". But first we are focusing on getting all the basics up and running.

 

[amen]

Just a quick update for those keeping an eye on our progress. We have put the scoring bunker on hold for now. Most of it is in place, but we are going to try out the electronic scoring system to see if this is the way to go. I'm being told we could have a system shipped to us as early as the end of next week. Once we get it in place and prove its viability, we will have it open for shooting. Today we limed the shooting field leading up to the targets to make any the bullet splash more visible. The question I have for everyone is what is an electronic target worth to a shooter?

 

[B Nettesheim]

Just a quick update for those keeping an eye on our progress. We have put the scoring bunker on hold for now. Most of it is in place, but we are going to try out the electronic scoring system to see if this is the way to go. I'm being told we could have a system shipped to us as early as the end of next week. Once we get it in place and prove its viability, we will have it open for shooting. Today we limed the shooting field leading up to the targets to make any the bullet splash more visible. The question I have for everyone is what is an electronic target worth to a shooter?

Pit service is immediate
You can pay more attention to conditions
Matches are done earlier
Earl can't yell at you for not being on the bus
I personally think e-targets are less complicated
Crossfires can be proven
Targets dont need to be refaced during the day for long range matches

 

[DT]

Pit service is immediate
You can pay more attention to conditions
Matches are done earlier
Earl can't yell at you for not being on the bus
I personally think e-targets are less complicated
Crossfires can be proven
Targets dont need to be refaced during the day for long range matches

Electronic targets are not allowed in long range benchrest competition.

 

[amen]

I haven't shoot competition, but I don't believe a pit is needed for bench rest (correct me if I am wrong). We have our Silver Mountain e-target in place and have shoot it only once so far. seems to work as advertised. Learning to operate the software and calibrating it is the most challenging so far(I should just give it to my kids, they could do it) but that comes with anything that is new (for me). So far we have only had PRS type shooters come to try it so they weren't there to do that, but they thought it was pretty cool and made it much easier to locate a shoot without a spotter plus it allowed them to see what their bullet speed was at the target(and how much variation their loads had). We have also been offered the HEX e-target to set beside the Silver Mountain for comparison. These two systems operate differently, have different levels of accuracy, and come with much different price tags. I think it would be interesting to see them side by side, but doesn't warrant the time spent if there isn't an interest in shooting them. I guess my question for everyone is, how many long range shooters prefer to shoot the paper over the steel? We have both steel and paper targets that can be shoot from the 1000 yrd line (or 600, 800, 1200 yrd line) at -200 yrd increments from the longest berm. This allows for a shooter to start shorter and work his way out to the longest range. The incremental targets only allows us to put the e-target at only one station, which would be the longest. I should post some pictures of what we did, that way everyone could see how the range has changed since those others where posted.

 

[Dennis]

For us at Lodi the e-targets are a necessity to run the size matches we do . I run the weekly Long Range Practice League and we have been shooting on the e-targets for about 8x now. So far no one has expressed a interest in going back to pulling targets and no one has quit shooting because of the e-targets. The e-targets have removed the complaints of slow target service and individuals can shoot on their own after we are certain they are capable thousand yard shooters. We don't do benchrest so that was not a concern to us. The only disadvantage I've encountered is users who cant or wont learn how to use the tablets we use. Best of luck with your range.