Making a bullet catcher.

[Maillemaker]

Hi All!

Last weekend I tried out my Mark I bullet catcher. I figure if I can reclaim the bullets I shoot in practice that is less lead I have to buy!

So I made a bullet catcher out of a 5-gallon Home Depot bucket.

I took the bucket and wrapped the body in strapping tape.

Then I filled it with sand to about 3/4 inch from the top.

Then I laid a dozen or so sheets of newspaper on top of the sand.

Then I cut out a piece of 3/4" thick plywood in a big disk to lay on top of the sand at the mouth of the bucket.

I took the snap-on lid and cut out the center, leaving just the snap-on perimeter and a bit to hold the plywood in place/down on the sand.

I staple my target to the plywood.

I hoped that the newspaper would keep the sand from leaking out the bullet holes in the plywood, and the paper and plywood would need to be replaced every outing.

It worked great! I had one bullet that hit the side of the bucket and cracked it, but I recovered all of my bullets.

But I did have some problem with the sand leaking out.

Now what I am thinking about is replacing the plywood with the material they make self-healing targets out of. You can buy 6" or 8" disks of these self-healing targets, but they are expensive, $30 a piece or more. They claim to withstand hundreds of shots, but I don't know how well they will withstand .58 cal.

Anyway, does anyone have an idea for a self-healing material I might replace the plywood with, and so minimize sand leakage through the bullet holes?

I might even double up the material to really minimize the sand leakage.

Any ideas?

Steve

[Francis J. Miller Jr, 02601]

Steve,

If you know anyone who works at a foundry or quarry where they use rubber belts for their conveyor systems, you might be able to get some old belting material when they change it out with new ones. The belting material is heavy material and has self sealing characteristics. Just a thought.

[rachbobo]

I just finished making a bullet trap for revolver and smoothbore. I sunk 2 treated 2x4's in the ground in front and a single one in the rear so it is vee shape.
It stands 6 ft tall and the target area is 4 ft tall by 6 feet wide,
The bottom is open 2 ft off the ground.
Rather than fill it with scrap lumber and sandstone I tried something different. It has a flat roof made from scrap treated lumber and inside I put a series of rows of eye bolts with a swivel on them
I attached another eye bolt to pieces of treated 4x4 to hang from the swivel. They are staggered inside like bowling pins overlapping each other.
The face is covered with treated 3/8 ths plywood.
When the ball penetrates the plywood it hits the hanging 4x4s. Rather than thunk into something unmovable solid it will spin the 4x4 and deflect off into another hanging 4x4.
It will be like a crazy pinball machine of sorts. More often than not the ball doesn't embed it's self in the wood and just falls to the ground from the open bottom.
An improvement I'll do over the next few days is to lay heavy plastic on the ground under it to keep it weed free then cover the plastic with a layer of sand.
When I want to retrieve the lead it will be like cleaning a kitty litter box., just scoop it out with a strainer.
Just a thought.

Bill Cheek
Cockade Rifles

[Lou Lou Lou]

can you post a photo?

[Maillemaker]

I'll post a photo of my bucket later.

My bullet catcher has to be portable as I go to a public shooting range. It also cannot contain metal as metal is not allowed. I cheated last weekend as the metal bail handle is still on the bucket but I can replace this with rope.

I like my bucket-o-sand as I can wheel it downrange on a wagon and wheel it back when I'm done with it. To use it, I've got one of those cheap-o wood "x" stools. I set the barrel on its side on top of the stool.

The only "catch" (hah) with my bullet catcher is in order to work you have to be able to hit the mouth of a 5-gallon bucket purty near-center. :)

Steve

[Maillemaker]

I wonder if I could replace my newspaper with kevlar fabric?

Steve

[Gary Van Kauwenbergh, 101]

I think I remember seeing this on an episode of the Red Green Show. He used duct tape.

[Timmeu]

The Brewers might have a candidate!

[Maillemaker]

I think I remember seeing this on an episode of the Red Green Show. He used duct tape.

To do what?

[Maillemaker]

The Brewers might have a candidate!

I'm afraid I'm missing the reference. :confused:

Steve

[Maillemaker]

I may have just had an "aha" moment.

I know a lot of professional bullet stops are made by using chopped up, recycled rubber tires.

You can buy landscaping material made of this stuff. It is dyed pretty landscaping colors, but it is just shredded rubber.

Shredded rubber will work great as a backstop, but may be less likely to leak out of bullet holes like sand will.

You might get away with laying a cheap piece of fabric over the chipped rubber and behind the plywood facing. The cheap piece of fabric will need to be replaced every shooting session as it gets torn to shreds, but it should keep the rubber chips in place for a day of shooting, I bet.

Steve

[Maillemaker]

Well, lookie here!

http://beta.ar15.com/archive/topic.html?b=1&f=5&t=1192575

Someone else has used chipped rubber mulch in a rubbermade tub to stop bullets.

And I think I understand the duct tape comment now - it can be used in between courses of fire to easily plug any holes from the outside.

Steve

[Pat in Virginia]

Here's an off the wall thought for you. I haven't tried it myself but it has a certain appeal.

What if you put a thick layer of heavy foam (mattress material, e.g.) between the board and the sand and compressed the foam. I'm thinking as the bullets make holes in the foam, the foam being compressed will seek to fill the holes and stop the flow of sand or whatever.

If you can put all of your shots into one small hole it should work great ;)


Pat in Virginia

[Maillemaker]

Yeah, I was trying to think of some cheap material that I could put behind the plywood to keep the rubber chips / sand inside the bucket.

Foam might work. Newspapers did not work (for long).

I'm hopeful that by using the chipped rubber that every 10 shots will not present enough holes in the wood to cause a problem. If you go downrange every 10 shots to put up a new target, you can slap some duct tape over the face of the plywood to plug the holes and keep the filler inside. Duct tape is cheap.

Steve

[Maillemaker]

An update on the bullet catcher.


Sorry I haven't posted any pictures yet.

The 5-gallon Home Depot bucket full of sand worked great. Heavy though - I brought along my kid's wagon to tote the bucket down range and back again. The problem with the sand is that it is so fine it leaks out the bullet holes in the front of the bucket.

So, based on the link above, I went to Home Depot and bought two bags of chipped rubber mulch.

I filled up my bucket to the brim with the rubber mulch, and then I put down this fine mesh netting that my wife put around the garden to keep the dogs out (it also routinely ensares birds, which I have to go and free from their predicament).

I waded up some of the mesh netting and laid it down on top of the mulch, and then snapped one of the lids on the bucket. The purpose of the netting is to keep the mulch from leaking out the bullet holes in the lid of the bucket.

The lids cost $1.69 each. I did not put plywood under the lid, nor did I cut out the center of the lid this time.

The good news: The bucket lids are almost "self healing". The material does not crack or split from the bullets, and 30-40 rounds just made a bunch of holes in it that closed up nicely. I doubt the mulch would have leaked out even without the netting.

The bad news: I blew the bottom out of the bucket straight away. I haven't emptied the bucket yet to see how many, if any bullets were trapped inside, but I did find one bullet within a couple of feet of the back of the bucket lying in the dirt.

My guess is the rubber material transfers shock to the back of the bucket. Also the bullets probably penetrate much deeper than I thought they would.

One nice thing is the bucket full of mulch is much lighter than a bucket full of sand - I can easily tote it by the bucket handle down range and back. This decreased mass is no doubt why it doesn't stop bullets so well, either.

I'm considering putting something in the bottom of the bucket before pouring in the mulch. The range forbids metal, but the easiest thing would be a steel plate in the bottom of the bucket. But, a couple of pieces of plywood might also do the trick, especially if it is shock and not bullets hitting the bottom of the bullet.

Steve

[Maillemaker]

OK, I took my Home Depot 5-gallon bucket full of chipped rubber mulch to the range last weekend.

The good news is, it is much lighter than a 5-gallon bucket of sand! Instead of needing a wagon to roll it downrange, I could easily tote it.

The bad news is, it didn't stop bullets. Now I think it is close to stopping bullets. After I knocked the bottom out of the bucket, I found a bullet in the grass right behind it. So I think the bullets are nearly spent as they get through the bucket.

Here are some pictures of the failed bullet bucket:

http://i.imgur.com/Kmmkg.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/oG063.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/WFmZV.jpg

You'll notice also that "near misses" will score and/or penetrate the sides of the bucket, with no great catastrophic failure. I'll just tape over the holes when that happens.

I wrapped the bucket with fiberglass strapping tape, but I don't know if that is necessary.

More good news: Shooting through the HDPE cover is very nice. I was worried about the lid cracking or shattering, but it is almost self-healing in nature. This is good because the chipped rubber won't leak out the holes from a normal shooting session. And the lids are only $1.69 at Home Depot, so you can just replace it every trip to the range.

Here is a picture of the lid after shooting about 40 rounds at the bucket. 20 of these rounds were from 100 yards, and I had never shot this carbine at 100 yards before so it took a while before I started hitting the bucket. I was shooting low (and thus my poor camp stool is now shot to pieces!)

http://i.imgur.com/exDAq.jpg
(http://i.imgur.com/exDAq.jpg)
One thing I noticed is that I just poured the chipped rubber into the bucket. I did not compact it. I took a dowel rod and was able to push it pretty much to the floor of the bucket. Tonight, I filled the bucket up to the rim and then stood on the mulch to crush it into the bucket. This compressed the mulch a good 4-5 inches. I then filled it up again and stood on it again.

Here is what the mulch looks like:

http://i.imgur.com/vJttQ.jpg

To reinforce the bottom of the bucket, I first put a piece of 3/4" chip board in the bottom, followed by two sheets of .03" thick mild steel.

http://i.imgur.com/EytYV.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/Li59T.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/WDNpe.jpg

Lastly, I grabbed a piece of my wife's garden netting. This stuff is very "sticky" yet flimsy. My hope was that if the bullet holes in the front lid got too big, the netting would keep the chips from falling out. I believe it will do this, but I think the lid is going to hold up for at least one shooting session no problems anyway.

http://i.imgur.com/1SSoj.jpg

I used the netting on the last bullet bucket and it worked perfectly. Bullets go right through it but it stays grabby.

The use of the steel plates in the bottom of the bucket is against the rules at the public shooting range I am going to. I considered trying it with just the wood, but I have more confidence with the steel in the bottom of the bucket. After this next shooting session with the compressed mulch, I will see if there are dents in the plate. If not, I will omit the plates next time.

I'm not too worried about the steel. I'm sure the rule is to prevent ricochet, but I do not see that as possible in this arrangement as there is no way the bullet will come back out through the mulch or any way I can see it going through the side of the bucket to come back to the firing line.

So why all the trouble?

Well I think this will make a simple, generally reusable, cheap bullet catcher. With lead at $2/pound from rotometals, and caps $.07 a piece from Back Woods, and powder about $.01 a shot from Back Woods, the lead is $.15 of the $.24 per shot. An afternoon of target practice that would normally cost $24 will be reduced to $9. That's a big deal.

And if you can't hit the mouth of a bucket at 100 yards? Well, that's a good incentive to shoot better! :)

Steve

[Lou Lou Lou]

Steve
There is a bullet catcher thread running over on the CastBoolits.com forum. It may give you some ideas you could use.

[Maillemaker]

Hi Lou,

Do you have a link to the thread? Their search function appears broken.

Steve

[Maillemaker]

I think I found it. This one?

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=26627

[0556V]

Try an old rubber mat from the truck bed of a pickup truck. I make hanging tile and pigeons out of the mat, paint them, drill 1/8" holes (2) at the top, used waxed dental floss and hand them with a staple gun. Work real good for revolver shooting. Hang once - they last all season.




Hi All!

Last weekend I tried out my Mark I bullet catcher. I figure if I can reclaim the bullets I shoot in practice that is less lead I have to buy!

So I made a bullet catcher out of a 5-gallon Home Depot bucket.

I took the bucket and wrapped the body in strapping tape.

Then I filled it with sand to about 3/4 inch from the top.

Then I laid a dozen or so sheets of newspaper on top of the sand.

Then I cut out a piece of 3/4" thick plywood in a big disk to lay on top of the sand at the mouth of the bucket.

I took the snap-on lid and cut out the center, leaving just the snap-on perimeter and a bit to hold the plywood in place/down on the sand.

I staple my target to the plywood.

I hoped that the newspaper would keep the sand from leaking out the bullet holes in the plywood, and the paper and plywood would need to be replaced every outing.

Try an old rubber mat from the truck bed of a pickup truck. I make hanging tile and p



It worked great! I had one bullet that hit the side of the bucket and cracked it, but I recovered all of my bullets.

But I did have some problem with the sand leaking out.

Now what I am thinking about is replacing the plywood with the material they make self-healing targets out of. You can buy 6" or 8" disks of these self-healing targets, but they are expensive, $30 a piece or more. They claim to withstand hundreds of shots, but I don't know how well they will withstand .58 cal.

Anyway, does anyone have an idea for a self-healing material I might replace the plywood with, and so minimize sand leakage through the bullet holes?

I might even double up the material to really minimize the sand leakage.

Any ideas?

Steve

[Scott Sites]

Have you tried layering the bottom of the bucket with several thick phonebooks? Then fill with the rubber mulch and lid. It should be enough to stop the bullets and not pass through the bottom.

[Maillemaker]

Here is an article I wrote up on my successful test of the Bullet Catcher!

http://www.4thla.com/bullet_bucket/bullet_bucket.htm

Steve