Ballistic Curtain - Novel Design

[Phanerothyme 12]

So - I've bought a plinking airgun, and I'm shooting up the garden into a brick box formed by the garden wall, the house and the offshot kitchen wall.

Obviously, I need to protect the window and glass in the basement door from stray pellets (I have a 2'x3' pellet catcher and a 14" target at 10m).

At the moment I've got 4 heavy old rugs slung over a pole but need a more elegant, less bulky, and less smelly solution, so I can take the rugs to the tip.

It needs to be flexible (roll up or concertina) slung-from-a-pole-or-line-able, and able to resist a .22 15 grain pellet at about 4-500fps (9-10 ftlbs at the muzzle) - and not too expensive.

Polycarbonate 3mm sheets - too expensive
Kevlar - too expensive

Heavy Dacron - on the cusp of too expensive.

 

Any novel, crazy ideas that could do this cheap?

 

[Pyrotequila 401]

A daft question, as you've likely already considered it, but why can't you shoot down the garden away from the house?
Would it be even harder to create a back stop down there for stray pellets?

[Guest makapaka]

9 hours ago, Phanerothyme said:

So - I've bought a plinking airgun, and I'm shooting up the garden into a brick box formed by the garden wall, the house and the offshot kitchen wall.

Obviously, I need to protect the window and glass in the basement door from stray pellets (I have a 2'x3' pellet catcher and a 14" target at 10m).

At the moment I've got 4 heavy old rugs slung over a pole but need a more elegant, less bulky, and less smelly solution, so I can take the rugs to the tip.

It needs to be flexible (roll up or concertina) slung-from-a-pole-or-line-able, and able to resist a .22 15 grain pellet at about 4-500fps (9-10 ftlbs at the muzzle) - and not too expensive.

Polycarbonate 3mm sheets - too expensive
Kevlar - too expensive

Heavy Dacron - on the cusp of too expensive.

 

Any novel, crazy ideas that could do this cheap?

 

“Neighbours, everybody needs good neighbours, with a little understanding.....”

[Phanerothyme 12]

The neighbours are fine with this - as I was sure to let them know well ahead of time. 

I have a nice quiet rifle (supressed) and a very quiet backstop [box stuffed with rags, backed with a resin plate] so it all makes less noise than a staple gun  - although have yet to modify the pellet catcher, so it clangs a bit. But some blu-tack or plumbers mait will take care of that easily enough.

The curtain just needs to be able to catch the very occasional flyer. 99.5% of pellets hit the pellet catcher and/or the backstop. No pellets go through the house, or into neighbours gardens, as per the law. At the moment, these old rugs do the job, but they're unwieldy, soak up the rain, and take up a lot of room.

 

My current thinking  is swaying towards multiple layers of lighter synthetic fabric freely suspended. This will roll up nice and tight,  and because its hanging freely, will move with the pellet, robbing it of energy.

 

I'm also investigating stable mats - heavy rubber mats with textured faces for horse stables - but wondering about ricochet issues. 

 

If it works, I could set it up at the foot of the garden too - which means on days like today I could shoot from a table under cover in the basement, and get 15 yards to the target, which would be cool. 

 

 

[Phanerothyme 12]

4 hours ago, Pyrotequila said:

A daft question, as you've likely already considered it, but why can't you shoot down the garden away from the house?
Would it be even harder to create a back stop down there for stray pellets?

Mainly because I'd rather break my own windows by accident than send a pellet over my property boundary and break firearms law, but also because with brick walls on three sides of the target area, ricochets and flyers are rendered much safer. 

 

 

[Resident 1,185]

1 hour ago, Phanerothyme said:

The neighbours are fine with this - as I was sure to let them know well ahead of time. 

I have a nice quiet rifle (supressed) and a very quiet backstop [box stuffed with rags, backed with a resin plate] so it all makes less noise than a staple gun  - although have yet to modify the pellet catcher, so it clangs a bit. But some blu-tack or plumbers mait will take care of that easily enough.

The curtain just needs to be able to catch the very occasional flyer. 99.5% of pellets hit the pellet catcher and/or the backstop. No pellets go through the house, or into neighbours gardens, as per the law. At the moment, these old rugs do the job, but they're unwieldy, soak up the rain, and take up a lot of room.

 

My current thinking  is swaying towards multiple layers of lighter synthetic fabric freely suspended. This will roll up nice and tight,  and because its hanging freely, will move with the pellet, robbing it of energy.

 

I'm also investigating stable mats - heavy rubber mats with textured faces for horse stables - but wondering about ricochet issues. 

 

If it works, I could set it up at the foot of the garden too - which means on days like today I could shoot from a table under cover in the basement, and get 15 yards to the target, which would be cool. 

 

 

It would still need to be slight weight at the bottom to prevent a breeze moving it & weighting it would also give it a little more in the way of stopping power.

[Phanerothyme 12]

28 minutes ago, Resident said:

It would still need to be slight weight at the bottom to prevent a breeze moving it & weighting it would also give it a little more in the way of stopping power.

Yeah. I envisage the last 18" of the curtain would be draped over the ground in front of it, to catch falling pellets. Weights would help keep it in position.  Loose tethers too, against it flapping in the wind.