Popper requires multiple hits before falling: REF or not? Split from a

[Norther]

With falling steel, major shooters have more leeway than minor shooters, just as with paper targets. Make it static, and major/minor draw closer together.

By "more leeway", I mean a major hit will knock it over when placed lower down, so in effect, major has a larger scoring zone. Make it static, and you'd have to score a minor hit on the hinge as a hit.

If you're worried about bullet construction, buy them accordingly.

Leave the steel rules alone.

[Sarge]

Leave the steel rules alone.

Agreed.

It seems like lately somebody, somewhere, wants to change something in our rules. The rules are generally fine if they are applied evenly and adhered to. Sure there are things about the rules that could be changed to make more sense but they are generally minor.

Production optics,load more than 10 in Production, Revo rules changes, static steel, no steel, etc....... Damn, just start a new discipline!

[Chills1994]

About bullet construction...

You have read the popper calibration procedure, right?

It specifies or recommends a power factor, caliber, even where to shoot it from and where it should hit, but it doesn't specify the type of bullet to be used.

In fact, when was the last time you went to a major match and it was published beforehand what the type of bullet is going to be used for the calibration ammo?

So if you're not using the same bullets as the calibration ammo, you could be putting yourself at a disadvantage.

Or...an advantage.

Just make an exemption for crappy weather days so that MD's/RM's can use their best judgement to wire or pin poppers in the up position. Then in the same section of rules make the bulb part and above of the static poppers a hit wort the same +5 points.

Having MD'ed/RO'ed on a really windy day, it sucks giving a brand new shooter his fourth reshoot or start, giving him the "Are you ready? ....Standby!...BEEP!" at the left side of the stage and then hearing a CLANG-KER-CLANG! sound coming from the right side of the stage.

[mildot1]

After following and reading this thread for the last few days I have come to this conclusion.

1. Rules are fine as written

2. You keep firing till it goes down, you own it.

3. You shoot it and go on with out it falling, call for calibration.

4. Some folks like to read things in the rules that are not there or try to use thier own logic to get around the rules.

5. As much as we would like it to be, the course will not always be "excactly" the same for all shooters. IE: The sun moves, the wind picks up, rain comes in, temp rises, targets bagged, ETC. We can't stop and wait out or fix every change that happens.

FWIW

[Chills1994]

6. Poppers won't hold their calibration EDIT: because of muddy ground conditions or too much wind.

EDIT: Appendix B4 and B5 go on to describe the various metal plates and poppers to be used. B4 and B5 dictate dimensions, but they don't specify either the thickness of steel to be used or the type of alloy.

Certainly, a 1/4 inch thick 6 inch by 6 inch square of mild A36 is going to react differently than say a 1 inch thick piece of AR500 also measuring 6X6 (when shot by the same gun and ammo).

Edited April 4, 2014 by Chills1994

[Norther]

So if you're not using the same bullets as the calibration ammo, you could be putting yourself at a disadvantage.

Or...an advantage.

That was my point. If you care about bullet construction and know what knocks down poppers best, buy those bullets. No possible disadvantage left, and maybe it'll actually do you some good. Obviously, I'm skeptical that a 120 pf FMJ is going to knock over a popper better than a 132 pf lead bullet. Or whatever.

[Chills1994]

different types of lead out there now especially considering all the different bullet coatings that are available. You don't have to run as hard a lead boolit when it is coated in poly/moly/epoxy/polyester powder coat/floor paint.

This is just my theory on things, but if the USPSA rulebook is specifying X, Y, and Z procedure and recommends a particular caliber at a particular power factor, then they should be the ones supplying the ammo, especially for area matches and nat's.

This would be way expensive, but Barnes makes solid copper bullets. Then probably even more expensive than that are the cintered metal bullets. I saw a well know shooter put on a shooting exhibition at an indoor range in 2007. He was shooting on steel plates using that cintered ammo. The static plates reacted differently.

Edited April 5, 2014 by Chills1994

[frag316]

Maybe you should just start your own game. Then you could "fix" all of the things wrong with USPSA and people would flock to your game instead.

When you start getting into nits about bullet construction and ballistic pendulums, you're missing the overall point of the game, which is to have fun in a safe manner.

Everyone's been to matches where the weather has screwed up the mechanics of the match and the shooter's execution of said match. It's an equalizer, because the weather is a variable that can't be controlled.

In many of the examples given, switching the targets to static steel wouldn't work, because they're multi-day matches, so the courses of fire have been used for scads of competitors already. So it's up to the individual MDs to decide whether they're going to worry about weather before the match begins (e.g., before staff day) and build their arrays with materials that are less weather sensitive, or to just try to soldier on and decide whether they'll throw out stages where significant disadvantage is given to the competitors on bad weather days. But, ultimately, it's the MD's decision.

There are already methods in place to deal with these situations. Just because you might not like how they're applied or not applied is not a good or even valid reason to go making major changes to the rules--especially since they just changed this year.

[BillD]

"Bending the rules" IMO is never a good way to go.

It leads for all kinds of rules being "bent" for a new shooter or for the RO's buddy.

Play it by the rulebook, that's why we have one.

[motosapiens]

"Bending the rules" IMO is never a good way to go.

It leads for all kinds of rules being "bent" for a new shooter or for the RO's buddy.

Play it by the rulebook, that's why we have one.

I'm not sure anyone was really talking about 'bending the rules'?

Never a good idea to bend the rules, but also not a good idea to stick blindly to one rule, while ignoring others, to the detriment of a shooter and to the detriment of a fair match. If you have to repair or replace range equipment to allow the match to continue, it *might* be justified to for the RM to have an affected competitor reshoot.

Note that the thread title does not actually represent the original topic of discussion. Multiple hits before going down is a clear-cut situation. Multiple hits before going down and then the equipment is determined to be faulty or mis-set and must be replaced or repaired for the match to continue might be a slightly different situation.

Edited April 7, 2014 by motosapiens

[BillD]

"Bending the rules" IMO is never a good way to go.

It leads for all kinds of rules being "bent" for a new shooter or for the RO's buddy.

Play it by the rulebook, that's why we have one.

Who was talking about 'bending the rules'?

Never a good idea to bend the rules, but also not a good idea to stick blindly to one rule, while ignoring others, to the detriment of a shooter and to the detriment of a fair match. If you have to repair or replace range equipment to allow the match to continue, it *might* be justified to for the RM to have an affected competitor reshoot.

You

"Sometimes a very slight bend of the rulses is required in order to implement the correct sportsmanlike non-bs behavior"

Club match this weekend. My heretofore 100% reliable Limited gun wouldn't feed on one stage. I shot 6 shots on a 32 rd. COF. Lots of penalties. We were all friends but not once did I ask to reshoot nor was it offered. It's against the rules.

Edited April 7, 2014 by BillD

[motosapiens]

"Bending the rules" IMO is never a good way to go.

It leads for all kinds of rules being "bent" for a new shooter or for the RO's buddy.

Play it by the rulebook, that's why we have one.

Who was talking about 'bending the rules'?

Never a good idea to bend the rules, but also not a good idea to stick blindly to one rule, while ignoring others, to the detriment of a shooter and to the detriment of a fair match. If you have to repair or replace range equipment to allow the match to continue, it *might* be justified to for the RM to have an affected competitor reshoot.

You

"Sometimes a very slight bend of the rulses is required in order to implement the correct sportsmanlike non-bs behavior"

Club match this weekend. My heretofore 100% reliable Limited gun wouldn't feed on one stage. I shot 6 shots on a 32 rd. COF. Lots of penalties. We were all friends but not once did I ask to reshoot nor was it offered. It's against the rules.

Ok good catch. After further discussion and research, I don't think that phrase applies here. I believe the situation I described is *clearly* covered under rules of REF and fair and equitable presentation of stages. It can *appear* like a bent rule to some people, but it is simply a case of a different rule taking precedence.

[BillD]

I disagree but that doesn't matter. Ask Amidon what he thinks. If the steel doesn't fall, the first shooter should call for calibration. After that happens enough times, the club will start calibrating steel, IMO.

[motosapiens]

I disagree but that doesn't matter. Ask Amidon what he thinks. If the steel doesn't fall, the first shooter should call for calibration. After that happens enough times, the club will start calibrating steel, IMO.

You appear to be talking about some other situation, and that's fine, but I have no comment on it.

Oddly enough, a very similar situation came up at this year's b2b nationals, and was the subject of a long thread a few months back, with many of the rules guys having a cow about The RM's decision. From what I know of it (which is not everything), the RM's made the right call. When I work with experienced RM's and time permits, I ask alot of questions about the calls they make and the reasoning they use. It is very educational.

Edited April 7, 2014 by motosapiens

[BillD]

Was that not the OP of this thread? Steel that would not go down and giving them a reshoot without a calibration shot?

[justaute]

What does "alot" mean? Is that the opposite of "alittle"?

[motosapiens]

Was that not the OP of this thread? Steel that would not go down and giving them a reshoot without a calibration shot?

No. It was steel that would not go down and afterwards it was determined that the steel had been incorrectly set or was malfunctioning, so it needed to be replaced, repaired, set differently or otherwise significantly changed in its presentation before the match could continue. Very different situation.

[BillD]

How is that different. Call for calibration, it won't fall, it needs to be calibrated, just like in the rules.

[motosapiens]

How is that different. Call for calibration, it won't fall, it needs to be calibrated, just like in the rules.

it's different because failed or improperly set equipment is not the same as a calibration issue. If you have to fix it before the match can continue, it seems obvious to me that it's not a simple calibration issue, and may therefore be covered under different rules than the popper calibration rules.

[Chills1994]

Just an FYI... on popper construction.

If standard pipe is used, welded to the bottom of the popper, and then some steel rod is put through that, that the whole popper plate hinges on...

There is a welded seam in that pipe that can drag or catch on the rod. The welded seam can actually be pretty rough or jagged.

So the solution is to put the seam on the bottom, or to use DOM tubing.

If you got some Bubba making your club's poppers, chances are he doesn't know better.

Just an FYI....

[BillD]

It seems to me you are going a long way afield to try to prove your point correct.

It's a simple matter of calibration. Steel won't go down, call for calibration. If the popper cannot be calibrated to fall, then it's either fixed or taken out.

And the guy gets a reshoot. If the stands there and bangs away on it until it falls, that's on him.

Troy might be a guy to ask.

[motosapiens]

It seems to me you are going a long way afield to try to prove your point correct.

It's a simple matter of calibration. Steel won't go down, call for calibration. If the popper cannot be calibrated to fall, then it's either fixed or taken out.

And the guy gets a reshoot. If the stands there and bangs away on it until it falls, that's on him.

Troy might be a guy to ask.

The extreme cases have really been the whole point throughout this discussion. For some reason, people keep arguing about the routine cases (perhaps because the thread was given a misleading title when it was split out). You appear to be talking about a routine case, in which case I would TOTALLY agree with you. The rules are clear there, not really any room for discussion.

I think it's worth discussing the extreme cases tho, because they do occur. I've only been RO-ing 2 years and I've come across a couple instances at local matches and one hearsay instance a few bays over at nationals.

It's easier for it to happen at a local match because you have volunteers of all experience levels setting up stages, so it's not that unusual to discover during the first run or two that something is faulty or set up incorrectly.

[Chills1994]

Serious question...

has anybody here actually seen a pre-match calibration procedure at a local club level match?

have you seen an MD/RM actually shoot a calibration round at a balky popper at a local club level match?

I ask that because I have not seen either happen at the local club match level. The most sophisticated thing that happened was the "acting" MD came over, knocked on the popper with his knuckles and goes "Yeah, that feels heavy. RESHOOT!" With me, IIRC, that happened twice. Two different clubs.

[motosapiens]

Serious question...

has anybody here actually seen a pre-match calibration procedure at a local club level match?

have you seen an MD/RM actually shoot a calibration round at a balky popper at a local club level match?

I ask that because I have not seen either happen at the local club match level. The most sophisticated thing that happened was the "acting" MD came over, knocked on the popper with his knuckles and goes "Yeah, that feels heavy. RESHOOT!" With me, IIRC, that happened twice. Two different clubs.

The places I shoot at knuckle-calibrate during setup, but if a calibration is requested, they cheat, and just use a minor round from one of the competitors. Or more frequently, the first minor shooter of the day fires 5 rounds in the scoring zone with no effect and the RO stops him and we check all the poppers and start over.

I should really load up some calibration PF ammo just to have in my range bag for such occasions. Thanks for the suggestion.

[frag316]

I've seen a club-level calibration called-for and granted once.

It's very simple--if the conditions are really that bad where the steel wouldn't set properly and you can't calibrate it after the match has started, you have two choices--modify the stage and have everyone who has already shot it reshoot it, OR throw out the stage.