Doors & How To Activate Movers

[Chris Keen]

I shoot IPSC at an indoor range every Tuesday night, with a great bunch of shooters. We have an 8 week league in which we award plaques for the best 5 out of 8 match scores, in almost all divisions. (not enough intrest in round guns here) But being completely indoors we have a few problems to deal with.

We cant shoot ANY steel (per the mgt.) unless we use frangible ammo ONLY. We have limited storage space for props, besides being limited by the fact that we cant really secure any of our props to the ground/floor or walls. So we have 1 barricade, 1 gravity swinger, 1 drop turner, 1 wall of many ports, and of course 4-5 starting boxes. Basically anything that stores flat against the walls.

Recently I did manage to build a free-standing door & frame (with removable supports) which we can use to activate the movers.

Our biggest problem ......... after ditchin' the door knob & putting a grab-handle on it ....... has been fool-proof swinger activation.

We have a gravity swinger & a drop turner ... which we try to activate both with the opening of the door, and often 1 will go and not the other. I think its more of a design problem with the drop turner's activation means than with the door, but we need a better activation point on the door. We just have an eye-bolt down low, close to the hinge .... so it dosent really have that much travel. Could be 2 problems in 1. We currently just use solid 2x2 sticks to release both movers, so I am going to try and make a couple of those hinged-in-the-middle sticks for better activation. So thats a good start, but does anybody have any ideas for better door activation-attachment points???

[David Olhasso]

Having a door directly activate a mover can be a pain in the ass. Like you said, if the eye loop is too close to the hing, there is not enough travel in the rope. If it is too far from the hinge, it can hang up your feet or fall into your eyes.

One method we have used at my local clubs is to use a weight to pull the activator line. The weight is held up about 4 feet off the ground by a 6" loop of rope that goes thru an eye bolt which is held in place by a pin. Opening the door pulls a small rope attached to the pin which allows the weight to fall, which pulls the activator rope, which starts the mover. The small rope attached to the door threads thru eye bolts overhead.

This method is MUCH more reliable than having a door directly activate a mover and insures that the activator works the same for all shooters.

[shred]

We've also put activators in series-- tie a separate activating rope to the swinger and have it yank the stick out from under the drop-turner as it gets activated. Hinged-sticks will help somewhat as well, but you still need to get all the slack out of whatever mechanism if you don't have much throw on the pulling side.

[rishii]

instead of using a door to activate, you might look at the R&R Racing activator box. super slick, it will easily activate 2 thing at once. although I don't have a clue how you would secure it to a cement floor.

http://www.randrracingonline.com/newstands.htm

[Flexmoney]

Chris,

David's weight deal sounds cool (got any pictures, David?).

We have used the activation in series like Shred mentioned. You can explore how that works if you make it to C-ville in the morning (tell Uncle Bill that the rain will be gone by then).

But, most important...what's the deal replacing my girl with Chewey and Han?!?!?