What if timer doesn't pick up all shots fired?

[PatJones]

May not be required to pick up all 32 shots, but I'd feel a LOT better about the whole thing if
 
it DID pick up all 32 shots.     

That would be best so I can score you as shot when your PCC craps the bed mid-stage, but I don't know to many shooters who would argue about a reshoot in that case.

[WaJim]

Yeah well, PCC or Open or other. there are stages where it either isnt safe or even advisable for the RO to follow the shooter closely. Take a U shaped stage for instance where the shooter starts in the forward section of one of the legs.

 

Would it be advisable or safe for the RO to be on the coattails of the shooter as he is trying to navigate the stage backwards so the timer picks up each shot?.

 

Some of these new kids are really fast. Not all RO's are young spry athletes.

 

Timer lays down the start signal and picks up last shot.........

 

IMO FWIW.

 

And some of those 'last shot' timer pick ups on a PCC with a long barrel are slightly unsafe . You know where the RO is holding the timer slightly forward and to the side of the shooter so it picks up last shot.

 

Also My opinion.

[happygunner77]

This is an easy fix. Get the sensitivity at the highest and use pocket pro 2.

[perttime]

I've recently RO'd a couple of stages where the competitior would move back fast. There's no sense in going so close you risk being run into, or run past.

 

Another thing that has happened is getting a spent case straight into the timer when going close to get the last shot. Couldn't be 100% on which one was the last shot, so the competitor had to reshoot.

[Ming the Merciless]

7 hours ago, ChuckS said:

There is this rule:

 

9.10.1 Only the timing device operated by a Range Officer must be used to
record the official elapsed time of a competitor’s attempt at a course of
fire. If a timing device is faulty, a competitor whose attempt cannot be
credited with an accurate time will be required to reshoot the stage.

 

So the real question should be, did you check if the timer is actually accurate?  You know with a frequency generator and an oscilloscope?  If not, how do you know if it's accurate?  Especially at local matches where each squad has a different timer?  The timer on one of the other squads might be 500 milliseconds faster or slower than the one on your squad.

[Brooke]

3 hours ago, happygunner77 said:

This is an easy fix. Get the sensitivity at the highest and use pocket pro 2.

 

Really?? So you would be happier if the timer picked up the stage next door?

 

Im not going to try and tell you that every RO at a local match is good. Sometimes they are not even certified. That's a shame I can't fix but every club should encourage members to become RO's possibly by holding seminars locally and/or paying the fee for members at seminars. Is this a complete fix? No, but it improves things.

 

If timer sensitivity is too high you pick up the open shooter next door. If its too low you can miss the last shot unless you get close and watch the time index. You also need to immediately look at the resulting time to avoid accidentally picking up a shot from another stage or even hitting the timer against your body before reading it.

 

RO's are not all equal. I agree with that but most do an acceptable job and many do an outstanding job. If you help setup/teardown, paste, and run matches most RO's will at least listen to a pleasantly presented complaint. If you arrive 30 minutes before the match starts and leave before all shooters are finished because you have "excuses" to be somewhere don't complain. Everybody knows who you are. If you're nasty about everything you won't get much attention. Thats just how life is. Blaming everyone but yourself for every freaking thing that happens is popular today.

[toothandnail]

SO it sounds like the OP wants a longer stage time?

I've had PCC guys, (in my opinion) try and shoot the  final shots of a stage in a way that the timer will miss them.

[mwray]

This is an easy fix. Get the sensitivity at the highest and use pocket pro 2.

This^^^ has been my solution thus far

[perttime]

42 minutes ago, mwray said:

This^^^ has been my solution thus far

 

As somebody mentioned, that can cause trouble if there's another stage very near. Like, we just had a match where we used a clay range for some stages. There were three stages between the same berms.

[ChuckS]

1 hour ago, mwray said:

This^^^ has been my solution thus far

Yup. Get a quiet PCC and the loudest open gun with people to shoot them. Go to the 2 bays with minimal separation and stand with the timer in one bay and have the open shooter blast away in the next bay. Turn up the sensitivity on the timer until the open shots are picked up and then back it off a hair. Then determine how far back you can stand and still pick up the PCC. One huge advantage of the PP2 is that you can be aiming the microphone in the direction of the shooter while simultaneously observing the time display. It's not rocket surgery. 

[alexmg]

2 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

Yup. Get a quiet PCC and the loudest open gun with people to shoot them. Go to the 2 bays with minimal separation and stand with the timer in one bay and have the open shooter blast away in the next bay. Turn up the sensitivity on the timer until the open shots are picked up and then back it off a hair. Then determine how far back you can stand and still pick up the PCC. One huge advantage of the PP2 is that you can be aiming the microphone in the direction of the shooter while simultaneously observing the time display. It's not rocket surgery. 

I want to add too, that operating a shot timer (regardless of brand or type) in this sport is an art of its own, take one isolated controlled case where you can do above mentioned technique it will work just fine, but in most match setups I have seen any squad you look at has mixed guns, you can have very loud open gun right next to super-quiet PCC, some loads are so quiet I don't even know how they push bullets out of the barrel. And sound pressure spreads somewhat unpredictably at the range, everything matters, how you point a timer, if there any obstructions between microphone and gun and by obstruction I don't just mean large obstacle like a shooter's back or a wall, in my tests, as you hold a rifle even elbow can be a decent obstruction for the sound to travel adn effectively hit microphone, not to the point to completely blocking it but to the point to make it inconsistent, so if timer's sensitivity is not calibrated to particular gun, shooter my turn left and you may miss a shot being picked up. If someone shooting an open gun that projects alot of low frequency noise close to the mic and there is a drum barrel or a wall nearby, it actually may pick same shot twice as it reflects if sensitivity set too much. Remember that video on youtube someone shooting a shotgun and when he is done, he shows clear, and slams slide back and timer picks up a shot adding additional few seconds to his total time. On hybrid or indoor ranges with narrow bays and wall dividers echo is a big enemy, if sensitivity set too high and echo suppression too low you may pickup extra shots which does not sound like a big deal but when fast shooters shoot smoke and hope every 10th of a second matter and you may pickup that extra 10th (or more) on last shot and some timers obscure that from you by only showing one number on display so unless you deliberately scroll through shots and check split time on last shot you wont know that. I also, not too too often, but have seen cases where gun perceived as quiet because it does sound somewhat quiet but it is actually received by microphone as loud, and vise-versa, that is because when timer's microphone gets hit by audio wave everything matters, energy, peaks, length, frequencies, etc.

Also as match progresses through the day and ROs get tired less and less attention may be paid to timer settings between shooters so yeah, so yes, we need to pay closer attention to shot timing aspect of this sport but always remember of its challenges and nuances. My 0.02 anyways

[MHicks]

You have your best run of the year. Oops, a few shots don't show up on the timer. RESHOOT!

[MHicks]

18 hours ago, mwray said:

That was in reference to the pcc shooters trying to run over the RO just to get a reshoot.

I was watching a shooter on a U shaped stage. A buddy walked up and said the guy shooting was a cheater. In the middle of the stage he had a difficult time with a bunch of extra shots fired. As he backed up the straight leg of the U, he glanced over his shoulder and then moved sideways into the RO.  No doubt in my mind he intentionally moved sideways into the RO instead of backwards to continue shooting the stage. He got the reshoot.

[Sarge]

30 minutes ago, MHicks said:

I was watching a shooter on a U shaped stage. A buddy walked up and said the guy shooting was a cheater. In the middle of the stage he had a difficult time with a bunch of extra shots fired. As he backed up the straight leg of the U, he glanced over his shoulder and then moved sideways into the RO.  No doubt in my mind he intentionally moved sideways into the RO instead of backwards to continue shooting the stage. He got the reshoot.

That’s a definite DQ. The RO was either:

a) a softy

b) ill informed

c) inattentive 

d) incompetent

e) scared to challenge the cheater

 

[IHAVEGAS]

14 minutes ago, Sarge said:

That’s a definite DQ. The RO was either:

a) a softy

b) ill informed

c) inattentive 

d) incompetent

e) scared to challenge the cheater

 

 

10.6.1 - Unsportsmanlike conduct?

 

 

[IHAVEGAS]

5 hours ago, ChuckS said:

Yup. Get a quiet PCC and the loudest open gun with people to shoot them. Go to the 2 bays with minimal separation and stand with the timer in one bay and have the open shooter blast away in the next bay. Turn up the sensitivity on the timer until the open shots are picked up and then back it off a hair. Then determine how far back you can stand and still pick up the PCC. One huge advantage of the PP2 is that you can be aiming the microphone in the direction of the shooter while simultaneously observing the time display. It's not rocket surgery. 

 

Sounds good, then it starts raining & you have to bag the timers and you are screwed. 

 

PCC needs to have a minimum power factor of at least 150, I hate standing in the rain hoping that the 2nd  reshoot will go better than the first two attempts. 

[Sarge]

14 hours ago, IHAVEGAS said:

 

10.6.1 - Unsportsmanlike conduct?

 

 

Yes, cheating falls under unsportsmanlike conduct.

  A few years back at a fairly big match an ADULT MAN ran right over a 10-11 year old RO to get a reshoot. Didn’t go well.

[Gary Stevens]

17 hours ago, MHicks said:

You have your best run of the year. Oops, a few shots don't show up on the timer. RESHOOT!

 

Are you saying you count shots on the timer after each run?

 

While it is important to try to get each shot recorded in case of catastrophic failure where the stage is scored as shot, the most important time is the last shot. I know the last shot because I watch it as it registers.

 

What is being discussed are RO failures, not timer failures, IMO.

[RJH]

18 minutes ago, Gary Stevens said:

 

Are you saying you count shots on the timer after each run?

 

While it is important to try to get each shot recorded in case of catastrophic failure where the stage is scored as shot, the most important time is the last shot. I know the last shot because I watch it as it registers.

 

What is being discussed are RO failures, not timer failures, IMO.

What is being discussed is someone wanted a reshoot and didn't get it

[Gary Stevens]

7 minutes ago, RJH said:

What is being discussed is someone wanted a reshoot and didn't get it

 

Yes I got that. A re-shoot is only justified for an invalid time. What I am saying is if the RO does their job you have a valid time, so no re-shoot.

[RJH]

7 minutes ago, Gary Stevens said:

 

Yes I got that. A re-shoot is only justified for an invalid time. What I am saying is if the RO does their job you have a valid time, so no re-shoot.

Yeah, i know,  I was just funning: -)

[waktasz]

Buddy of mine was forced to reshoot a standards stage at Production Nationals 2015 because the ROs were counting shots on their fingers then comparing to the timer count and had a discrepency.  He called me over as they were discussing it and I was going to argue for him but they had already told people to paste so he had to reshoot anyway.  Got a M/NS on the reshoot, which sucks.  

We made sure the ROs were corrected after that. 

[WaJim]

19 hours ago, IHAVEGAS said:

 

Sounds good, then it starts raining & you have to bag the timers and you are screwed. 

 

PCC needs to have a minimum power factor of at least 150, I hate standing in the rain hoping that the 2nd  reshoot will go better than the first two attempts. 

 

Or shorten the barrel length....

 

Aren't there also muzzle brakes that direct noise sideways. Buddy of mines 223 is way louder than mine.

 

Make a equipment check like a PF ammo check...the PCC needs to pass a Decibel level ...Level TBD

Edited September 25, 2018 by WaJim

[Sarge]

3 minutes ago, WaJim said:

 

Or shorten the barrel length....

 

Aren't there also muzzle breaks that direct noise sideways. Buddy of mines 223 is way louder than mine.

 

Make a equipment check like a PF ammo check...the PCC needs to pass a Decibel level ...Level TBD

Shortening barrels involves the feds so that won’t happen

[IHAVEGAS]

23 minutes ago, Sarge said:

Shortening barrels involves the feds so that won’t happen

 

In general no. Too much money for permits and then there are state line considerations and all that stuff. Do have a couple friends shooting short barreled rifles in pcc, loud enough & very easy to maneuver in the tight spots.