How Are Poppers Supposed To Work?

[mcginnes]

Poppers are supposed to fall over if you hit them high enough with a bullet having a sufficient powerfactor, as described in the rule book, right? What if you hit them twice? Should they fall over or not? Standard poppers do, but forward falling poppers (FFPs) don't always.

lets say two shooters in two different clubs shoot the same classifier, shooter A is shooting standard poppers and shooter B is shooting FFPs. For both of them, the last popper is slow in falling so they shoot it again. For shooter A, the popper falls, no problem. For shooter B, his second shot stands the popper back up, and he has to shoot it a third time. The classifier is clearly not the same for these two shooters. So, does that mean that you can't use FFPs on classifiers? If FFPs are not allowed for classifiers, how can they be allowed on other stages? I don't see a description of FFPs in the IPSC or USPSA rule books. So, what's the deal?

[Vince Pinto]

Does the rulebook or classifier book require that poppers be backward falling? I also can't find a description of the design of "moving targets", and this is because there are numerous possibilities.

If the competitor shoots an FFP twice, he's preventing it from acting as intended. Of course if he shoots an FFP once and it fails to fall, then it's most likely range equipment failure.

Mandatory reloads are allowed in Standard Exercises and Classifiers but not in Level III or higher "regular" COFs, so we do have some differences depending on the type and level of course or match. See Section 1.2.

[lynn jones]

this is how the ffpp's are not supposed to work.

and yes, this happened to me.

lynn jones

[Bucky]

Vince,

Wasn't it you (or perhaps it was Ivan) that posted a FFP (back in your IPSC list days) that was held by gravity and by a hook?? The first shot would unhook it and any follow up shots would merely delay the falling of the popper. I think the real problem is when a standard popper is turned around in an attemp to make a foward falling popper. The second shot will stand it up and it will stay that way - the voice of experience.

Several years ago we did a test with a standard popper turned around to FF. We were able to set it so that once shot from a 9mm would knock it over every time, yet a 175+ pf 38 super would not. I don't think you are supposed to be penalized for power??!!

-- Bucky.

[David Olhasso]

Forward falling poppers suck. They always suck. Any mechanical device intended to make then not suck will not work. Forward falling poppers that activate moving targets suck more. A match which has a stage in which 4 targets are all activated by the same forward falling popper also sucks.

Just my humble opinion.

[Vince Pinto]

David,

So what are you saying? You don't like FF poppers? Your message is unclear

Bucky,

If an FF popper "hesitates" too long before it falls, this usually means the angle while set is too shallow (not angled forward enough) and/or the distance it has to travel rearwards to disengage the hook is too wide and/or the popper travels rearward beyond the vertical when shot.

It's almost a black art building them correctly but, when you do, say "bye-bye" to popper calibration challenges.

The other thing is that with FF poppers, they don't need to be hinged to the base. The FF poppers we use in Hong Kong sit in a "V" channel, which eliminates one of the major reasons why regular poppers don't fall when they should (i.e. crud build-up within the hinge mechanism).

If you're interested, here is a basic diagram of a FF popper (note that "V" channel not shown).

[Flexmoney]

Here is Vince's diagram:

[tightloop]

I am with David, I think the design is poor and the function unreliable.

[Vince Pinto]

That comment would apply to poppers generally. I can't remember a match I've attended anywhere in the world (and I've been to a few), where the single biggest problem wasn't the poppers.

At WSXIII in South Africa, the poppers were rearward falling and, according to the Range Master, they had something like 90 calibration challenges in 8 days of shooting.

[mcginnes]

Ah HA! Life makes just a little more sense. All the FFP I have seen are the 'turned around regular popper' variety. (They have cost me time and points, and I hate them. IMHO, they should be banned.) I had never seen the kind in Vince's post, however I spent a couple of hours and designed almost exactly the same thing. The only real difference being that mine was spring loaded

[xcount]

Of course if he shoots an FFP once and it fails to fall, then it's most likely range equipment failure.

Vince, is this going to become official policy?

[Vince Pinto]

Michael,

I've seen a few spring-loaded FF poppers too which worked flawlessly (and damn fast too!), but locally we decided not to use them because they tend to take away the advantage of shooting Major.

And, given recent events, we don't want to give our old mate Lynn ideas which might cause him a serious concussion!

Xcount,

No, it's not "policy", and it probably never will be, because there's no way to know whether the actual bullet used to shoot a "problem" popper had sufficient power to make Minor.

However my experience in the early days of using FF poppers was that if it was shot in the calibration area and it failed to fall, it was invariably due to the fact that the stopper allowed the FF popper to retract rearwards beyond the vertical, hence calibration challenges rarely caused them to fall.

Of course once we became Masters of the Black Art and we constructed our FF poppers correctly, we've not had a single calibration challenge since.

These days, our primary target malfunctions are when the sticks holding paper targets are shattered by being shot, but thankfully this too is rare.

[shred]

A well-designed FFP is a thing of beauty. A half-assed one is a pain in the rear. We've got a guy locally that builds some super nice ones. The mech is more or less like the picture, but instead of just gravity pulling the hook down, there's a piece on the plate itself that also pushes the hook out of the way, should it not be moving on it's own. No way to DT these back up again. The plates are also dead-vertical, but on a 3" offset hinge so they can't stay up if the hook is gone, and have plenty of pulling power for activators as well.

[benny hill]

last year at a state match I'm burning a stage down. All the poppers fall back except the last one. I hammered a shot on it, it didn't fall back so I hammered about 5 more shot's on it before it dawn'ed on me to just let it fall FORWARD. Damn I hate thoes poppers.

[Vince Pinto]

Benny,

Sorry to hear of your experience.

However the problem is not the FFPP. It's moronic stupidity in course design and construction. IPSC shooting is supposed to be testing your shooting skills, not your memory.

Commonsense (often a rare commodity), dictates that all poppers in a single stage fall the same way, just like all doors in a single stage should open the same way (e.g. all outwards or all inwards).

[muser]

Benny,

Sorry to hear of your experience.

However the problem is not the FFPP. It's moronic stupidity in course design and construction. IPSC shooting is supposed to be testing your shooting skills, not your memory.

Commonsense (often a rare commodity), dictates that all poppers in a single stage fall the same way, just like all doors in a single stage should open the same way (e.g. all outwards or all inwards).

I can assure you that every shooter that walks a stage, including while he is

"on deck", is committing to memory every target location, their order of engagement, and where any reloads are going to take place. IPSC is very much a memory sport.

It is rather silly to expect that all of the doors in a stage open in the same direction, and that all steel falls in the same direction. Do you really think that we are all a bunch or morons? To judge the quality of a stage by such measures is questionable, at best.

[benny hill]

One day you will be as old as me & then when you get a case of oldtimmers disease & forget something on a stage of fire, think back to today's answer.

[Ron Ankeny]

[rant mode]

I am with Vince and Benny and I am neither a moron nor am I suffering from...er I forgot what they call it...oh yeah, old timer's disease. Had I been in Benny's shoes, I would have hammered the popper several times. Any course of fire that includes stunts designed to confuse and/or trip up a shooter is a bad course of fire, period.

[/rant mode]

[Vince Pinto]

Muser,

Perhaps you have more experience than I in designing, building and/or officiating at IPSC matches but, in my experience, having doors open different ways within the same stage is also very unsafe.

And no, it's not because competitors are morons.

During a COF, competitors concentrate on shooting at the targets, as they become visible, as accurately and as quickly as possible. Hence having a stage where the first one or two doors push open away from the competitor, with subsequent doors opening by being pulled towards the competitor, is asking for trouble.

Do you have any idea (or can you imagine) what happens when a competitor moving at pace with a loaded gun rushes towards and pushes a door which is supposed to open towards him?

DQ traps are something that course designers and range officials who know their ass from their elbow avoid at all costs.

[mcoliver]

I have to agree with Vince. I can still find my age in all months except Feb yet when it comes to opening doors or windows, I'd much prefer them to have a standard. And what about those doors that have REAL door knobs...C'MON! IPSC doors are supposed to be PUSHED or PULLED, no twisting with any ga'dang knob!.

[ErikW]

Where can I get some (good) forward falling poppers?

None at MGM, R&R, or GT web sites.

[mcoliver]

Since we're discussing poppers here, I'd like to share a recently 'DUH' moment and see if I get a common experience from the forum.

For rearward falling poppers, we normally shoot high to make it fall faster (or shoot it more) and shoot low to delay activation of something so we can setup properly for the activated targets, right?

However, it never occured to me that for forward falling poppers the opposite may be true. Shooting high may actually increase dwell time (standing) due to the slack the popper has to take by moving rearwards first before actually falling.

Now I haven't really timed them yet in practice and could'nt tell for sure if the "dwell time" is significant (probably more of a factor in rearward slack, something to check in the walk-through? ). But the idea seems right, right? Has anybody ever timed these in practice?

Thanks.

[Run n Gun]

Erik,

Get a hold of Robert Wright at R & R I KNOW he makes them. The last time I was up there he had a bunch. Robbie’s “day job” often takes him out of town making him hard to get a hold of M-F. If you can’t reach him, I’ve got his cell number around here… somewhere.

PS Robbie and his wife just had their first child a month or two ago!

Ed

[Vince Pinto]

McOliver,

In my experience, the "dwell time" difference is the same, whether the PP is forward falling or rearward falling, and I suspect this has something to do with physics and leverage, although I must admit that physics was not my strongest topic in high school.

If you shoot the top of the PP in either case, I suspect that you generate more leverage, so that speeds up the action.

Anyway, I'm highly impressed that you actually consider which part of the PP to shoot, depending on the COF. Personally, I just hope to hit the bloody thing with my first shot

[lynn jones]

erik,

max davidson make very good quality fpps. www.gunsteel.com

lynn