Bianchi Moving Target

[Rufus The Bum]

I'm in the thought process of building a Bianchi moving target, but need a little info about how fast it moves. Better yet, If you have a simple solution to practicing the moving target, I'd really be in debt for your info. Thanks.

[tightloop]

If I am not mistaken, it moves 6' per second. Best method for practice is first to know the velocity of your load and thencompute the correct lead and then gear up, load up, and go shoot it. Shoot it from different distances, near to far until you have the correct lead established and ingrained into your shooting memory banks.

[BigDave]

If you are shooting stock (iron's), this is basically how it works.

The target moves 60 ft in 6 seconds or 10 ft/sec. With ammo moving 900-1000 ft/sec, my leads are like this:

10 yds: edge of X ring

15 yds: edge of 10 ring

20 yds: edge of 8 ring

25 yds: edge of target, slightly inward

My best score, which was in my third AP match ever was 438/480. I don' recall the X count.

The biggest key to this match is to get the gun moving, establish your lead and keep it moving. Don't look for your hits. Maintain sight alignment, sight picture and break a clean shot. People make a much bigger deal out of the mover than needs to be. This is my best AP event.

[tightloop]

After reading BigDaves post and thinking about it, I think he is correct, it does move 10 feet per second not 6.

[old shooter]

Rufus,

I built a mover about 20 some odd years ago. If you have the space, and are a little handy you should be able to pull it off, 20 years ago I wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed, but I make a very good mover.

Think about the mover as 2 seperate parts to build. I used 2- 6inch pipes as the main support. On one pipe, I welded a 1/4 inch plate about 8 inches by 10 inches. This was to mount the motor. This was mounted at the top of the left hand pipe on my mover, leaving about 4 inches of pipe above the plate. You now cut or drill a hole at the top of both pipes for the cable that will hold the target. The target holder of mine was a piece of 3/4 pipe with 2 tabs on them that held the 1x2 that held the target. Thread the cable thru the hole in the first pipe, then thru the target holder, then thru the second pipe. My pipes were set in concrete, but if yours are to be portable, I am sure you can figure something out by staking the ends if the cable. You should now have 2 sturdy pipes with a target holder that should freely slide over the cable.

Now, I am only going to give you the basics of how I wired the motor, and figured the pulley size that would make 10 feet a sec.

You need a capacitor start, reversable motor. These aren't hard to find, and you can find a used one if you know what to look for. Mount the motor on the pipe with the plate on it with the shaft pointing up. Your motor will be either 3450 rpm or 1725 rpm. Now, I don't feel like doing math right now, but...at 3450 rpm, a 4 inch pulley will go a certain speed. Remember, if it is 4 inch radius, you need to find circumference. circumference times speed will tell you what you need to know to get to 10 feet in 1 second. Not hard if you have a calculator handy. Now put one end of a rope thru one of the tabs on the target holder then around the pulley on the motor, then on to the other pole where you have put an idler pulley, then back to the target holder. Make it tight. Now, wiring the motor. I didn't have anything fancy that would stop the targets when they got to the other end, I did it manually. I make a wooden box with 2 regular light swithes. A double pole swithch won't work, but a 3 way will. I wired the 2 switches so that I could direct the target to go in both directions. I also had 2 strings that guided the lower portion of the 1x2 wooden target holder.

This is pretty much a copy of the bianchi targets, but I made a few changes to accomodate what I had, and what I could do. If this sounds confusing to you, I am sorry, and will gladly sort it out for you if you email me.

Hope this helps

Mike

[Ross Carter]

You need to get some practice in on a mover. Nothing will really take the place of it. But, what makes the mover difficult once you know your lead points is that it is purely offhand shooting. If you're in open you hardly ever shoot offhand except at the mover. You're grabbing the barricade or the ground every chance you get. If your practice is limited to the stages of the Bianchi you just don't practice offhand shooting. What has worked for me to get in shape for the mover is to shoot the plate rack all the way back to 50yds going right to left and left to right. You will found out quickly if you need to work on your offhand shooting. Good luck.

[Rufus The Bum]

Thanks guys for the help. I will keep an eye out of a motor and can easily rig something up over a weekend. I will also try the plates at 25yrds. Thanks again

[SRT Driver]

Rufus,

An old garage door opener might be the ticket.

[Ross Carter]

Rufus, out to 50 yds.

You want to be good doncha?

[SRT Driver]

Rufus,

Ross has a good point.

An 8" plate at 50 yrds looks the same as the 4" xring at 25.

[10mmdave]

Garage door motors work very well as a mover motor, I made a mover with 2 wire rope pullys, about 75' of wire rope (wire cable from HD) and 2 "T" poles made out of black iron pipe. The garage door motors will reverse and hey ?? if ya want you can use the remote ! Getting AC power was my biggest problem, borrowed a generator from a friend and we were off.

You will need to know the rpm of the motor to figure out the pully size to get the speed you want (10 feet/second-60 feet/6 seconds, thats what the rule book states anyway) The nice part about the garge door motor is the mounting base is already there, the reversing electronics and even limit switches for the target travel !! (I never did get that part to work right)

Good luck, I had alot of fun with mine, DaveP

[SRT Driver]

And if you get one that has those sensors that stop the door if something is in the way (forgot the correct term) you can set those to stop the target when it passes a predetermined point.

[gm iprod]

I'm with Ross, shoot as much as you can out to 50y.

Mickey Fowler shoots 4" plates back to 50y. That is murderous, but he has won more Bianchi's than I have so I'm with him.

A very good way to practice the mover (especially in open) is to shoot a static mover.

You put a target at the centre of the run, and then you take up your normal start position (lined up with the left or right side of the mover range), then on the start signal draw and unwind to the target and shoot. You must reduce the time to 5 seconds not six. Keep going until you can put them all in the X. This is more beneficial to open shooters as they aim at the centre of the target. But anyone will make quite good gains whether you shoot stock or open.

I use this when the range is busy and we do not have the space to run the targets. You must however practise on a real moving target before any big match, just to confirm that you are leading the correct amount.

I have improved my scores in the last 6 months from around the mid 460's to well over 470 everytime and with some luck 480 on more than 1 or 3 occaisions. Now all I have to do is keep myself together at big matches.

Persistance is a good attribute for the mover and the plates.

I shoot plates standing at least once a week. It helps with sight picture and trigger control. It also makes you slow down. Try setting up a dummy rack (make the targets 2") in the garage and just taking sight pictures and random dry firing at a single plate as you go througgh the sequence.

[Alan550]

The amount of lead depends greatly on the velocity of your ammo. On anything under 1,000 fps, you'll be leading off the target at 25 yds. Here's the formula and a chart that works:

Lead Factor for Moving Target

Formula: D / V x 120 = L

D = Distance to target in feet

V = Velocity of bullet in feet-per-second (fps)

120 = Assumed target speed of 10 fps

L = Lead factor in inches

Distance to center from edge of

X- ring = 2"

10-ring = 4"

8 - ring = 6"

target = 9"

800 fps, 45 min. lead

10 yds - 4.5"

15 yds - 6.75"

20 yds - 9.0"

25 yds - 11.25"

850 fps, 42.5 min. lead

10 yds - 4.24"

15 yds - 6.35"

20 yds - 8.47"

25 yds - 10.59"

900 fps, 40 min. lead

10 yds - 4.0"

15 yds - 6.0"

20 yds - 8.0"

25 yds - 10.0"

950 fps, 37.9 min. lead

10 yds - 3.79"

15 yds - 5.68"

20 yds - 7.58"

25 yds - 9.47"

1000 fps, 36 min. lead

10 yds - 3.6"

15 yds - 5.4"

20 yds - 7.2"

25 yds - 9.0"

1050 fps, 34.3 min. lead

10 yds - 3.43"

15 yds - 5.14"

20 yds - 6.86"

25 yds - 8.57"

1100 fps, 32.7 min. lead

10 yds - 3.27"

15 yds - 4.91"

20 yds - 6.55"

25 yds - 8.18"

1150 fps, 31.3 min. lead

10 yds - 3.13"

15 yds - 4.7"

20 yds - 6.26"

25 yds - 7.83"

1200 fps, 30 min. lead

10 yds - 3.0"

15 yds - 4.5"

20 yds - 6.0"

25 yds - 7.5"

1300 fps, 27.7 min. lead

10 yds - 2.77"

15 yds - 4.15"

20 yds - 5.54"

25 yds - 6.92"

Hope this helps,

Alan~

[brentm]

Shooting plenty of movers is a great way to get comfortable with the match but if you've no mover, like the guys said - off hand practice is what you need.

when i can't get to a mover range i shoot i practice two things to help

set up three 8" plates on a 50yard range one each side, one centre, timer on 5 sec, you can get the feel for those longer ranage shots with the timing...

the other simple one is to shoot a plates match standing, 1 sec quicker

enjoy