It’s a lot of work but I use cut up racing slicks in my trap just pull the layers out the bullets are all laying there on the bottom
I have several ideas in the works:
1) add a second tank in front
2) add a wood disk in front of the sawblades to stop/catch the frags
3) build a sand-filled tank where I set up the tank then pour sand into it. When I'm lone shooting let the sand out, pouring through a screen. I'd have two smaller buckets of sand that would be easier to handle. I can get all the free sand I want outside a sandblasting place about a mile from my place.
4) I thought about hanging a large 1/2 thick AR500 gong in the metal trap to stop rifle boolits [I'd have to put a mudflap or ? over the front of the trap to contain the shrapnel
I built mine last year and have not reclaimed lead yet. I have about $100 into it. Just a simple box about 2x2 ft square with 2x12 sides (2x8 at the top so there is a slot and I can fill it with sand as it settles or leaks out). I put 3/4 ply on the back as that is what I had about the right size. Built a slot in the front to hold a piece of 3/4 horse stall mat from TSC ($35 on sale and I get 6 fronts out of one). Like OS OK, mine sits on a little garden cart (think it weighs about 400 lbs when full) so I can move it if I need/want to. Got the cart at Sam's Club years ago so did not that add it into the cost above. Think they go for $60 or so.
It has stopped .308 jacketed and .450 BM factory rounds at 50 yards, but its main purpose was to handle .22's and pistol bullets. Plan on building adding stationary one at the 100 yard range. The current box may get moved there and wind up building one out of 2x8's for the moveable trap used at shorter range. Sand is an excellent medium to stop bullets. See below:
https://www.theboxotruth.com/the-box...sands-o-truth/
The issue with sand is its weight. My new box with 8x2" sides will hold 2.33 cu ft - that is 225 lbs of sand plus about 50 lbs for the box. I am fortunate to have a range off my back porch so portability is not a concern. One option is to use the information from the article above and build two boxes. Boxes out of 2x6"s will hold 150 lbs of sand each. It appears the vast majority of bullets would be caught in the first box anyway making for less work to reclaim the bulk of the lead.
Like I said, I have not reclaimed any lead yet but hope it can be sifted out. Floating off the rubber kernels and dust seems less feasible for me. Plus I have thousands of tons of sand free and it will not deteriorate as it gets shot into.
Don Verna
I built one just like that several years ago. Most of my boolits turn to coarse dust. How about you? Do your boolits disintergrate ?
That's some great ideas guys, I especially like the one that directs them out the back and into a bucket.
Mrs. Hogwallop up and R-U-N-N-O-F-T.
I'm strongly thinking about sand.
https://www.theboxotruth.com/the-box...sands-o-truth/
22, 223, 7.62x51, 12 ga slug, 45/70 510 grn, 308 passed thru 1/2" drywall and stopped in 5 1/2 in sand
9mm and 45 acp passed thru 1/2" drywall 5 1/2 in sand 1/2" drywall and stopped
No wonder the military uses it
12-inch diameter 1-inch deep slice of sand in a propane tank weighs approx. 7.85 pounds
7 inches should stop everything I shoot X 7.85 = 54.9n pounds
I can shoot in my backyard so I have several bullet traps set up at 7,25, 50, 75 and 100 yards to recapture my lead.
I originally made my traps 18" x 24" x 5-1/2 " (HxWxD) filled with sand, but now use 2x10 lumber on the sides for 18" x 24" x 9-1/2" because some loads were blowing out the back of the trap.
These "boxes" are mounted a few feet off the ground and attached to vertical 2x4's.
I use old 1/2" plywood for the front and back and screw some cardboard on the fronts so I can use push pins to attach the paper targets.
When the fronts get full of holes and the sand starts leaking out I put my wheelbarrow under the trap, between the two vertical 2x4's and remove the front plywood. The sand falls into the wheelbarrow through some 1/4" welded wire screening.
It works great!
Deleted. Started to hijack thread. Sorry. Will post as seperate thread.
Last edited by MrWolf; 03-16-2020 at 06:16 AM.
i had a 1/4 lead plate that stopped .22 rf bullets. maybe a disk of lead poured in the bottom of the propane cylinder would deform enough to stop that slug and when you need lead, melt down the whole dam thing
I've built a 1/3 tank model with a 12" AR500 steel gong wielded in the bottom and rubber mulch to stop bounce back with a plywood front [I'm looking for some thick conveyor belt to replace the plywood, it's supposed to be semi self-healing]
and this one with sifted DRY sand to where the pot was 12" wide, a couple of 12" saw blades, DRY sand to 1" from the top then either outdoor carpet or jigsaw rubber flooring and a piece of plywood.
(IF you use damp sand, the boolits will form a channel then punch a hole through the back of the tank -I wield it up, went to dry sand and no longer had that problem )
the percussion of the heavy boolits in the sand tore the plywood out of the screws. since this, I have wielded 4 nuts around the rim of the tank and hold the plywood in with bolts and fender washers
An 8-gallon propane tank with some rubber mulch, a couple of saw blades then filled with rubber mulch also works
Conveyer belts, check with local quarries or gravel pits, anywhere that crushes rocks (or has a production line, like bottling plants)
Used to live by one. Their junk pile had a LOT of old tired belts. I imagine most have old ones or could let you haul one off when they change belts?
We used to have a indoor range in town that had a plate of salvaged battleship armor about a inch or so thick as a backstop.
It was angled at 45 degrees or so, and had a sand pit under it at the base.
Nobody ever mentioned that a bullet had ever bounced back off of it.
They wouldn't let you fire center fire rifle jacketed stuff though.
The concern was so many full house rifle shots in a small pattern might eventually chew a hole in it.
..
Another range had several layers of overlapping rubber sheets that looked like old conveyor belt material a foot or so behind each other.
There were piles of bullets on the floor under the first couple of layers, but not one ding in the cinder block behind them.
That concept should work with a 55gal. barrel and have 4-5 maybe 6 rows of 4-5 inch wide strips
that over lapped the gaps from the row in front and behind made from old tires or a conveyor belt.
Each row drops down in slots a few inches apart cut into the top/side and attached to a rod
or a board so the strips hung down inside the barrel.
Last edited by Winger Ed.; 01-15-2021 at 03:49 AM.
In school: We learn lessons, and are given tests.
In life: We are given tests, and learn lessons.
OK People. Enough of this idle chit-chat.
This ain't your Grandma's sewing circle.
EVERYONE!
Back to your oars. The Captain wants to waterski.
My latest renditions:
1) DRY-sifted Sand ( with wet sand the sand will form a channel and the boolits can plow a hole through )
2) 1/2" AR500 12" gong in the back with rubber mulch filling the space to keep the boolits from bouncing back.
I got a 1" thick horse stall mat that I will use the next time I replace the front. So far these two have caught EVERYTHING I shot at them, 22-30-06 - 8mm - 45/70
Last edited by Conditor22; 03-11-2021 at 01:51 PM.
Interesting project.
If emptying and sifting the Lead back out is a hassle, and ya don't want to get better and faster at it-
I'd just let it fill up more so I didn't have to do it so often.
Besides, if sand can catch boolits,,, then certainly spent boolits can catch them just as well, or maybe better.
I have a strong belief that, 'what you do well,,,, you will also find yourself doing it often'.
In school: We learn lessons, and are given tests.
In life: We are given tests, and learn lessons.
OK People. Enough of this idle chit-chat.
This ain't your Grandma's sewing circle.
EVERYONE!
Back to your oars. The Captain wants to waterski.
I use outdoor carpet and/or rubber floor mats to help keep the sand in the trap. After a few uses, the sand will start running out.
These are portable traps and I want to keep them as light as possible, I'm not getting any younger .
I use 4 Home Depot buckets set one in the other on top of sawhorses. The rear two are filled with sand so there is no air space when the buckets are assembled. The next bucket is similarly filled with rubber mulch and the front bucket is stuffed with the stuff. When they are assembled, they make a solid unit. At 35 yards where it is set for load development and chrono work, the combo has stopped everything I have shot at it including 44 Mag and 358 win. Nothing has made it into the last bucket sand and most everything stops in the mulch.
BP | Bronze Point | IMR | Improved Military Rifle | PTD | Pointed |
BR | Bench Rest | M | Magnum | RN | Round Nose |
BT | Boat Tail | PL | Power-Lokt | SP | Soft Point |
C | Compressed Charge | PR | Primer | SPCL | Soft Point "Core-Lokt" |
HP | Hollow Point | PSPCL | Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" | C.O.L. | Cartridge Overall Length |
PSP | Pointed Soft Point | Spz | Spitzer Point | SBT | Spitzer Boat Tail |
LRN | Lead Round Nose | LWC | Lead Wad Cutter | LSWC | Lead Semi Wad Cutter |
GC | Gas Check |