Picture of my rimfire rifle target

The wood is a good idear. Better would be to box the plate in 3-D, which would retrievably capture most of the bullets, addressing numerous issues, incl the liability. I would, however, reverse the concavity of the plate. A space of 4-12" between wood/plate would proly do.

Did you figger out how to motorize the base for the 1.25 steel? Might I suggest treads on sprockets.....

Keep in mind, this plate is something I made for myself to shoot .22 rifles. As such, with the plywood in front, I expect it to last forever and I do not want to make any further modifications.

I am not going to motorize it, I just want to weld a couple of things to it and sell. I do not have time for that sort of stuff.

Are you going to apprise the buyer that THEY will have to motorize a 6x6ft base, with sprockets and treads?? Or lash it to a burro..... lol

Sheeit, your 3/4 plate requires half a burro to hump dat thing around....

I don't think your intended use is particularly practical. Proly the person who buys it will buy it just for the 1.25 plate. What you could do, IF it is not too badly warped, is face the side that will require the least metal removal, for a nice flat (SELLABLE!!!) top. True, the thickness won't be uniform, but dats why yer gonna make it a bargain sale..... If the topology is right, you could mill the bent part of the plate into a step (rabett), which could actually be useful for alignment, etc.

Better wear eye protection, that backstop is going to reflect whatever you shoot back at you. My backstop has the plate tilting forward 45 degrees to bounce the bullets into the ground.

David

Absolutely correct.

This screams "safe".

{Gunner}

Cool one, David. :)

After reading how railroad rail could turn a bullet back at you me and a cowboy buddy went to trying to get it to do that. xD ...sure enough! :) ...once you got it dialed-in that rail'd turn them 22 bullets slick as anything. :)

We were shooting at a chunk in his back yard at ~45 degree angle.

The 22 bullets were comming off that rail regular as anything and starting to form a -doggone group- in the dirt. LOL :)

Alvin in AZ

Why exactly is it unsafe?

Richochets are very unpredictable with steel plates in the vertical plane. The bullet may..may shatter..or it or pieces of it may spray backwards rather surprising distances.

If you use a steel plate..make sure its at a 45' angle downwards so the round is directed at dirt or some other media that will capture it.

Seriously.

I still have a bit of lead in my left thigh that was the result of shooting at something big and steel that was in the verticle...40 yrs ago.

Gunner

The fixed angle of the plate perpendicular to the line of fire. Most targets are designed with plates at an angle or plates that are free swinging so they move to an angle to deflect the incoming rounds down, either into dirt or into some other containment medium. The most modern bullet traps are snail drum style which catch the incoming round in a curved snail drum that has a film of flowing oil on it and allow the round to spin around in the drum until it looses momentum and drops to the bottom where the flow of oil carries it off to a collection bin for metals recycling.

you'll find out.