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Indoor Home Practice Solutions?

4K views 14 replies 8 participants last post by  JamesCC 
G
#1 ·
Hey all,

Do any of you have a setup to shoot your firearms indoors in your home (basement, rec room ect.) or in a building near your home? (garage, pole shed, ect.)

Are there any practical and safe options for indoor home practice with smaller handguns (9mm or less)? Or maybe even a .22 rifle?

Where I live, there is no indoor range near me, and with the cold and snow we've had up here in the north, shooting on my outside range isn't an option a lot of the time.

In my situation, noise wouldn't be a factor (I live in the country), and I have the room to try something like this.

I've considered getting an Airsoft gun to practice with indoors, but I'd rather spend that money on more .22 ammo.

Any suggestions?
 
#2 ·
There are options, certainly. As an apartment dweller, I have used break-barrel .177 air rifles with lead pellets. I've made a target box with old phone books and newspapers that traps the pellets nicely, and the targets can be taped to the side. It sits in the closet when not in use. Of course, a metal trap can be used too, although it makes a louder ping when in use than the dull thwack of the carboard box. The metal trap has little orange plates though, which are fun to hit. The splattered lead pellets can be a nuisance to pick up, however.

The key is a long hallway or adjoining rooms in order to get the necessary challenging range.
If you have a basement, you might try a similar set up with .22 shorts or something like that without much more of an outlay. You might look into a .177 rifle or pistol or both, depending on your preferred shooting practice.
 
G
#4 ·
Thanks for the suggestions.

I've thought about the pellet gun idea, and I may end up doing something like that.

I don't have a basement, but I do have a pole-shed with about 15-20 yds to work with. I was just hoping to find a safe option for a backstop to put in there for normal pistol work.
 
#5 ·
Hi,

I've not been dry firing as I should either. When I do get outside to practice with the handguns, my groups reflect that.

One thing I need to start doing again is shooting the plastic ammo I have. It's just red plastic cases with primer pockets and black plastic wadcutter bullets which are designed to be fired indoors. Not too accurate from a snub.

Then there's the "pencil trick" I guess I could do using my 9mm.

Josh <><
 
#6 ·
Old ROTC and Army manuals often have detailed diagrams and instructions on how to do the "pencil trick" for dry fire practice from a 1911.

Taping aiming points up to walls is also handy for dry fire practice.

Simply practicing the draw over and over until it becomes ingrained and automatic, as indicated up post, is also very important, certainly.

An important safety issue with dry fire practice for those of us who keep firearms loaded is that when practice is over, it is over. I have not had a negligent discharge, but dry fire practice can create scenarios to be avoided. In my case, I leave ammo in a room that I never dry fire practice in, and when I re-load the piece in that room, I'm done with the practice session.

While some folks dislike lasers, laser grips, and so forth, they do a great job of gauging steady-hold, flinch, etc. if you have a willing "spotter" while you do dry fire practice. Even if you rely on iron sights, if the laser dot is weaving or bobbing around, something should be corrected. YMMV.

--d.
 
#7 ·
An idea for practice mags:

Take a junk mag you have - with a steel bottom - and pour melted lead into it. This will approximate the weight with the loaded mag.

Just an idea taken from a Jim Orlando, a Navy man and competition shooter, whose stuff I ended up with after he died. How I ended up with it is a different story altogether.

Josh <><
 
#8 ·
+1 on Dave's comments regarding the dry fire session being over, and on keeping ammo out of the practice area. As a LEO supervisor I had to investigate negligent discharges by officers both on duty and off. In almost every case the officer had cleaned his pistol, dry fired it for a while at his favorite electrical outlet or light switch, and then reloaded the weapon. After a cup of coffee and a phone call or two, he returned, picked up the pistol, took careful aim on his favorite electrical outlet or light switch, and blew it out the back side of the wall.

I saw this time and time and time again, even in the designated cleaning area of the station. So when you're finished dry firing, avoid temptation and put the gun away for a while......unless the zombies are attacking in force you don't need to reload it immediately after the session anyway. Give yourself some time to get your brain back in gear before reloading, and follow Dave's advice to avoid reloading in the practice area.

We were always trained to dry fire into the corner of a room, where there are lots of studs to stop an inadvertant shot. Also, a piece of tree trunk about a foot thick and a couple of feet in diameter makes a very good bullet trap/backstop for dry firing exercizes. Best wishes.

JayPee
 
#9 ·
Highly recommend looking into one of these for dryfiring and administrative handling: http://www.safedirection.com/.

Several versions made, one of which is designed for use as a backstop when DRY FIRING. (And of course you still need to put it someplace where you won't muzzle-sweep things that should not be shot.) Won't help MRC with his original question -- SafeDirection ballistic pads are "one boom only" -- but when dry firing or administratively handling the pistol, it give you a no kidding safe place to point the muzzle. No holes in the book case and six of your favorite books, no holes in the drywall and studs or TV, no holes in your significant other, kids, neighbors, or pets if you really screw up.

I've posted on these before, and some people seem to think this is somehow cheating and giving yourself permission to have an ND, but this is nonsense. If you pick up a gun, you are running the risk of an ND, period. People are fallible. You have to point the muzzle someplace. There's really no excuse for not having a safe place to do so, and really, book cases and gun safes and corners of rooms are not safe places, they are just least-bad choices.

elb
 
#10 ·
My 2 cents on dry firing and safety,

Holsters can be used to make guns safe.

My carry gun is a SA 1911 that I carry in an in the waist band holster. I store it at home in a drawer loaded, cocked and locked in the holster.

I store it that way all the time. If it's in the holster and in the drawer it's ALWAYS LOADED and I treat it as such.

When I practice dry firing it I take it out of the drawer, unload it, go to a different room and do drawing from concealment drills etc. When I'm done I load it put it in the holster and it goes back in the drawer every time.

I don't leave it laying around in the holster unloaded. NEVER

I don't leave it laying around out of the holster loaded. NEVER

Therefore if I see it in the holster I KNOW it's loaded. If it's out of the holster at home it's unloaded.

I don't carry it around in the house loaded. I put it on and leave. I come home and put it away.
 
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