PMCI - March 2021

pmcimagazine.com
SKILLS & DRILLS
MOBILE RANGE
With our good friend and valued PMCI contributor Andy N back in the fold he continues to share the experience
he has gained both in the UK military and “on the circuit” as he continues with his usual wry take on the “Skills
and Drills, Kit and Kaboodle” that are invaluable to any shooter!!!
D
oing the rounds on the square ranges, whether
it’s for personal gain or for defensive tactics can
be a little laborious to say the least. Even the
most sophisticated and high tech range can
seem like a place of doom and gloom. But what
if you find yourself on a range in the middle of
nowhere and with few and slim resources? How
would you go about setting up targets to practice
those new and old skills?
In this issue of PMCI I want to introduce you to my portable
or mobile range bag. I have three range bags; one for indoor
training with minimal kit, a bag for outdoor training with almost
everything I need for a full day on the range whatever the
weather, and my mobile range bag.
There have been many times that I’ve had to improvise adapt
and overcome during training sessions both on a purpose-built
rage and in the middle of nowhere. It can be hard and frustrating
at the best of times when you struggle to make do with only
what you have to hand. So I decided to put together a bag with all
that I need to build a range (well, targets system anyway). It may
not be the best nor the prettiest of systems, but when you have
absolutely nothing to hand this, to me, has proved a life saver.
Quite a few chaps who have had the privilege to use my mobile
range bag have gone on to put one together for themselves.
My first task was to plan it to be portable enough to take
on any deployment I may find myself on. Everything had to
be compressed into a large sports hold-all which was not too
cumbersome and heavy. This took lots of trial and error before I
got just what I needed, but my final result was workable.
My first problem was the target stand. For this I used 35mm
poly pipe the kind you find in a plumbers merchants or hardware
store. I cut lengths of pipe to fit into the bag with T-joints and
bends to construct the shape. I also added a couple of straight
connections for when the pipe gets damaged, so I can make a
quick repair. I use sticky tape to hold the paper target to the stand
once constructed. As for the targets themselves I use basically
whatever I can lay my hands on at the time. If it’s available, I
will use a role of lining paper, the type that decorators use when
papering a wall. This is cheap and easy to get hold of in most
places. Once secured in place with your trusty sticky tape you are
free to draw or spray paint wherever targets you want. The poly
pipe structure is lightweight and very sturdy for what it is but it
will need to be secured to the ground in order to stop it falling
over in the wind. For this I have used rocks, sandbags and even
filled the pipes with dirt from the ground before now. I’ve rarely
had any issues with these methods.
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