so I was shooting on a friend's makeshift range last night. he has a few of those steel plates set up so that you can hear it ring out when you hit it. Anyway, I got to wondering what happens to bullets when they hit the plates? Do they just disintegrate or do they ricochet off in random directions? the 9mm rounds I was shooting didn't even put a dent in the plates, just chipped a little of the paint off the surface and that's it.

turn in to fragments. bout to build a few 1" thick for a buddy of mines range club

What kinda steel and what u cutting it with?

This, a good steel target stand/hanger will also allow the target to swing back a bit when hit or be angled slightly as to deflect the fragments down to the ground at the base of the target.

Not all bullets turn into fragments. I have shoot a lot of plate with pistols and rifles. The pistols bullets can fragment or they can expand and shoot off that plate. The plates should have the target surface of the plate facing the ground angled at about 10 degrees or so forcing the bullet to go into the ground. But this is not always the case with all targets. Think about poppers or knockdown targets. These target fall backward by the force of the shoot, seen lot of these targets throw the bullet up into the air. You can see them they expand out to about the size of a quarter and go up into the air. With shooting steel plates with short ranges with a pistol (only) I'd keep target 15 to 20 feet away. If you need closer shots then run a paper target (now all this take place in a 3 sides shooting bay with all pass thru targets set-up so bullets in up in the dirt berm.
When shooting this type of stuff always wear eye protection. I have not seen a bullet come back and hurt anyone but I have seen them frag and a piece cut a mans arm. If it had had his eye it would have been bad. I have also seen birdshot come back off steel plates and pepper me, when shooting three gun stuff (this is why no magnum load or buckshot allowed in the matches).


As for shooting rifles (not 22's) I'd keep the steel back at least 200 yards away. Use paper for closer stuff. And as above have the plates setup to swing or angled to the ground. The rifle bullets seem to just fragment at 200y out to about 400y after that we see deformed bullets laying on the ground where they have bounced off the steel after losing velocity.

If you ever have the time go out to Brock's Gap in Hoover and watch one of the action pistol/shotgun matches and you'll see for yourself what the bullets do.

cold roll nothing special. they are already cut. they were leveling pads on one of my old machines. I saved them for a rainy day. gonna weld some chain to them so they can swing.

this is going to be for long range only

You also want a good flat surface on your steel. Don't shot at dimpled up steel if the bullet hits in one of the dimples it can send it back at you.

And always wear eye protection when shooting pistol at steel. I'd tell anyone to wear eye protection all the time when shooting but I do not always do this when shooting long range with a rifle.

This^^^. Never shoot damaged plates or plates that are not made of proper steel. I learned that the hard way, by digging bullet fragments out of my gut with a pocket knife.

dang!!