Hi All

We've just completed another couple of working bees at our club remaking/repacking our target butts, in steaming hot weather, to prepare them for a major ranking shoot for SE Qld clubs just two weeks ago.

Just that one day's shooting and we need more working bees to repair, rapack and remake the bloody things again. AAAAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!

This really is a tiresome business and I'm sure archers everywhere struggle with the problem. The current range of solutions is either highly expensive (eg Danage Domino targets) or highly work intensive (just about every other solution).

As I am getting older and tireder, I have been searching for an easier solution and believe I may have come up with one. I have to say right from the outset that this isn't my idea but was invented by a firm calling themselves ProMat, which makes a target consisting of a mesh, monofilament front screen which holds the arrow in place as it penetrates and a material backstop (probably made of Kevlar or the like) to prevent arrow penetration.

My idea is a refienment (I hope) on this idea. I once tried the ProMat backstop and it didn't prove terribly durable or long lasting so I really never pursued the idea any further. However now I think I have a way to get around this and make for a workable long lasting target (I hope)

As best I can determine, the mesh that ProMat uses is a monofilament, self healing, polymer screen printing mesh and I discovered many websites on the web offering this stuff for sale in a heap of different grades and it's pretty cheap too.

The problem at this early stage is to work out which mesh is the most suitable. One has to get the right degree of "space" between the meshes but this should be a case of trial and error. I'll start with a fairly open style and work from there.

I intend using two screens, not one, some six to eight inches apart to give better control of the arrow and stop any movement. For a back stop I have contacted Dupont Aust and asked them about obtaining either heavy duty Cordura or Kevlar ballistic cloth. I'll use a single heavy layer of this but with two reinforcing pads about seven ring size attached to the main stop with velcro so that they are easily changed if damaged. This back stop will have brass eyes fitted in the corners and attached to the target frame with springs to allow some controlled give when the arrow strikes. See Drawings:



The real key to this thing working, I believe is to change the arrow point design. I'm not sure if any back stop will take the pounding of the usual arrow points, which although not greatly sharpened nevertheless have a point to them which will penetrate just about anything.

I've just ground down one of my points using a hand held Dremel and cut off wheel to achieve a rounded point, which should allow for parting of the mesh material without damage to it and should not penetrate the back stop material or if it does it should be very limited. here is a pic of what I have done:



You may well think that this will cause a wide variation in arrow weights. Not so. I have done this with several points now and have kept the weight to within a couple of grains of each other so it isn't a problem. Just a bit of care needed.

Will it work?

Well the ProMat works and I believe this is an improvement of the design. I'll let y'all know following Christmas.

I offer this design up to all here in case you too, like me, have been struggling with this issue as well.