Bowling Pin Shooting at Marion County Fish & Game on Saturday 2/27

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  • chizzle

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    Shooters,

    Our Bowling Pin Shooting match will be next Saturday, February 27th at 1 pm. We will begin setup at 12:30 pm, and we'll need help from volunteers. We will have a shooters' meeting (required for new shooters) at 12:45 pm to explain the rules. At 1:00 pm sharp, we will begin shooting. We'll be charging $3 per bracket for club members and $4 per bracket for non-members, with all money going towards the club or making the competition better. Youth (under the age of 18) shoot free with a paid adult.

    We could use some help finding some bowling pins to use at our match. We traditionally have only used free bowling pins, so that we can keep our match fees as low as possible. If shooters could ask around at local bowling alleys to get some free pins, that would be a big help!

    Bowling Pin Shooting is conducted under a COLD RANGE. That means all guns must be holstered (or bagged) at all times, unloaded, hammer down, with no magazine inserted. You may only handle your gun at the direction of a range officer (RO), or at the designated "safe table". Violation of these or any other safety rules shall result in a match disqualification.

    Rules are posted at www.IndyRange.com: If you have any questions about the match, please read the rules posted at:

    www.IndyRange.com (look under "Programs and Events" > "Bowling Pins")

    If you are unable to find an answer posted in the rules, please feel free to email us. Please let us know if you are willing to help as an RO, or as a scorekeeper for the match. Volunteers are the lifeblood of our sport, and of our club. With our numbers continuing to grow, we ask that everyone does their part to help the match run as smoothly as possible. Please be ready when it is your turn to shoot, help reset the pins, and volunteer to keep score.

    If you're new to competitive shooting, we encourage you to check out the following site. It shows upcoming shooting events for 3-gun, Action Pistol (Bianchi Cup), Bowling Pin Shooting, Cowboy Action Shooting (SASS), ICORE, IDPA, Multi-gun, Steel Challenge, and USPSA.

    www.IndyGunRacers.com

    See you at the Range!
    Chuck
    BowlingPinShooting@gmail.com

    "As to species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with a ball and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks." Thomas Jefferson 8 Papers of Thomas Jefferson 407 (J. Boyd ed., 1953)
     

    cbhausen

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    I wanna try this, but...

    My new M&P Pro 9 might be in for warranty work (front sight fell off). I could bring my Glock 27, a friend's Glock 22 or my 10/22 (presumably without 3x-7x B&L scope).

    Any recommendation on what to bring for my first time? Thanks!

    BTW I have at least 2 mags for each.
     

    m_deaner

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    I'd go with the Glock 22. Your M&P might not be the best gun to bring anyway - I really haven't been happy with the performance of 9mm on pins.

    You could use my Glock 35 or Glock 24 if you want; these are both in 40S&W, there's really not much difference than your friend's Glock 22 but the sight radius is larger.
     

    cbhausen

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    I'd go with the Glock 22. Your M&P might not be the best gun to bring anyway - I really haven't been happy with the performance of 9mm on pins.

    You could use my Glock 35 or Glock 24 if you want; these are both in 40S&W, there's really not much difference than your friend's Glock 22 but the sight radius is larger.

    Thanks for the offer; I might bring my G27 anyway. I know it's a handful in more ways than one (the Pearce Grip + 1s help me hang onto it but the short bbl and sight radius plus my nOOb shooting will be harder to fix).

    Does anyone bring rifles or shotguns? I've heard the really battered pins are sometimes polished off by shotgunners, I wanna see or be that, hehe...

    I know some bowling alley folks and I will try to line up some pins. Does that mean I get to de-frock them? ;)
     

    HICKMAN

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    I'll probably bring my G23 and shoot some pins, haven't done it before and the kids basketball seasons just ended.

    besides, with a lil practice, the G27 is awesome

    [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdqIhmu9Fuk]YouTube - Glock 27[/ame]
     

    chizzle

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    Bring what you have!

    Deaner is right; a longer sight radius really helps when shooting pins. While factory 9mm can work, typically ammo loaded with a heavy bullet (i.e. 147 grain hollow points in 9mm) works the best.

    That being said, come out and play with what you have! You can always get started with your existing equipment and improve it little by little. When I started, I was using an HK in .40; my how times change :)
     

    BrandonM

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    9mm will work just fine out of a full size gun. I shoot a Glock 17L using 147gr JHP. I use both Winchester white box from Wal-Mart @ $19/box of 50 and I also buy remanufactured ammo from Precision Delta. You can get a 5 box evaluation pack for $91.58 which I think includes shipping. Precision Delta - Competition Ammunition


    Hey not to hi-jack the thread but I just bought some white box Winchester for my G17 for $26.95 for 100 rounds at Bradis. Saw that you said your from Indy and Bradis is not to far from there. Just figured I would try to help some :ingo:
     

    chizzle

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    Thanks!

    Thanks for helping our participants find some ammo! Right now the weather is looking ok for Saturday; it's a high of 36 degrees (which is much better than the past few matches) and a 0% chance of rain.
     

    cbhausen

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    Finding bowing pins...

    Not as easy as it sounds. Every place I call seems to have just gotten rid of a bunch (hopefully MCF&G got some of these). I've got several feelers out and I'm supposed to call the Royal Pin corporate office on Wednesday. If anyone has any suggestions beyond "call a bowling alley" or Ebay or Craigslist let me know.

    And again, the nOOb question of the day: Does anyone do this with a long gun?
     

    chizzle

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    Rifle info

    We don't typically use rifles or shotguns on bowling pins. Occasionally we will allow people to use rifles in pistol calibers (9mm Luger, .40, .45, .38 special, .44 mag) but they are required to shoot additional pins as compared to pistol shooters.

    For instance, if you shoot a rifle in 9mm Luger with iron sights, you'd shoot 6 pins, while pistol shooters with iron sights are shooting 5 pins. If you bring a rifle in 9mm Luger with optics, then you'd shoot 7 pins while pistol shooters with iron sights would be shooting 5 pins. This is the best method we've found for levelling the playing field, so that we can all compete equally.

    Let me know if you have any questions.
     

    chizzle

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    Thanks for the hard work!

    Thanks to everybody for asking around about bowling pins. I understand that they're hard to find, and I really appreciate that people are working hard to find more pins.

    We've got a good supply of pins right now (probably enough to last until mid summer) but it pays to plan ahead so that we don't run out. Keep up the good work, and let me know if you find some so that I can meet you at the range to put them in the bowling pin shed!
     

    cbhausen

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    Did my first bowling pin shoot today...

    Had a great time and steadily improved with each round. Thanks to everyone for the advice and making me feel welcome. And that Glock 24 really has me thinking... One can never own too many guns, right? :) EDIT: and thanks especially to m_deaner for letting me use the G24 although it will probably cost me more than a few dollars in the long run...
     
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    m_deaner

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    Had a great time and steadily improved with each round. Thanks to everyone for the advice and making me feel welcome. And that Glock 24 really has me thinking... One can never own too many guns, right? :) EDIT: and thanks especially to m_deaner for letting me use the G24 although it will probably cost me more than a few dollars in the long run...

    I'm glad you liked it. Last time I was in MC Sports they had three G-24s there gathering dust.

    You just gave me an excuse to post a pic of it:
    4236640215_0e2b0e4fac_o.jpg


    PM me if you want a 40 load that performs well at pins. I worked up some loads using 220-grain bullets. They won't clear the pins like a 45, but they're not bad.
     
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