Rear plate?

[Wal86]

Fellas,

Need some clarification on the rules regarding rear plates, to sit your rear bag on...
Im looking at building a rear plate for my rear bag but want to make sure that it's legal.

Is it legal to have a rear plate that is adjustable?
(Used only so you can adjust legs to make plate level on uneven ground, just like your front rest)

Cheers

Alan

[johnk]

FO: (While shooting in Australia)

20.2.5 Rear Rest
(a) A rear rest must use a sandbag as the only contact with the rifle. It may not be attached to the front rest.
(b) Any number of simple objects of any material, including additional sandbags, may be placed underneath the rear sandbag to stabilise it or make allowance for variations in slope of the mound. This includes ‘donut’ bags.
(c) A plate of board may be used to create a stable platform for the bag to sit on and may include spikes limited to 50mm. in length, unless spikes are prohibited by local conditions.
(d) The plate or board may not have side rails or raised edges and the bag must be free to move horizontally in all directions.
(e) There may be no mechanical means of adjusting the bag, either laterally or vertically.

FO: (Elsewhere)

20.40 The use of ‘tables’ i.e. a single flat solid surface extending under both front rest and rear bag is prohibited. Carpet or similarly flexible matting may be placed under the front rest and rear bag. Separate flat boards and or plates not exceeding the dimensions of the individual rests by two inches on a given side may also be placed under the front rest and rear bag. In the case of a bipod the board or plate may be as wide as necessary to accommodate the bipod at its widest point, but not be more than 12" front to rear. It is not permitted to provide tracks for the guidance of bipod feet. No levelling screws or protrusions are allowed on these boards or plates. They must be flat on the top and bottom.

FS:

20.10.2 Rear Rest
(a) A rear rest must use a sandbag as the only contact with the rifle. It may not be attached to the front rest.
(b) Any number of simple objects of any material, including additional sandbags, may be placed underneath the rear sandbag to stabilise it or make allowance for variations in slope of the mound. This includes ‘donut’ bags.
(c) The bag may be placed in a box. The box may use internal or external spacers but must not have spikes and must be free to move laterally
(d) A plate or board may be used to create a stable platform for the bag or box to sit on and may include spikes limited to 50mm in length unless spikes are prohibited by local conditions.
(d) The bag or box may be restricted from rearward movement but must be free to be moved laterally.
(e) There may be no mechanical means of adjusting the rear bag or box either laterally or vertically.

F/TR:

20.40 The use of ‘tables’ i.e. a single flat solid surface extending under both front rest and rear bag is prohibited. Carpet or similarly flexible matting may be placed under the front rest and rear bag. Separate flat boards and or plates not exceeding the dimensions of the individual rests by two inches on a given side may also be placed under the front rest and rear bag. In the case of a bipod the board or plate may be as wide as necessary to accommodate the bipod at its widest point, but not be more than 12" front to rear. It is not permitted to provide tracks for the guidance of bipod feet. No levelling screws or protrusions are allowed on these boards or plates. They must be flat on the top and bottom.

[Wal86]

John,

Thanks for that,
Rule 20.2.5 rear rest (e) the way I read it, would make any mechanical adjustment to a rear plate illegal..

Cheers
Alan

[johnk]

Rule 20.2.5 rear rest (e) the way I read it, would make any mechanical adjustment to a rear plate either laterally or vertically illegal.

...as long as you read that in conjunction with (b). The way I judge it is that you can, for example, have friction tight washers on spikes & could vary the quantity to stabilise etc, but not an arrangement that you could manipulate shot to shot without the need to take the whole rear setup apart.

[Wal86]

Rule 20.2.5 rear rest (e) the way I read it, would make any mechanical adjustment to a rear plate either laterally or vertically illegal.

...as long as you read that in conjunction with (b). The way I judge it is that you can, for example, have friction tight washers on spikes & could vary the quantity to stabilise etc, but not an arrangement that you could manipulate shot to shot without the need to take the whole rear setup apart.

OK, so if you were to have threaded feet which didn't exceed 50mm in length you could say that it's legal?
The last thing I want to do is have something that maybe questioned by a RO or another shooter..

Cheers
Alan

[Wal86]

Does anybody use a similar set up where the rear plate spikes have a threaded washer on them where you can level up the plate?
If so at queens level was this exceptable?

Cheers
Alan

[AlanF]

Does anybody use a similar set up where the rear plate spikes have a threaded washer on them where you can level up the plate?
If so at queens level was this exceptable?

Cheers
Alan

Yes I do Alan. Its a flat steel plate with holes at each corner and nuts welded to the bottom of the holes. I use threaded rod in these nuts, plus a lock nut underneath, so lengths of each leg can be adjusted to a maximum of 50mm to suit mound slope, soil hardness etc. It has never been questioned by anyone, and as Johnk mentions above, it is only adjusted (if necessary) before the first shot is fired.

[saum2]

Alan,
A lot of ways to achieve a good rear plate to suit most mounds. We procured some thick alloy plate, cut it into lengths to suit our rear bags,machined a 3 degree angle and drilled & tapped threads for threaded spikes, Some were 50mm long & some 10mm for mounds like Bendigo where long spikes aren't permitted

[DenisA]

Regarding the rules. It was said to me a while ago buy a forum member, and I agree completely, the way the rules are written leaves too much open to interpretation based on the way the rules read and what the readers trying to get away with. The "intention" of the rule is what's important and that should be notarised with each ruling.

I believe that the non adjustable rear plate rule came from the non mechanically adjustable rear bag rule. I don't believe it has anything to do with levelling the plate on the mound.

Regarding rule (d) The plate or board may not have side rails or raised edges and the bag must be free to move horizontally in all directions.
I see plenty of people who have their feet screwed down through the plate with a large head above the plate which essentially stops the bag from moving when the bag is anchored against the heads. I've never seen someone pulled up on it though, nor have I complained about it.

My advice is to keep your 50mm feet narrow. I had solid tapered feet up until the QRA Queens. The CRO pulled me aside twice and said that people were complaining about me stomping my plate. I've always been conscious of stomping a plate in and only done it when the shooters either side of me were reloading. But apparently people don't like the mound to shake............ EVER. Now I tip toe into position, sometimes commando crawl into position so as not to cast a shadow when the sun is low and I only raise my voice to a whisper at the chalk boards also. These were a couple of other things shooters were winging about. Maybe we could pause the rotation of the earth, pause cloud and shadow movement and such for the duration of their shoot.

Sarcasm aside, keep your feet narrow. As the ground gets harder in the dry weather we've been having in QLD, it gets harder to seat a rear plate properly.

[Steve N]

Has anyone used one of those dead bottom or donut bags to stabilise their rear bag on the mound. I saw one being used a while ago and it looked okay. Anyone had any success or otherwise?

[johnk]

Can be a bugger to keep sand in (the model I have anyway) and really too small for field use. It's really a bench thing IMO.

[Gyro]

What I do with a sand bag that leaks ( don't they all ? ) the fine sand like say Zircon is go over the stitching with epoxy. Do it with the bag filled and maybe in more than one stage so the stitching being sealed is facing up as it cures.

Ive been playing with epoxy for years and if you have some in those little squeeze bottles you can very easily just count out the drops of each part to make very small batches in say a bottle top. Thickening agents are available if ya need to be filling gaps with the mix too, as are colouring pigments to colour the mix to black/red/yellow etc.

It's an awesome, hard strong glue and lasts for years in its container.

[johnk]

No, it's the filler that leaks.

[Wal86]

Thanks for the helpful advise

Cheers
Alan

[Gyro]

Just picking up on your comment DennisA about capturing the rear bag under the spike heads. That's gotta be fine because if the plates top surface has any of the many 'grippy' textures on it then the bag's going nowhere anyway, at least not during your string. So securing the bag to the plate is perhaps being done mostly for reasons of convenience during use and transportation ?

You guys in Oz have I reckon used some good common sense by allowing some 'tweaks' to the ICFRA rule book re permitting leveling aids for the rests ( some of ) on what is normally a compromised ground surface, sometimes very much so. Seems only fair to allow ALL the shooters within each class the chance to secure a nice stable setup ?

A story/example : at our Nationals at Trentham in January this year I shot FTR and when we got back to 1000 yards on the third day I found myself positioned at about the middle of the mound right beside the vehicle road into the range. Now work had been done here to the little retaining wall but the "range fairies" had not leveled the ground off at all well and the piece of ground I had was badly sloped. I could have complained and said I wanted a better spot but that's really gonna make me look stupid !!

My solution ; reach forward and find a small rock ( a protusion ) to put under my cutout free steel plate to get it level, or close. I shot my rifle free recoil and doing that with big bullets on a badly sloping plate does not work well !

My question ; was I cheating ?