the purdiest shooting bench?

[alinwa]

This bench has been in my back yard for about 5yrs.... Back when we formed it up the forms sat for several mo before we poured it and then they didn't get removed for over a week and it ended up UGLYYYYY. It shoots OK but it was an eyesore......

We've had some time off from our real job of pouring foundations so we've branched out into trying some concrete facing methods. The ugly bench was our first project. I was loading some of the pix onto my website and figured hey, why not share

Before, during and after pictures......our first attempt at prettying up a poured concrete item.


checki'dout......

It still shoots good too

al




For the full story go to the picture gallery at http://www.sierraconcretefoundations.com/gallery.php?cat=concrete_tables&popmethod=

 

[Bill Wynne]

Al,

That is beautiful. Those benches are simply great in design and construction without the added beautifying techniques. With them, they are outstanding.

There is something to be said safety-wise for the design of joining several benches together. I remember seeing a young boy step out from between benches for a piece of brass at our gun range when the line was hot.

The grouping of several benches would provide added stability it seems.

Did you precast the top and set it separately?

I wish that your benches were included my bench article on this site.

Good work Al.

Concho Bill

 

[TomD]

As someone who has seen a lot of formed concrete I can say that the original effort is pretty d***** good. What did you use for the coloring agent, penetrating stain?

 

[mike in co]

Al,

That is beautiful. Those benches are simply great in design and construction without the added beautifying techniques. With them, they are outstanding.

There is something to be said safety-wise for the design of joining several benches together. I remember seeing a young boy step out from between benches for a piece of brass at our gun range when the line was hot.

The grouping of several benches would provide added stability it seems.

Did you precast the top and set it separately?

I wish that your benches were included my bench article on this site.

Good work Al.

Concho Bill

not to take away from the good looks, i disagree with the basic design. benches and target lines are nearly always laid based on the dominant right hand shooter. add one left hand shooter and things can go down hill quickly. the three bench section becomes a two with a single lefty on any of the first two positions(r to l) target line can also be an issue. center targets on the center of the bench not off the right side.

yes they look great !

mike in co

 

[Jay Idaho]

I really like it. I had two benches at my own range for 29 years but they were typical one-passenger benches (at different locations to get different distances). Your design allows for several shooters to have their rifles setup at the same time. I don't envision more than one shooter being active at a time but not having to move everything to changed shooters is a real convenience.
Well thought out and well executed.

Jay, Idaho

 

[Bill Wynne]

not to take away from the good looks, i disagree with the basic design. benches and target lines are nearly always laid based on the dominant right hand shooter. add one left hand shooter and things can go down hill quickly. the three bench section becomes a two with a single lefty on any of the first two positions(r to l) target line can also be an issue. center targets on the center of the bench not off the right side.

yes they look great !

mike in co

Mike, Should you have the need, You could put all the left handed shooters on the left and all right handed shooters on the right and everyone can sit and shoot.

Concho Bill

 

[333smitty]

alinwa's purdy bench

 

[333smitty]

als purdy bench

 

[333smitty]

als bench

 

[jackie schmidt]

What Am IMissing Here?????!!!!!

Being able to step out into your backyard and shoot would be quite good enough for 99.99999999 percent of serious shooters. But Ole Al has to have a attractive Bench to shoot from

Al, this next Sunday Morning, when I am taking my 1 hour treck to Tomball, I am going to be thinking, "man, our Benches are sure Ugly".

This just proves that Life is not fair. I wonder if this example of class warfare will be brought up in tonights Presidential Debate??.........jackie

 

[mike in co]

Mike, Should you have the need, You could put all the left handed shooters on the left and all right handed shooters on the right and everyone can sit and shoot.

Concho Bill

bill ,
look at the bench....the width of the far left is much smaller than any other section.
its not a big deal, but i would not like this design at any range i was shooting at. individual benchs,,,but with the fine finish.

( kinda a minor issue, i don't think al has invited me over...lol)

i like the nice large base....

mike in co

 

[HovisKM]

That's good Jackie. They are darn purty benches. Have you shot off them yet al ? If you have, does anyone to your left or right get vibrations that are unusual. I shot with a guy one time at a range that had two concret benches that were poured with one top. Seemed very difficult to shoot off of because of vibrations from each other. They were not like yours (how they are made). Just wondering because I am getting ready to pour benches this fall or spring and man, that sure is cool what you have done.

Hovis

 

[alinwa]

Al,

The grouping of several benches would provide added stability it seems.

Did you precast the top and set it separately?


Concho Bill

Bill,

This is the 5th set of benches I've done and it's poured all in one pour with rebar extending throughout for the cantilevers. There are no cracks in it anywhere. This bench is connected to the slab with rebar and is not isolated from the slab, (there are a couple of isolated ones on my website) The reason for this is simple...... this isn't my official bench it's only a temporary which is now used for the deer hunters to sight in from. I had a 100" vibrating road roller on site when I prep'd for this thing, it's on a serious bed of gravel extending down to huge boulders in the subgrade. It's rigid enough that when shooting 300yds using 36X-45X scopes we don't have to control the foot traffic, folks come and go at will, no vibration.

 

[alinwa]

And can you tell me at what time dinner will be served?

I guess you incorporate the stone look in exposed foundations?

Dinner is served WHENEVER you're in the area

Yes, we're now offering the "stone" facing..... we've got 6 different patterns and styles on 6 different retaining walls around the property, we're calling it "polyglot landscaping" hoping it'll be the new thing

Some of the later stuff looks really cool.... I mean REALLY cool! The stuff on the bench was just troweled on like sheetrock mud, all of the later stuff is actually stamped with a stone pattern and then carved out to look like mortered or morterless fitted stone joinery.

al

 

[Bill Wynne]

bill ,
look at the bench....the width of the far left is much smaller than any other section.
its not a big deal, but i would not like this design at any range i was shooting at. individual benchs,,,but with the fine finish.

( kinda a minor issue, i don't think al has invited me over...lol)

i like the nice large base....

mike in co

Mike, That is just a minor flaw. It leaves enough room for our far left friends. Jackie and I wish that was our back yard.

Concho Bill

 

[alinwa]

As someone who has seen a lot of formed concrete I can say that the original effort is pretty d***** good. What did you use for the coloring agent, penetrating stain?

Tom, yes exactly. The coloring agent is a dye from Smith Paint designed specifically for this. It's transparent so that it shows through and it doesn't affect the surface like paint......you can epoxy stuff right on top oif the dye and it'll pull and break the concrete instead of debonding, it's NOT paint! It looks better than acid stain without the hassle and doesn't materially affect the surface of the concrete in any way. The surface must be sealed AFTER dye application with standard sealers as if it were bare concrete.

al

 

[alinwa]

, i disagree with the basic design.



mike in co

Agreed. Your points are valid, thank you for bringing it up because it's important that folks can learn from this stuff......otherwise it's just braggin' LOL I should really set up some guns and shoot another pic, show the relative size and muzzle offset...it's just that for the website I call these "tables" not shooting platforms.

Note though that the benches are all wide enough, even that skinny looking one on the left has plenty of elbow room. The wider RH side is for setting coffee cups and gear on. The issue was, I only had 16' to work with because the left end of the apparatus contains an RV dump and a spigot, I had to work around the motorhome parking

The design isn't arbitrary but in other applications I do it differently.


BTW, my range is actually set up for movable RH/LH double-sided benches which look more like the ones you're used to, furthermore I've allowed room between the windows for placing the lefties and righties without conflict.

al

 

[alinwa]

That's good Jackie. They are darn purty benches. Have you shot off them yet al ? If you have, does anyone to your left or right get vibrations that are unusual. I shot with a guy one time at a range that had two concret benches that were poured with one top. Seemed very difficult to shoot off of because of vibrations from each other. They were not like yours (how they are made). Just wondering because I am getting ready to pour benches this fall or spring and man, that sure is cool what you have done.

Hovis

Hovis, no this one does not vibrate, (see post above) We've been using it for 5yrs. For your own benches I strongly recommend isolating the bench from the walking slab. To do this you must form and pour the bench first and then pour your walking slab around it keeping it from bonding to the bench. This applies if you're pouring a "light" setup. The one in the pic is "medium" weight and it's set on compacted gravel, SERIOUSLY compacted gravel. If you're doing one like this and you set it on a subgrade which has been compacted with something like a walk-around plate compacter it WILL MOVE! If you set it on 12" or more of contained ConAg that's been hammered in with a jumping jack you'll probably be OK depending on your area.

Some of the "heavy" benches we've done, (one of them is in the web gallery, the one with the 6" thick top) are extremely stable. I shot for years off of the one in the gallery and a person could dance on the table while another was shooting. (We didn't do this a LOT, but you know...fundraisers and after-hours stuff)

al

 

[alinwa]

Being able to step out into your backyard and shoot would be quite good enough for 99.99999999 percent of serious shooters. But Ole Al has to have a attractive Bench to shoot from

Al, this next Sunday Morning, when I am taking my 1 hour treck to Tomball, I am going to be thinking, "man, our Benches are sure Ugly".

This just proves that Life is not fair. I wonder if this example of class warfare will be brought up in tonights Presidential Debate??.........jackie

It's all about the WIFE Jackie ...... she thought it was unattractive....


Actually I'm flat-out lying. We did it for advertising on my website. It was concrete. It was available. It had interesting angles. It's easy to get pictures of.......and it's far enough from the house that we started on it so that by the time we got over to the stuff closer to the house we'd be doing better work. The stuff by the house is awesome

al


BTW......it's worse than you think. That bench is OUTSIDE!! And although it does have Simpson Collars cast into it for accessories like umbrellas and chronograph mounts and stuff, sometimes it gets COLD out there! Just this last winter it got down into the mid-20's and we've had frost already twice this Fall........no, I shoot from the building about 35yds away from this bench. And on the cold days I turn the heat on...... It's 'wayyy more convenient because my reloading room is there, the room is wired for sound and there's 7 stations to shoot from so's we can mingle around. Ohhh Yeahhh..... and there's power for the coffepot.

Life is good


al

 

[alinwa]

Vic, thanks for posting these correctly.

Jay, thanks for the kind words...... you know that that offer still stands Come and shoot off this thang!

LOL


al