Plinking for pleasure!

[Jonathan333]

Folks,

I'd love to know what you all do when you plink. Its such a wide area that I can't help but feel that there will be some fascinating stories out there.

I started plinking in the 60s when, as a spotty teenager, I had a selection of poorly built Airfix models. The provided more entertainment as an air rifle target, shooting them in the garden with a slightly wobbly Webley Mk3 or a Webley Junior, than I ever got from building them. My parents must have gone mad, with bits of Bristol Beaufighter scattered across the lawn... Obviously Coke tins were a prime target, particularly as they were actually made of tin and lasted much longer as a result. I heard of one girl who was given a dolly for her birthday while her brother was given a BSA Merlin. She found the Merlin much more fun so she shot the dolly. Worryingly, she became adept at head shots!

Forty something years later and I'm still shooting tins. They're thinner, and most airguns shoot straight through them, but there's still a simple pleasure in chasing tins up the garden with a spring gun. I still haven't got into the PCP thing yet and still love the involvement of the older guns. They seem to have so much character. The Airfix models have long gone and this is probably a good thing because they'e so much smaller I'd be unlikely to hit them.

And surprisingly, after all these years, I've had a bash at target shooting. Nothing formal - I'm not a member of a club - but there is a certain satisfaction from getting the very occasional tight grouping. But ultimately shooting tins is where its at for me, whether its with a rifle or pistol. It doesn't matter what the gun is - I'm as happy using a Lucznik Predom as a Feinwerkbau Mod 90.

The question is, how do you plink?

Jonathan333

[humperdingle]

A couple of mates and myself used to set-up opposing armies of plastic toy soldiers on the potato patch (!), and we took turns on trying to decimate each others' armies... 5 shots of the Gat each, with an artillery blast of the Pioneer .22 (Now B2 rifle) in between.

Toy cars coloured green as army vehicles

That brings back memories

[ducati]

god i was same with toy soldiers and used my first gun asi sniper they were good days them

[Powderfinger]

I blasted my Airfix models. A bit of a shame really. The remains are buried at the top of my old garden. It will give the archealogists something to think about in the year 2525CE: "Was this the site a battle between two races of 1/72nd scale warrior peoples? Why did they favour .22 over .177?"

[ggggr]

Well tin cans are always good but like you say, the soft drink ones are very thin now and dont make the right sound. I put wine bottle corks and caps out and plink at them. The synthetic corks are virtually indestructable but the proper cork ones are pretty good. I like to plink at the caps with a Bsa scorpion pistol, sometimes in very poor light. I wont say if had a drink when I do this (in case I get zapped) But I definately would not drive a car. I got my lady friend into plinking after I had relaxed her a bit as well

[Abe Gethin]

You can add me to the list of late 60's Airfix plinkers.

Many a plastic Panzer fell to my old Diana Model 2 and later an SP50 (my first Webley was an awesome upgrade from the Diana GATs).

Me and my mate got more adventurous later on by filling the models with cotton wool, meths, match heads and sandpaper, to try and get some pyrotechnics going when we hit them. It seldom worked.

Great memories.

[CHJF177]

Ah... nostalgia, where would we be without it.

I'm an early 60's plinker with my Diana model 22 ( still have it).

My Airfix models went the same way as others have stated!

Apples on the tree were also a favourite, try cutting the stalk!
also used to cut through the pellet skirt in a cross and fire it in reverse!
thinking I had created a 'hollow point' and then compared the entry
and exit 'wounds' on said apples against a normally fired pellet (inconclusive!)

and wasps on the large compost heap! quite satisfying seeing a hole appear
where there was once a wasp..... or did they depart a split second before
the pellet arrived? ...... or does this get classed as hunting not plinking?

Some may say I still haven't got a life yet!!!!!

[mark the hat]

my mums pegs on the washing line with an old diana sp50......she allways wonderd where all her pegs was going lol
and a
old guy next door HAD some old terracotta plant pots sat on the roof of his outhouse the sound of the pellet hitting them used to make my day
and them coloured darts you got with the gun i used to stick them panini stickers on the shed door......man city/liverpool/leeds/everton were allways the best ones to aim at
mark

[acdean]

A can lid dangling from a piece of string was great fun but inevitably we would end up trying to cut the string itself, which very occasionally we would do.

We collected loads of old paint aerosol cans once. The puffs of coloured paint were mighty impressive. Not sure Dad was so pleased with the multi coloured lawn though.

Most of our targets were attached to a lanky plum tree at the end of the garden. It eventually died, probably of lead poisoning.

Andy

[keith66]

I always liked plinking, tin cans, aerosols & bottles in the pond you name it though the thought of all those shards of glass today does make me feel guilty.
Also fun was crab shooting along the back creeks when the tide was out, moving targets! Definately a "sport" where .22 is better as a hull down crab can be dislodged from his bunker to run the gauntlet of massed air rifles. Just hope that there is no such thing as reincarnation as i have a feeling i know what i would come back as!

[Muskett]

Having destroyed my Airfix I had a cast iron Chieftain tank by Matchbox which was indestructible until I found Promethius pellets. Sustained hits in the same place finally broke through its armor.

Have all sorts of plinking targets now; even a moving one

[martini1215]

Match Heads

Latent firebug in everyone of my profession
I think it was the fizzzzzzzzzzzz and smoke when you hit em right that got me started

[1963cockney]

The memories this brings back ...nothing was safe from being "plinked" .....
although the targets changed as I got older

Airfix Soldiers
Airfix planes (one good shot would shatter it)
Action men (firing squad anyone ?)
Wasps (particularly when leaving the metal dustbin lid slighly off to attract them !)

and anything I though my younger brother wouldn't notice had gone from his bedroom