NFOA MEMBERS FORUM
General Categories => Newsworthy => Topic started by: Ghost on July 15, 2012, 09:47:08 AM
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A new indoor range is being built in Lincoln. See the story at the link:
http://journalstar.com/business/local/with-shooting-range-military-couple-giving-new-life-to-old/article_f022a45d-2b71-5fdc-b9f3-96e2de968d23.html (http://journalstar.com/business/local/with-shooting-range-military-couple-giving-new-life-to-old/article_f022a45d-2b71-5fdc-b9f3-96e2de968d23.html)
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Hmmm...they're optimistic about the opening date, thats for sure.
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awesome. That is just two blocks from my house.
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Not far from me either. I could ride the bicycle that far. (If I was into that kinda of crazy excersice stuff)
Kudos to them, I hope they can pull it off.
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Good News about this proposed new shooting range.
However, sure hope that it does no harm to Randy Lauer and Thunder Alley.
May both ranges prosper..............
Even enough to open active branches in Omaha.
sfg
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Good News about this proposed new shooting range.
However, sure hope that it does no harm to Randy Lauer and Thunder Alley.
May both ranges prosper..............
Even enough to open active branches in Omaha.
Thunder Alley just isn't that big---I'm thinking Lincoln easily has enough shooters to run MORE than two indoor ranges at a profit for everyone. Glad to see this happening!
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That's a pretty big building with, presumably, a lot of overhead... I'm hoping they can keep prices on range time reasonable.
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That's a pretty big building with, presumably, a lot of overhead... I'm hoping they can keep prices on range time reasonable.
thats what i was wondering about as well...mildly concerned that the cost of renovations may have an impact on what the fees are.
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Not far from me either. I could ride the bicycle that far.
Don't try that with any long guns strapped to your back! Lincoln residents would see that and drop from sudden strokes, and then an urelated Banking bill would get gutted and re-written to ban all guns from bicycles on City streets!
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Don't try that with any long guns strapped to your back! Lincoln residents would see that and drop from sudden strokes, and then an urelated Banking bill would get gutted and re-written to ban all guns from bicycles on City streets!
I wasn't thinking of taking any long guns there (but don't think I haven't thought of throwing the ol Marlin in a scabbard on the motorcycle and headed to the public huntin grounds around Lincoln)
And ; (If I was into that kinda of crazy excersice stuff)
Means i'm not one to exert that kinda of energy)
That being said I have headed to the shooting range/ areas with the range bag full of pistollas and ammo strapped to the motorbike more than once.
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This makes sense. As soon as I transfer out of UNL Lincoln gets another shooting range. I like that "try before you buy" policy they want to implement. May have to make a trip down there after it opens and support some vets.
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Quick update: the signs for the Big Shots Shooting range are up on the building, and a large banner across the windows says "Opening Soon".
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Good for them, competition is always good for the consumers and if done properly is good for the businesses too. Exposure in a visible place like that can only lead to more shooters too.
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I heard they were meeting with the ATF today, but also heard they have been getting the run around from the City.
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What? Lincoln giving a business a hard time? That's crazy talk.
This town is so anti business it's ridiculous. I can only imagine the trouble in starting up a firearms related business.
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What? Lincoln giving a business a hard time? That's crazy talk.
This town is so anti business it's ridiculous. I can only imagine the trouble in starting up a firearms related business.
Unless you are HyVee, Walgreens, or Breada... then they'll throw money and permits at you so you can open stores every three blocks.
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Unless you are HyVee, Walgreens, or Breada... then they'll throw money and permits at you so you can open stores every three blocks.
Braeda every three blocks??? I missed opening those other ones then :-) I can assure you that the city hardly throws money and permits our way.
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What? Lincoln giving a business a hard time? That's crazy talk.
This town is so anti business it's ridiculous. I can only imagine the trouble in starting up a firearms related business.
UNLESS you can sell yourself/ business/soul the the Huskers. Then the sky is the limit! I know this to be fact by all the cranes within sight of my apartment!
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My son works at BestBuy and I believe Teresa Clark came in to buy some items for their range. When he found out what kind of business she was buying for, he told her I was a gun nut and she gave him their card.
(http://i1120.photobucket.com/albums/l484/OnTheFly64/BigShotsBusinessCard_zpsdcd33bd0.jpg)
Fly
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Indoor ranges are not my thing. At all. Much rather see someone opening up a decent outdoor rifle range, but this is great for everyone else ;)
Found out recently I know one of the architects designing the thing, dated her a year ago for a couple months.
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Indoor ranges are not my thing. At all. Much rather see someone opening up a decent outdoor rifle range, but this is great for everyone else ;)
Found out recently I know one of the architects designing the thing, dated her a year ago for a couple months.
+1 on outdoor ranges. After college I am decided I'm moving to Grand Junction, CO, they have a range with 12 covered benches that go out to 1000 yards; best of all it's free.
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I need to find a decent outdoor long range, I lost my airport and need to stretch the mauser a bit.
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Any update? Has this opened yet? Did a quick search and only saw plan to open in October. Their website, is also under construction still.
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Rumor is opening in early November
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I just spoke to Teri (called the number on the business card above). She hopes this coming Monday.
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I drive by there mostly every day on my way to work/back home, I am patiently waiting for the Grand Opening sign to appear.
Note: I am not disappointed that they are not open yet, I am sure that (as with any project of this scale) they have hit a few snags along the way and would be more than happy to be open already.
Also, I can't imagine what it must have been like for them at City Hall.... "you want to open a GUN RANGE? and sell guns within Lincoln city limits???? Hope you brought some good scissors to get through all the red tape.."
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They are open. Went down to evaluate the place. A LOT of guns, my guess is close to 75 on display. Very large showroom, not alot of inventory yet, or maybe it looked that way due to being spread out so much. Range fees are $20 an hour, one hour minimum, and $5 every 15 minutes after that.
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Good to hear they are open. I wish them all the best. Now I will have to scrape up some $$ for range time...
Edited to add- their website has been updated with a little info- hours, rates, etc.
Edited again- I could have been following them on facebook and known a lot more....for some reason it didn't occur to me to look for them. :)
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They are open. Went down to evaluate the place. A LOT of guns, my guess is close to 75 on display. Very large showroom, not alot of inventory yet, or maybe it looked that way due to being spread out so much. Range fees are $20 an hour, one hour minimum, and $5 every 15 minutes after that.
One of the proprietors told me that all of their AR-15 merchandise was still on the way, and that in the meantime his wife made him move all the empty display units/shelving into the storage room so people walking into the newly opened store wouldn't be looking at a bunch of empty shelves.
One thing I noticed while I was there was that they are very Glock, Springfield, and S&W heavy. They did have a KSG that I drooled over for a while, but since I was carrying my four-month-old I didn't get a chance to play with it. The KSG is going for $980 if I remember correctly, a nice premium over MSRP, but still a lot cheaper than the $1200–$1400 that they are going for on gunbroker.
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I went and shot a few rounds at their bullet trap today. It's a very clean facility and very modern looking. The lanes are all equipped with a digital pad that you use to set the distance of your target (this is way cool).
You can't bring your own targets. The explanation was that the paper particles from a standard target will pollute the air or clog the air filters. Their special targets don't leave as much dust in the air, I guess.
You aren't allowed to draw from a holster while shooting. They also want you to watch a safety video before you use the range the first time. They're pretty concerned about your safety and health which is a good thing.
They do rent guns and their inventory is slowly growing as stuff comes in. I didn't have a chance to look at the choices, though.
Rifles are allowed as long as the ammo is not armor piercing and the caliber is .308 or smaller. They are very concerned about damage to their backstop, which I imagine is very expensive, so they will use a magnet on your rifle ammo to make sure it's not steel.
Overall, I was very impressed with the facility and staff. I will be going back, but my one problem is that it's so far from home.
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do they allow NFA weapons?
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oo good question. I don't have any of those, so I didn't think to ask. Sorry.
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do they allow NFA weapons?
I just spoke with Steve at Big Shots and he indicated that they eventually plan to have some Title II firearms available to rent, in addition to the twenty-nine Title I firearms that are either available for rental now or will be in the next week or so.
He indicated that they do not allow full-auto on their range at this time.
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I just spoke with Steve at Big Shots and he indicated that they eventually plan to have some Title II firearms available to rent, in addition to the twenty-nine Title I firearms that are either available for rental now or will be in the next week or so.
He indicated that they do not allow full-auto on their range at this time.
They have 29 weapons to rent? Wow. Are these mostly pistols? They mentioned the ability to "test" a gun before purchase. Curious to know if this is the way that can be done. Buy one of each you intend to sell and dedicate it to a "test" weapon.
I will have to check them out this weekend.
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They have 29 weapons to rent? Wow. Are these mostly pistols? They mentioned the ability to "test" a gun before purchase. Curious to know if this is the way that can be done. Buy one of each you intend to sell and dedicate it to a "test" weapon.
He told me the other day that they won't be able to have a rental gun for every model they sell, but it is my understanding that a lot of their rental stock will be matched up with the inventory that is for sale.
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I just spoke with Steve at Big Shots and he indicated that they eventually plan to have some Title II firearms available to rent, in addition to the twenty-nine Title I firearms that are either available for rental now or will be in the next week or so.
He indicated that they do not allow full-auto on their range at this time.
thanks for asking. did he mention anything about seeing the Form 4?
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thanks for asking. did he mention anything about seeing the Form 4?
He mentioned something about paperwork being processed, but he didn't give me sufficient details to know exactly what he was talking about. He seemed to have the impression that they were waiting on paperwork that would allow them to permit full-auto fire on the range, not just paperwork that would allow them to take possession of NFA firearms. That sounded odd to me, but since I just cold-called the guy and started asking him some questions I didn't want to start grilling him about being wrong on some of the fine points.
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I had the day off, so I took a drive down to check this place out. It is an awesome place. I don't understand how Lincoln can support two indoor ranges and Omaha only has one. Their prices on handguns were a little high. They did have a Gen 4 Glock 26 priced at 539, which I thought was really a decent price. All the other Glocks were in the $600 and up including a Gen 3 Glock 26, possibly wrong price. I keep hearing that there is two new ranges supposed to open in Omaha this spring, does anyone know anything about them? I hear one will be in the Old Mill area and the other will be out around 144th and I80 or somewhere close.
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I also went to BigShots on Saturday. Met the owner and his wife. Great people, and extremely nice. Rented an XDm 4.5" in 9mm for my wife to try and had a fun hour of target practice with the AR and Mosquito as well. A bit pricey on the range price and the weapons under that glass were certainly a bit spendy, but I think every weapon under there was an "upgraded" version. The XDm's don't come with Trijicon Night sights do they?
Overall, very happy with our experience and Allen a RO on duty, was a great guy to BS with while the wife was plinking away. Very knowledgeable and friendly.
Also got some pricing on FFL xfers. $50 for non memebers and $15-20 for members (IIRC). Like every other new business, there is overhead to cover in the first few months of operation as they feel out the customers. Hopefully these prices will lower as they become more established.
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"I don't understand how Lincoln can support two indoor ranges and Omaha only has one"
Lincoln can support two at this time as we've only had two for less than a month. That being said, hope both can hang around a long time. $50 transfer ??? Yikes.....
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"I don't understand how Lincoln can support two indoor ranges and Omaha only has one"
Lincoln can support two at this time as we've only had two for less than a month. That being said, hope both can hang around a long time. $50 transfer ??? Yikes.....
To be fair, that is for NON members, and they haven't posted the Member Pricing yet... But your reaction was the same as mine.
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They just posted on facebook, no caliber over 5.56/.223. Shotguns only when no one else on range, and no russian ammo.
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They just posted on facebook, no caliber over 5.56/.223...
Interesting. That must have just changed.
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Interesting. That must have just changed.
I know they had an issue Tuesday night with AP Russian Ammo. The sear and scrape marks are visible on lanes 2 and 3.
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I know they had an issue Tuesday night with AP Russian Ammo. The sear and scrape marks are visible on lanes 2 and 3.
Unfortunately, their post on Facebook says "Russian ammo...is often made with a steel core..." which isn't remotely true. And many people buy plenty of Wolf ammo for their AR and Ak variants, because it is cheap, plentiful, and perfectly accurate at most short distances. (And doesn't have a steel core, though the thin bullet jacket IS magnetic.)
I can understand them not wanting steel-core ammo. However, painting everything Russian as "steel-core" isn't a good solution.
They also say "Russian ammo can also be bad on your modern firearms" --- modern Russian ammo is perfectly fine. (Older foreign ammo is a different story---but that isn't limited to Russian ammo.)
I'm glad there is another indoor range opening up in Lincoln, and I wish that Omaha would do the same. (And then some...)
That being said, with their hourly range fee level, plus gun prices, plus the way their commentary is worded above, I'm not particularly thrilled with them yet.
(The comment on Facebook about how a Governor is his favorite "hand cannon" didn't help, either.)
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Unfortunately, their post on Facebook says "Russian ammo...is often made with a steel core..." which isn't remotely true. And many people buy plenty of Wolf ammo for their AR and Ak variants, because it is cheap, plentiful, and perfectly accurate at most short distances. (And doesn't have a steel core, though the thin bullet jacket IS magnetic.)
I can understand them not wanting steel-core ammo. However, painting everything Russian as "steel-core" isn't a good solution.
They also say "Russian ammo can also be bad on your modern firearms" --- modern Russian ammo is perfectly fine. (Older foreign ammo is a different story---but that isn't limited to Russian ammo.)
I'm glad there is another indoor range opening up in Lincoln, and I wish that Omaha would do the same. (And then some...)
That being said, with their hourly range fee level, plus gun prices, plus the way their commentary is worded above, I'm not particularly thrilled with them yet.
(The comment on Facebook about how a Governor is his favorite "hand cannon" didn't help, either.)
Not sure if you saw both posts or not, but the second post referred to the ammo ban based on Armor Piercing rounds...
Personally, it matters not to me as I have nothing larger than .22 right now! :pout:
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Not sure if you saw both posts or not, but the second post referred to the ammo ban based on Armor Piercing rounds...
Personally, it matters not to me as I have nothing larger than .22 right now! :pout:
I saw both posts, and I understand that they can't have AP rounds hitting in their range---that doesn't, however, actually change the inaccuracy of what they said in their first post regarding Russian ammo.
I'm not sure how banning Russian ammo is going to fix their problem, actually----according to them, people are showing US-made ammo, but shooting the cheap AP stuff in the range area. Banning all Russian ammo won't make any difference to that---it'll just annoy people who happen to have Russian ammo. It wasn't as if the problem was that people were showing Russian ammo, then shooting AP stuff on the range...
AP stuff was already banned. People were sneaking it in (according to their post) and shooting it. So...how is banning all Russian ammo (most of which isn't AP) going to change that, I wonder?
I do certainly understand them wanting to make sure that no one shoots AP ammo in their range, though.
....so, since you have a .22, you are going to come out to ENGC and shoot the Steel Challenge match in January, right? :) We've got a .22 division...
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They just posted on facebook, no caliber over 5.56/.223.
Yesterday all their paperwork said 308 and under.
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Well when the man who signs the checks says on FB nothing over 5.56, i think that supercedes what they already had printed.
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....so, since you have a .22, you are going to come out to ENGC and shoot the Steel Challenge match in January, right? :) We've got a .22 division...
Well...... I would be a poor competitor with my Little Mosquito and my wifes the better shot with the S&W AR-15 .22 so.... but I am looking to join ENGC. I think I will most certainly come out and watch it. I need to find a site that explains all the rules and a few vid's on HOW TO before I try competing.
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It would be nice for another range to open up in the Omaha metro to give the Bullet Hole some competition.
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Well...... I would be a poor competitor with my Little Mosquito and my wifes the better shot with the S&W AR-15 .22 so.... but I am looking to join ENGC. I think I will most certainly come out and watch it. I need to find a site that explains all the rules and a few vid's on HOW TO before I try competing.
Your mosquito would be perfectly fine---it is a pistol competition, not a rifle competition. :)
As for rules and how-to, here is a link to a thread we had awhile back in the Shooting Sports section about Steel Challenge:
http://nebraskafirearms.org/forum/index.php/topic,4766.msg34780.html#msg34780 (http://nebraskafirearms.org/forum/index.php/topic,4766.msg34780.html#msg34780)
Some other info:
http://hapkido.4t.com/Downloads/SteelChallengeComments.pdf (http://hapkido.4t.com/Downloads/SteelChallengeComments.pdf)
I note that you do NOT have to be a member of ENGC to shoot matches at ENGC. And we always welcome spectators (primarily because once you've seen it, you'll want to shoot it). :)
We are working on making a "how-to" video on Steel Challenge. Much of the video has been recorded---I just haven't had time to actually edit it and put it together in a coherent fashion.
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I stopped by Big Shots this morning for a short range session. The facility is top notch and the best indoor I have ever had the pleasure to visit.
The target carriers are easy to use and the staff is friendly and very helpful. They have a nice selection of handguns in stock if you're shopping for something new.
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I stopped by Big Shots this morning too. Had a great experience. Very friendly staff, phenomenal shooting area. I'll certainly go back.