Boomershoot 2010 was awesome and a lot of fun. I don’t know exactly why, but I ended up shooting the opening fireball for the shoot. Laurel from Politics Guns and Beer was there along with an entourage of help. I spent some time behind the rifle, but I spent more time educating and making sure others had a blast. And I’m glad to say, it appears they did have a great time.
The high intensity(video) shoots were fun as usual; feeling the boomers go off rattles your soul from head to toe always puts a smile on my face. The dinner though was a great social hour.
Oleg was there along with Laurel, Mike and Abigail.
Abigail
As well as some friends from my days back in scouts. I told them I was going to put this pic online and I’m a man of my word. For those who don’t know, yes I’m an Eagle Scout and the reason I carry is to “Be Prepared.”
Mike, Andy, and Robert
We had a wonderful dinner which raised $2000 in raffle tickets. Half of which went straight to Soldiers’ Angels. The other half is put into a raffle lottery split into 10%, 10%, and 30%. David won the $600 which he then stated that he was going to make a $1000 donation to Soldiers’ Angels when he got home. Thank you David.
Overall it was yet another awesome year at Boomershoot, with a great reminder of how great the people are who participate. I hope to see you all again next year.
TMM is the owner, editor, and principal author at The Minuteman, a competitive shooter, and staff member for Boomershoot. Even in his free time he’s merging his love and knowledge of computers and technology with his love of firearms.
Many know his private name and information however due to the current political climate, many are distancing themselves due to the abandonment of Due Process.
Now that my box is back up and running, CAPTCHAS enabled, and I have a minor break in things. I guess I’ll do a post on last year’s blogger day. This year I’m going to help with setup on Thursday and let my wife enjoy blogger day. She has an account here, and can blog, but she says she has nothing to write about. Hopefully I can change that.
It started off in the wee early hours of the morning, around 10am I do believe, when fearless leader arrived. Note, awesome video at bottom!
Joe then proceeded to give us a tour of the BoomerShoot site from the gun line. Giving us a background and history of how it started. From there we moved to our real meeting location for the day, the Taj, where a smile is put on everyone’s face like a kid on Christmas morning. “Why?” I hear you ask. Because we get the coolest stuff to unwrap and play with. Some even taste tested the ingredients. While I highly suggest you DON’T do this, in this case it was safe. If you want to know why, go to blogger day and find out for yourself!
Joe with smaller portions.
From there we then moved into the history of Boomerite. How a series of failures and different approaches to the problem finally resulted in the wonderful elation we then see in this video. He then discussed how it has evolved over the year. As it was a year ago, my memory is fuzzy due to the late hour, and it’s all up on his site, check out the details here.
The newest mixture is a mix of Ethelyne Glycol, Potassium Chlorate, and Ammonium Nitrate. There’s also a secret ingredient in there, but if I told you it wouldn’t be a secret now would it? One of the most important items learned however is the aversion to metals in the manufacturing process. The only instrument used that could have metal on metal contact while mixing is a Kitchen Aide mixer, which Joe is hunting for a plastic mixing attachment.
The reason for this aversion is because of the pressure that can be created between two pieces of metal. This pressure if it occurs at the wrong time could result in a less than pleasing result for those in the immediate vicinity. Because of this, metal bowl = plastic or wooden spoon, plastic scoops, things that will deform under low pressure are desired.
Joe explaining the history of the packaging for targets.
Coming up with an efficient target platform has been as much of a problem as finding a good mixture and efficient production method. All the targets have to be placed the morning of, plus holders put in place in preparation of the event. I went out and helped Joe with some experiments at a private party a couple weeks ago. Suffice it to say, you’ll find out what at Boomershoot. Or you can see pics after. Problems with targets have been with how to place them, currently stakes and rubber bands, type of packaging, and methods of packing. Big problem is to make sure not to squeeze the air out of the bag. If you do, it probably won’t detonate when hit.
Matthew of TriggerFinger mixing up his first batch of explosives.
After that, we all made our own set of targets, which we then laid out along the berm and blew up. I didn’t take pictures of that, as much as I took some video.
TMM is the owner, editor, and principal author at The Minuteman, a competitive shooter, and staff member for Boomershoot. Even in his free time he’s merging his love and knowledge of computers and technology with his love of firearms.
Many know his private name and information however due to the current political climate, many are distancing themselves due to the abandonment of Due Process.
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