REVIVAL OF RIFLE CLUB AT RANGIORA

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28530, 8 March 1958, Page 5

REVIVAL OF RIFLE CLUB AT RANGIORA

r DHE grip of the rifle will, no doubt, feel a little strange to most members of the Rangiora Rifle Club when they have their first shoot on the club’s new range at Summerhill, near Cust, today. Although the thought of shooting has not been very far from their minds, their opportunities have been very few during the last 18 months, when they have laboured hard to build a new range to replace the one washed out by the Ashley river, near Rangiora. Little is left of the outdoor shooting season, but members are looking forward to the prospect of about four shoots during this month and early April. The club was fortunate after losing its former army range, near the Rangiora racecourse, to be granted the use of some land, with many natural advantages, by Mr I. C. Graham, of Summerhill. Behind the butts is a terrace and some 300 or 400 yards further back is a cliff of about 300 feet. The firing mounds are also natural banks, and will allow shooting at 300, 500, and 600 yards. At least one member of the club, O. Sollitt, has not had his rifle out of its case for nearly two years. Since work started on the new range he has been in charge of the operations, and has been on the scene nearly every weekend. Most of the project was completed on a voluntary basis, and the only work let out was the bulldozing out of the butts to a depth of six feet and a width of 14 feet.

The greatest expense was in the reinforced concrete lining the butts, and for this two tons and a half of cement were used. All the shingle was carted by trailers

or trucks from the nearby Ashley river-bed, and most of it was shovel-loaded, for only on one week-end did the club have assistance with a front-end loader. The whole project cost about £l3O.

The club was a successful tenderer from the Army for the fittings at the old range, but the reclaiming of some parts was a difficult operation, carried out over 12 feet of water. The men had to tie spanners and other tools on the material being worked on so that if they were dropped they were not lost in the river. Some of the material had deteriorated—“the water beat us to it,” said a club official—and the iron frames for the targets to run up and down in were among the things that had to be manufactured by the members. In the meantime telephone communication between the butts and the firing mounds has to be run out every time the range is used, but it is intended to lay the telephone line in the ground later. Since the club has been engaged in building its new range it has allowed its affiliation with the New Zealand Rifle Association to lapse, but it intends to affiliate again next season, when it has become firmly re-established.