hey everybody welcome back to our channel today i'm gonna
be talking about a product that we haven't really shown on our youtube
to date so today we're gonna be talking about our armored rifle dueling tree let's dive into it
i know what you guys are probably thinking you're probably thinking oh another dueling tree what's
so special about this one and why is there armored in the name and guys this video is not going to
be some crazy 20 minute video i want to keep it short and i just want to give you the information
that i think is pertinent to you if you are potentially shopping for a dueling tree target so
the first thing that i noticed when we started ta targets back in 2015 in regards to dueling trees
there's a lot of people putting out dueling trees that they said were rifle rated and the reality is
they're not rifle rated at all and there's one key reason why they were not rifle rated in the least
and the difference the major difference that you're going to see between our dueling tree
and the competitors and everything else that's out there on the market is the materials and
the quality of the materials that are going into this and we're talking raw materials but also the
construction of this dueling tree and i'm going to admit to you guys and you're going to see if you
hop on our website this thing's not cheap and it's not cheap for a reason it's because it is built to
last forever and we're a company that stands by our product so when people have issues if there's
a weld that breaks and the product no longer functions we just simply will send another one
out to you we take care of our customers because you're supporting us that's value exchange and
that's an equal value exchange and it's the least that we could do and it's also because we believe
in our skill set and our ability to produce a quality product and we believe in the end result
of that said product so talking about those quote unquote rifle rated dueling trees on the market
the biggest downfall of the competitor targets that were out there was the upright people were
making dueling trees out of mild steel and then saying that they are rifle rated and i will admit
that most people that buy a dueling tree are going to shoot them with pistols but there are a lot of
people like myself included that want to go out to two or three hundred yards and shoot it with a 308
there is virtually nothing quite as fun as laying down next to a buddy with a bolt action 308
and our armored rifle dueling tree and going at it and trying to race each other to get the
paddles over to the other person's side there's very few dueling trees on the market that are
going to allow you to do that so starting from the spine here the whole shield every piece
of this is ar-500 steel so both of these are two different pieces that are welded into a v
the easiest thing to do with the dueling tree is to just buy mild steel angle
and just weld your gussets into that but then the problem is the front shield's not protected
so what we decided to do was actually take ar 500 shield pieces we have a jig we lay them all out in
this jig and then we weld the gussets into that so you've got an armored front if you have rifle
rounds that impact the shield they simply glance off to the side and you don't damage the system
if you had mild steel not only would you punch holes through that spine but if the
bullet doesn't go all the way through that mild steel it creates a crater which could potentially
send that fragmentation back into your face or one of your buddies faces or a vehicle that's parked
on the range it's just not a good idea and there were companies that were making them out of mods
mild steel and then you had to purchase a big guard that would kind of go over the front
and it just seemed so cumbersome so we just decided back at the beginning
we're not going to screw around we're going to make a dueling tree that is just built to last
so the gussets and everything else that the paddles rest in are also ar 500 steel
and then these paddles are pretty unique because we purchase ar 550 steel for the paddles and
there's a couple different types of paddles i'm just going to reference them here but this is the
most popular paddle size that we have it's what we call our reduced paddle on our website you might
see it called the 556 pistol paddle the reason why is it's 3 8 ar 550 steel this is one piece no
welds nothing like that we cut that out on our cnc table and it's rated for anything like 38 special
nine millimeter 40 smith and wesson 45 acp you can shoot magnum pistol calibers on this as well
but you can also shoot 556 nato 223 you can shoot 300 blackout you can shoot 762x39 5.45 by 39 6.5
grendel things like that so this paddle is really well rounded it's sized right i will say that
if you're a competition shooter shooting things like really lightweight revolvers and they're 38
special they may not rotate these paddles every single time you do need a pretty stiff load and
you need a pretty good solid hit on this paddle as well another feature you're going to see is this
keyway so this keyway is locking the paddle into the gusset on the back and that's making it so
that the paddle can't jump out because as these paddles are rotating what's actually happening
is friction and centripetal force is going to actually rotate and try to drive those paddles up
out of the gussets themselves so that little ledge is keeping them into the gusset but because these
are one piece because they're ar 550 they're super durable super long lasting and these are going to
work great for you if you're like me and you also want to shoot 308 6.5 creedmoor other calibers 243
things like that we do have a paddle that's very similar size to this but it's half inch ar 550
so we do not recommend the reduced paddles using 308 or anything like that they're not
going to break the paddles necessarily but it is very violent and you'll get double smacks you'll
get double bounces when you're shooting at 100 yards now if you're out at three 400 yards yeah
you could probably get away with using this paddle but most of our customers that are going to shoot
308 or 6.5 creedmoor are going to upgrade to the half inch paddles because it's also going to
make your paddles last a lot longer and be more predictable when you're shooting those calibers
aside from that the other thing you're going to notice is our dueling tree comes in two different
bases if you're on our website you'll see it comes in our 20 inch base or you can get it with
our 26 inch base generally speaking i'm going to recommend that you guys go with the 26 inch base
you see here the reason why is this thing is just incredibly stable the wind will not knock it over
you can have it on less than ideal terrain we've got a pretty good slope on this range can't really
tell because of the footage i mean it's not going to show how steep our range is but it's nice and
stable you could use the 20 inch base now the only time that i would recommend the 20-inch
base is if you're only shooting pistols you're only shooting light rifles if you start shooting
308 the base footprint just isn't quite big enough and this dueling tree can actually start
to turn as those paddles are rotating because of all of that rotating weight so 26 inch base
is definitely the better option you definitely have to save some money and get the 20 inch base
you could also just stake down the target base and then it's not going to walk like that
we also have a good solid forward lean on the system and that's important for a couple
reasons one it's going to bring the paddles back into their position in the event that you have a
really close impact on the side here there's not going to be as much leverage on the paddle so you
might notice that the paddles are just going to do that they're going to bounce and kind of come back
into position now that's not perfect and when the dueling tree is brand new and you're breaking it
in you're wearing off that paint there may be the occasional paddle that kind of gets snug up on the
back usually shooting another paddle lower than it or around it is just going to bring it back into
position that's one little thing that i would keep in mind if you have a brand new dueling tree from
us but aside from that that forward lean is also giving us that forward deflection angle that we
want with our steel targets so when the bullets hit these paddles they blow up into a thousand
tiny little pieces most of that fragmentation is going to go to the ground same feature with the
shields like i said deflecting rounds off to the side when those rounds impact this shield they're
going to blow into a ton of different pieces most of that frag energy goes down to the ground
and you will get a fan out to the side as well so guys overall this system is built like a tank
it's fully solid welded on the back it's meant to last and it's backed by company of us patriots
people that believe in the republic believe in freedom believe in our rights to own all fighting
arms to be able to protect ourselves from enemies to be able to protect ourselves from attackers
so guys you're supporting a really good company and you're supporting a company that makes these
products here in southeastern pennsylvania we manufacture these in our shop and we're
building them to the best quality so that you guys have targets that when you invest in
they're built to last you for your lifetime so you have any questions at all about our armored rifle
dueling tree i'm going to put a link down in the description definitely check out the product page
that's the best place to see all the specs i have the website laid out in a way that you can click
a little question marks next to the paddle types it's going to give you a breakdown help you decide
which paddle is best for you and one last thing that i did not cover we do have rimfire paddles
that are available in the individual parts section so if you shoot 22s we do have a special set of
paddles that you can purchase they drop right down into the back of this dueling tree you'll
be able to rock your rimfire rifles or pistols on the range and have a ton of fun so guys i hope
this was helpful to you if you have any questions at all you can also reach out to us through our
website contact form we would love to get you guys into a dueling tree appreciate you guys
you