Hostage Rescue Target Setup: From the Box to First Shots

The Hostage Rescue Target bolts to the back of the 2x4 post that holds your AR500 silhouette, so the steel hangs in front and shields everything that moves. Once the cells are charged, setup takes under 15 minutes: two U-bolts, a cut on the post, and a head. Charge the cells before anything else. They ship part-charged for air freight.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbsHCdh6vkw

Watch: What's Inside the DRX1 Hostage Rescue Target? (22:26) on YouTube. The kit in the video is a bundle with add-ons the website kit does not have. The steps are the same; the lists below say which items are extras.

Chapters in the video: 0:38 Unboxing: QC checklist and manual | 2:00 Chargers, batteries and spare rubber bands | 3:42 Battery install and charging | 5:23 Fitting the U-bolts without pinching wires | 8:19 Replacement heads: how long they last | 9:10 Cutting the 2x4 post | 10:29 Mounting the unit and hanging the steel | 15:37 Remote walkthrough | 16:47 Recording and looping a movement pattern | 18:26 Converting to pop-out mode

What you need before you start

• The kit. The target unit, the joystick remote with its 9V battery already fitted, two lithium-ion cells for the unit, a charger with a standard US wall plug, 10 reactive heads, a spare set of linkage arms, two U-bolts with waterproof gaskets and wing nuts, two aluminum backing clips for the U-bolts, zip ties, spare rubber bands for head alignment, a small box of tools, the manual, and a quality control checklist signed by whoever tested the unit.

• An AR500 silhouette: 66 percent IPSC (about 12 by 20 inches) or full-size (about 18 by 30 inches), 3/8 inch plate. The steel is not in the kit.

• A 2x4 post, and whatever you already use to stand it up and hang steel from it. The stand, legs and post-top hanger in the video are bundle extras. A T-post version of the kit exists if your range runs steel posts.

• A saw for the post. The wrenches for everything else are in the kit.

The standard kit on the table: unit, stack of heads, remote, cells, charger, tackle box, manual.

Setup, step by step

1. Charge the cells. The charger light is red while it charges and green when it is done.

2. Install the cells. Take off the two hand-wheel screws, lift the top cover, and drop the cells in the way the housing marks them. They are standard lithium-ion cells with a low-voltage protection circuit, which makes them slightly longer than a bare cell, and they fit tight on purpose so impacts on the steel do not work them loose. Lever one out with a kit wrench when it has to come out. Match the protected length when you buy spares; they do not have to come from us.

3. Bench test it. Switch the unit on, switch the remote on, push the joystick. The head should move.

4. Fit the U-bolts with the top cover still off. Each one drops through the housing beside the cells, with its two legs coming out the back. The wiring sits right next to that path, so slide each one down slowly and watch the wires as it passes. Then put the top cover back on.

5. Cut the post so its top sits where you want the top of the steel. With a hanger that caps the post, like the one in the video, that cut sets the steel height. If you hang steel another way, set the steel first and match the unit to it with the height rule in the next step.

6. Hang the steel on the front of the post. Hold the unit against the back of the post so the U-bolt legs straddle it, put an aluminum clip over each pair of legs on the steel side, and run the wing nuts up. Height rule: the bottom of the plastic housing level with the bottom of the steel. I don't always use both U-bolts on my own units, but the two gaskets together are what seal the housing, so use both if the unit lives outside.

7. Fit a head. Heads are double-sided in two colours; use whichever side stands out against your backstop. On the day in the video I used the black side. The white side chips where it is hit, which shows hits from the line. Heads go on with hand-wheel screws.

8. Downrange, switch the unit on, walk back, and pick up the remote.

9. Check the safe zone before live fire. With the remote locked, drive the head through its whole travel and confirm from the firing line that it stays behind your plate.

Step 2. Two cells in, top cover still off. The U-bolts go in next, through this same opening.

Step 4. Both U-bolts through, legs out the back, ready for the post.

Step 6. Unit on the back of the post, steel on the front. Housing bottom and steel bottom line up.

How the remote works

Hold it upright with the joystick at the top; held sideways the directions feel wrong. The power switch is at the bottom, with a red light when it is on. The joystick drives the head up, down, left and right. Press the button built into the joystick and the light turns blue: the safety lock is off and the head can travel outside the zone the steel protects. Another press puts the lock back on.

• Bottom left button: a pan, side to side.

• Bottom right: straight up and straight down.

• Top right: random positions with random pauses between them.

• Top left: record. Hold it for three seconds until the light flashes, drive the pattern with the joystick, then tap the button again to play it back. It loops over and over until the battery runs down.

The remote runs on a 9V battery behind four screws and reaches the unit from up to 300 feet. Every button is covered in the remote walkthrough.

Joystick at the top, buttons below, head answering on the right.

How long the heads last

About 50 rounds of pistol or rifle per head, depending on calibre. A shotgun takes a head out in one shot. The kit ships with 10. Replacement heads are $60 and replacement linkages $49 in the shop. The linkage arms sit behind the steel, so they rarely get hit, and a spare set is in the kit.

Converting it to a pop-out target for a shoot house

With the wall-mount kit, the same unit mounts on a wall so a head appears for a single exposure: behind a desk, up a staircase, through a rat hole. The wall-mount kit is a bundle item. Swapping to the bracket takes about two minutes; marking and drilling the wall is extra. For a quick mount on a barricade in the standard setup, the zip ties in the kit are the backup to the U-bolts.

1. Take the unit off the post and lift the top cover.

2. Take the U-bolts out. The wall bracket goes on in their place, with its brass fitting at the bottom, then the bracket's crossbar and its nuts.

3. Work out the height before you drill. Run the linkages all the way out to see how far the head reaches, then place the bracket so the head is hidden below the edge of the wall at full down and clears it at full up.

4. Screw the bracket to the wall with the wood screws from the wall-mount kit, switch on, and run the head up and down once.

The brass fitting takes a standard camera-tripod screw, so the unit also sits on a tripod. The one in the video was a $49 camera tripod from Amazon.

Pop-out step 3. Linkages run all the way out against the wall before a single screw goes in.

The one thing that went wrong on camera

The U-bolts packed for this shoot were too short to go around a full 2x4, so I cut down the back of the post to make them reach. Kits ship with U-bolts sized for a 2x4. If yours do not reach, call us before you cut anything.

Standard kit or bundle

• Standard kit, $925: the unit, the remote, the cells and charger, 10 heads, a spare linkage set, the manual and the mounting hardware listed at the top of this post. Steel sold separately.

• Bundle extras in the video, quoted on request: two spare cells, an extra linkage arm, a 66 percent IPSC steel silhouette with stand legs, post-top hanger and base, a box of about 20 replacement heads, and the wall-mount kit with its spacers, bolts, nuts and wood screws. The stand legs end in spikes you step into the ground, with holes for tent stakes.

Price, kit contents and the purchase-order form are on the Hostage Rescue Target page. The March kit breakdown post lists every item in the box, and How It Works, What's Included, and What It Replaces covers how the target changes a drill.