Front view... basic box, 3/4" plywood left from one of Ann's old cutting tables. Corners are reinforced with 2x4. Holes drilled down sides permit lacing the nylon cord that holds all the foam in. As soon as I can get another hank of nylon, I will lace vertically, weaving between the horizontals. The carpet was a scrap on hand and is doubled. That really works well, and I am going to improve things by getting a remnant 4' x 8 1/2" and putting a bar on the top to hold it (so it doesn't droop like this is). Note that the whole unit is on four swivel wheels, so you can wheel it out into the driveway or whatever.

Basic box is 2'x4' pieces of the 3/4" ply. It has a 1/2" plywood back made from two pieces of bunk board from a boat Ann did where she had to replace the wood.

 

 

Here you can get a little better feel for the foam and junk, just stuffed in as tight as a tired old man could stuff it. Adding vertical lacing will control it better, and once the full-size carpet remnant is in place, the lacing and stuffing won't be visible.

 

 

The box is 2' deep, which I now realize was overkill. 18" would have been plenty... maybe even 1'. If you look carefully at the top, you can see that the pressure of the foam is very slightly pushing the hinged top up. Any time the box starts to go "soft" in any area, all you have to do is open the top and push more scraps in.

 

You could make this very nicely from 1 and 1/2" sheets of ply. Have the full sheet cut into four 2x4 foot pieces and get a 4 x 4 foot piece of 1/2", maybe even 1/4" for the back.

 

The nice thing about this is that it is wide enough that from the driveway, you cannot see the edges. As most of you know, I have to shoot through the furnace room door. There is no way you can miss this box and hit the wall, wrecking an arrow. You would hit the door frame first, and it's cheap wood.

 

Of course, once in position, I had to test it... I didn't do that well. I'm so tired my muscles are quivering.

 

 

Here you see the now fully woven "net" supporting things. I used cotton clothesline this time, rather than the nylon. The nylon is too stretchy. I also mounted an additional 2 x 4 support under the front edge and cut two pieces of carpet remnant to fit 9not quite 4'x4'), then tacked one to the back of the 2x4 and one to the front. Then I put all the foam and plastic stuff back inside. The whole thing is very nice and taut.

 

By putting a knot at the end in the line each time it goes through the frame, you protect the weaving. If an arrow should happen to cut a line, only that line will lose tension. The whole thing won't come unravelled.

 

Nest step was to trim the remaining carpet remnant, which was 4'9"x 8', down to just under 4' and arrange a way to hang it in front...

 

Here you can see how I put two support arms on. The 8' carpet piece simply hangs on them. By sewing the ends together, you have a continuous roll. As a few spots get shot up, you can simply rotate the carpet, like the old roller towels.

This whole thing is undoubtedly overkill. With four layers of carpet I could easily have gone with a 1' deep box, which could be built from one sheet of ply. A 70# bow only sinks an arrow about 4" into this. Of course, places will soften up, put there is always the option of cramming more stuffing behind the carpets.

 

And here is what I wanted... a decent looking backstop big enough to display a full burlap target.