My layered foam garden target has been out in the elements for 6 years and has taken an absolute beating in that time. I must have put 20-30k shots into it over that time and it has been rebanded and ratcheted down more times than i can count.
Its finally given up the ghost though, and even with the softer boss I was given by a friend behind it I am burying arrows in it up the nocks or getting pass-throughs quite often. The time has come to get a new target! Enter the Block Black...
The Block Black is made by Field Logic in the USA and comes in a variety of sizes. I went for a middle sized one at 18" and it is bigger than I expected in the flesh. It cost £92 so it is a bit pricey, but if it performs up to its claims and the reviews I have read all over the net it will be worth the investment.
The BB target is essentially a cube of a high density self healing foam, with a central core similar to a layered target but under high compression and fused together with Field Logic's patented 'Poly-Fusion' process. It has an inset solid carry handle at the top and is fairly light for its size so it is very portable to move around or take with you if you want to go mobile!
Regular faces can be pinned to it, but it already has high contrast targets stencilled onto the 4 shootable sides. 4 of them are multi-dot patterns and one side has an animal target showing the vitals as this is from the US market, and is aimed primarily at bow hunters.
A nice feature is that all of the multi dots are offset from the ones on the opposite sides. This means once a side is completely shot out and you turn it, the new dots are over fresh foam so you can shoot out 4 targets in one.
So - stopping power...
I was a little short on time and didn't have chance to set up my full Unlimited rig, so I grabbed my Bow Hunter gear to test it. This is a Bowtech Guardian shooting ACC's, 56lb at about 280fps. I popped the target halfway up my garden steps so it was being shot very close, from about 5-6 yards and I was impressed with its performance.
The arrows don't thump or whack into it, they seem to be slowed down gently and still had plenty of material behind them. If it can stop them that well, at that speed from that close then I have lots of confidence with it. This was in the thinnest orientation as well, if you shoot the other sides you get another few inches of target behind them for extra stopping power.
Arrow extraction was as easy as they claim, the arrows slide out nice and easy. I only had time to shoot about 2 dozen arrows into it so it got 4-5 arrows in each spot and they were all stopped well. In a training session I normally shoot 5-6 dozen so that will only be about 12 arrows per spot per session. At that rate I should get a lot of use out of each spot before they start getting soft, and then I will just change sides. Once all 4 sides are eventually shot out, I will stencil new spots onto it in the unused areas. I can see this lasting a long time!
Before I put it away, I couldn't resist having a pop at the animal target on it - especially considering I was holding a Bowhunter style bow...
So only a quick session to try it out, but so far I am impressed with the quality, finish and stopping power of this Block Black target. The various surfaces and offset spots should offer a long target life and value for money. I will post a follow up to this review in a couple of weeks once I have shot several training sessions on the target, and report in on how it is holding up.
Thanks for looking!
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