Note: this site is in its very early stages and most of the content is not up.

ETarg is an open-source project with the goal of creating a comprehensive system to allow hobbyists to build their own electronic target system that plots impact locations quickly and accurately on a laptop. A basic system can be built for about $50.

How does it work?

There’s a whole section covering the process in detail, but the gist is pretty simple. When you shoot the target, your rounds hit the target, creating a shockwave that propagates predictably away from the impact location. You mount several inexpensive sensors to the target and wire them up to a target timer system (you’ll have to build it). The target timer system creates a precise timeline of when the shockwave hit each sensor and reports that to your laptop. Your laptop churns through the calculations necessary to plot this impact location and voila–an electronic target system.

Sit back down, put the spotting scope away, and fire off a few more rounds.

About the project

The project originated as the NIU CEET Senior Design project for two Electrical Engineering Technology students: Matt Waterman and Don Salazar. CEET students must complete a two-semester senior design project prior to graduating. We decided to have some fun and build something we’ll enjoy using and that the target shooting community needs.

There are electronic target systems out there already, but they are proprietary and expensive–too expensive for most ranges and shooting clubs, let alone the average shooter. One of the overriding goals of the project (besides that it works) is to make the system as cheap as possible. Some people will be able to build a complete system out of stuff they already have. Others might spend $50-100 to create a system.

We hope to continue working on the project long after the semester is finished. We will be providing all of our research, designs, and code so anyone can build our systems and hopefully contribute improvements.