I would like to know what concerns you would have with shooting a swinging gong and having richochets come back at you.  I'm not too concerned about shooting at it at long ranges with my military rifles, but I am wary about shooting my pistols at it at close range.  I read that if there are deep pockets form large caliber rifles in the gong, that it could act like a "rifle" sending the repeat hit back at the shooter.  Should I not shoot at the pock marked side with a pistol?  Can I shoot at the clean side with pistol and not worry?  I don't want to see what a .44mag richochet will do to me or my truck, or heaven forbit one of my kids.  Should I only shoot cast bullets at it?  Rimfires seem to just splatter.  Should I stay away from FMJ stuff?  The gong is very heavy.  About 9" around and about 4" thick.  I usually see the bullet hit the ground a foot or so in front of the gong after hitting it.  Can I just turn the gong at a slight angle to be safer?  Thanks for your opinion.

We shoot steel with ARs, AKs, HKs ect. all the time at our club. I've only seen rounds come back of off some plates that someone made from mild steel, the harder the better it seems.

i've got a couple of gong stories::

the First deals with the 1 1/2" scar on my neck where a piece of gong or bullet (not sure which) was removed from my neck...223 shot at gong at 25 yards....stupid but true....

The second deals with a bunch of buddies shooting a 50 cal at 100 yard gong---Boom--750 grain bullet came straight back and bounced off a 2 or three propane tanks and ended up spinning around on the cement...

there  are a few truths in this world and one of them is -- if you shoot steel you will be hit by something eventually.

Just remembered another i witnessed--Ever seen those frisbee looking pieces of lead laying around the steel plate  pistol range--well nobody saw it comming but one sliced a guys cheek bad enough to require stitches.  Looked like hew had been cut by my new AR15.com tactical folder (what a knife!!!!)  Dick

general rule for centerfire pistols and steel is 35 feet for reactive (moving steel) 25 yds for static steel.
Steel should be free of craters.
Rifles should be at least 200 yds for cratering to be minimized on steel. Hot rolled is better than cold for targets.