As a new AR-15 owner in Miami, I was searching this site and others for an 'FDCC-like' club I could get involved within SoFla.  The only one I came across was the FDCC-South which apparently has disbanded early this year.  The Florida Defensive Carbine Club is great, but the drive from Miami to Lake City every month is prohibitive.  Does anyone know of a different club in the SoFla area OR is anyone in Dade/Broward interested in getting together for a monthly (or so) shoot?

Let's get together and throw some lead.

You'r best bet is to join USPSA and / or IDPA.

 Good shooting clubs are available. Competitive too. There is room for more too, too bad FDCC SO. never solidified.

I shoot in Broward at Markham Park the second Tuesday of the Month. I will be going in September .

They do allow full auto and your own trgets. I use hanging metal plates and its cool with them.

Tom

I answered you on the www.tssa.net board but I'll post here as well for anyone else who cares.

I attended some of the very first FDCC matches in Lake City.  I don't think many of the core group remember me being there, but I shot a FAL most of the time (some of them will remember said FAL from the 3 year match).

I moved to Broward County in 2001, and in 2003 attempted to start up an SFDCC club.  At the time I was starting this, I found out that there had been a previous attempt at an FDCC-S a year or so prior.  I was not a part of that club.  Both clubs shot at Pop's place out on 27 (a private property, private hunt club).  Other than that I don't know much about the FDCC-S or what killed it.

My attempt, the SFDCC, was essentially started by myself and two other members of www.floridashootersnetwork.com.  We shot once a month, and were amassing a decent collection of targets, barricades, and other props.  One of our founders has pretty good welding and other fabrication skills and made up quite a few running targets, as well as reactionary targets that dropped when you shot a balloon concealed behind a t-shirt etc.  We had the use of a small storage shed at the range to keep alot of this gear in.  The 6 or so shoots we had were limited to about 6-8 shooters while we tried things out and worked on the logistics.  We fully intended to open up enrollment at some point.  Our membership was limited to those that came to at least one of the 3 range cleanup days we had where we hauled an ungodly amount of trash away, and literally raked the entire range from the berm back 100 yards to the covered shooting position.

It failed for us for several reasons.  
1) The range.  Several of the regulars complained about us taking up the range on Saturday mornings.  This despite the fact that we were paying to reserve the range.  We were asked to move the shoots to the afternoon.  The problem was/is that this is South Florida, and afternoons in the summer (which is when we were doing this) are both damn hot and usually rainy.

2) Membership.  Our decision to limit the membership both helped and hurt.  It helped in that we all got to shoot.  It hurt in that there were very few people to help reset targets.  If you've got the shooter coming off the line, and the shooter coming on, and the scorekeeper and the timer, that really only leaves you with 2 guys to reset.

3) Props/targets.  Our targets were very ambitious.  They were virtually all either movers or reactive, and they virtually all wore t-shirts and required a balloon to be fastened in some shape or form.  There were many bugs to be worked out, and very few people helping.

4) Course design.  There were essentially 3 of us working out course design.  It got a bit tedious, and alot of the courses got very ammo intensive.  People were literally running through 3-4 mags on a course, in part due to the more realistic nature of our reactive targets.  Unfortunately in the shooting sports, fun and reset time are on inverse curves.  You want to maximize the fun factor, while still keeping the time between shooters to a minimum.

5) Infighting.  This is as much my fault as anyone else's.  The target designer and myself did not see eye-to-eye.  I wanted to keep the targets and barricades very simple in the beginning so that we could work on all of the logistics.  This was advice I had gotten from Newarguy about him starting up the original FDCC.  Our target designer did not agree.  He thought we should have fun and interesting courses of fire, and work out the logistics later.

I probably could go on and on but oh well.  I am trying to put together another meet & eat for the SoFla crowd to discuss giving this another go.  If you're interested grab me at one of the www.tssa.net matches, or sign up over here and let us know what day of the week words best for you.

I will add this.  If anyone is interested in this, I think we could try to make it work again.  The key is active participants.  At the time we started this I was living with the girl I thought I would marry and I had more free time on my hands.  Now that I'm single and have been promoted at work, I have much less time to devote to shooting and organizing.  I will work like a dog and labor under the hot sun all day long on the day of the shoot (ask any of the tssa members), but my time to devote to this outside of shoot day is severely limited. I have the leadership skills, and have no problem helping to organize it, but we'll need people down in the trenches building targets and barricades and such as well.

ETA:
Here's a pic of me shooting at the now-defunct (or is it just in hiatus?) SFDCC.  You can even see our logo on the barricade.  I have more pics at home I'll have to dig up if anyone cares.

I met Norman74 at the last SFDCC shoot. It was awesome. However, as Norman74 stated, changing out targets of this kind after each shooter became a hassle. The final shoot I attended was ungodly hot in the afternoon. I believe Pops would work again, but an agreement would definately need to be reached. Targets would have to be changed somehow to easier facilitate more shooters through the course on any given day.

I am committed in whatever capacity to the rebirth of these monthly shoots. It's been too long.
Perhaps Norman, myself and others could meet up to discuss the potential for the revival of SFDCC.

HS1

Quoted: I met Norman74 at the last SFDCC shoot. It was awesome. However, as Norman74 stated, changing out targets of this kind after each shooter became a hassle. The final shoot I attended was ungodly hot in the afternoon. I believe Pops would work again, but an agreement would definately need to be reached. Targets would have to be changed somehow to easier facilitate more shooters through the course on any given day. I am committed in whatever capacity to the rebirth of these monthly shoots. It's been too long. Perhaps Norman, myself and others could meet up to discuss the potential for the revival of SFDCC. HS1

Norman, HighStrung;

Count me in, too.  I started this thread because with my newly-acquired AR, I'm stoked to meet some other AR, AK, SKS etc...owners with similar interests and the desire to hone our skills.  I've got time to devote on the weekends and will do whatever needs doing to start up a SFDCC.  I've built my 1966 Mustang from the ground up (including the engine) so I'm fairly handy with tools and fabbing stuff.  I've got a MIG welder (but not a whole lot of welding skill) and lots of tools.

Let's do this!

Also, I vote for MORNING meets.  Just got finished mowing the grass at 2:00 PM today and 'like ta died'.

miamilightning

Hey Norm!  I'm sure you remember me, the large crew cut dude with that annoying AK74 brake on my Bushmaster ? I've spoken with Echo about this a few times, and really wanted to get together again with you as well, cause I really think it could be done. Most (well, all) of what you posted I agree completely with.  Some of the biggest problems with it were the ammo intensive COF's, and a total lack of realistic scenarios toward the end. It reall was different the very last time we got together, like you not being there(I missed that tactical yellow visor!)I had offered my help as well with a couple of COF's to our target designer, but none were ever used. This could be re-started quite quickly, with no trouble at all. Lets just say I've been wanting this to get going again, and I am willing to donate for the use of the SFDCC, a CED shot timer, and of course,about 10,000 paper targets to help make this work. All we need are some stands, shooters, and a roll of masking tape. I'm in if this gets going again. Thats for sure.

Excellent, Synweap223.   It's startin' to look like this might actually get done.

Hey norman74, HighStrung1, and everyone else who might be interested, how about a meet/eat /discuss some time soon?

miamilightning

I'm down with a meet and eat. I'll be heading out to Pops in the morning for some sighting in and general purpose fun. Is anyone else available for tommorrow? I'll be there around 11 am. If you can make it, see ya there.

HS1