Creating a home on the range
AN Ashmore security company will be shooting for new markets after developing a potential export item.
Guardrite Training has developed a portable firing range tailored to the training market.
The range, which has been approved by the Gold Coast City Council and Queensland Police, has been constructed for training security guards and for conducting the Queensland Police approved weapons safety courses.
However, manager Richard Hunt said the range could have strong export potential.
“We had seen a few in the US where defence forces use them so we decided to do one of our own,” he said.
“Security trainers aren’t allowed on a lot of pistol club sites in the region which puts a big restriction on training.
“So this one we built to specifically train people.”
As would be expected, the range is fully bulletproof.
“It took 18 months to build and another 14 to get council approval,” Mr Hunt said.
“We needed to get a sound engineer around to make sure that if you were standing outside the range you couldn’t hear shots fired inside.
“Then we needed Queensland Police approval so there was lots of rigmarole.
“It’s the first of its kind so we’d make an application and no one knew what it was. So every time we applied they had to come and have a look.
“It was unknown territory for a lot of people.”
Mr Hunt said the range was built inside a 18m (60’) container which can operate anywhere.
“You can put it on a truck and away you go. We are looking at the police force and the defence force to see if can draw some interest,” he said.
“If we can we will build them here and in a production line we could knock two or three out a year.”
He said the company has no intention to outsource the manufacture of the ranges and is intent on keeping the production inhouse.
Mr Hunt said there was a lot of grief involved in the development of the range.
“We didn’t think we’d ever get there at times,” he said.
“But we’re pretty confident these things will take off now that people are confident it can be approved.
“It has Australian-standard airconditioning and air-cleaning and they are soundproof so you can shoot in comfort.”
Guardrite has been operating on the Gold Coast for the past 35 years – Mr Hunt saying the firm began before the Gold Coast City Council existed.
“We started out as security guards and traffic control and evolved into a training organisation,” he said.
“We still do a little bit of security but the Commonwealth Games put a damper on a lot of things.
“We train security guards and we do the Queensland Police weapons safety course as well. We run 15 courses and we have 10-15 people going through each week.”