Recently TNT Guns & Range in Murray opened up and I haven't seen a review done on here about it so I figured I'd post one up. Get ready for an in-depth and lengthy review of Utah's premier gun range and the nations ONLY indoor skeet range/field!
First doing a google search of the shop results in the normal links to their Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/TNTGunRange/ and webpage http://www.tntgunrange.com. Going into the google reviews you will not find a single review out of 25 that isn't a 5 Star rating, 4 of which are just stars without any comments. Upon reading the google review comments, one is to believe that this place is a unicorn and most of the reviews are probably paid yet I can vogue for each and every comment on there THIS PLACE IS A UNICORN!!
My wife and I went on Friday Aug 12, 2016 around 4:30pm. Just in time to ensure everyone getting off work would be there and the place would be packed. It is located at 5669 Commerce Dr, Murray, UT 84107 directly next door to the UHP station. There isn't any large signs or billboards out front (coming from the North) that would point you to its location and its set back from the road a bit. As we arrived, parking seemed limited as the street out front was full and only 1 open spot was seen directly in front of the shop (There is additional parking on the North side and behind the shop that we discovered when we were leaving).
Once we entered into the shop, it was what most dreams are made of! It was well light and laid out main floor, with round tables of different pistols from a basic 1911 to a fully custom Glock race gun. Directly in front of you as you enter is the round tables and behind that against the wall is a LED white lighted glass case of firearms. Before the door even closed behind us we were greeted by a employee and asked what we were there for. The attitude of the employees were so upbeat and lively. They wanted to help in every way they could, even offering to help carry my rifle bag and ammo can.
We were then escorted over to the payment counter and asked what type of firearms we would be shooting, which range we'd like to shoot on and if we'd like to rent any firearms. We explained that we had an AR, pistols, and a shotgun and that we would also like to do the simulator. The lady behind the desk told us that we could shoot the rifle and pistol on the rifle range but we couldn't shoot both on the pistol range. We opted to go to the rifle range and were again escorted down, and by down I mean downstairs underneath the facility itself, to the rifle range since we hadn't been there before. We were required to leave our driver licenses with the desk and would pay upon completion of our time. Directly next to the checkout counter was the range entrance, we walked into a room with the pistol/shotgun range door to our left and rifle range door to the right. We placed on our ear pro and entered through the rifle range door, immediately through that door to our right was the simulator room. We turned left and walked a few feet before coming to a stair well that led downstairs. Past the stair well, was a bunch of different doors which behind we later found out are classrooms, gunsmith work area, a green screen room for the simulator so they can create their own scenarios, and a few offices. As we proceeded down the stairs we noticed a normal sized gun vault door which I can only imagine enters into a massive room with firearms of all types (oh Narnia!).
We finally arrived at our own private rifle booth. Upon entering the room we noticed that a TNT Guns & Range mat was laying on top of a table to provide comfort for prone rifle shooting. These rifle ranges go up to 100yds down a solid concrete tube, where you can have the table up or remove it to stand and shoot pistols (you can go back up stairs to have the employees move it or do it yourself (if you do it yourself, they are constantly watching the video cameras and the original employee who escorted us down, came back down to ask if we needed help putting it back into position after shooting pistols). While shooting pistols on the rifle range they have Action Target System retrievers http://www.actiontarget.com/categories/target-retrievers/ and these systems are able to face forward, backwards and sideways. I highly suggest using a full cardboard backer to ensure that when the target is approaching you face on that the paper doesn't fly backwards and you aren't able to engage properly. These target systems are state of the art with pre-programmed drills, custom drills or regular distance shooting scenarios. Some of these pre-programmed drills include the full FBI qualification, shoot/no-shoot, and many different distance drills. If you follow the pre-programmed drills, I assume they don't care if you come from the low ready or even holster as you are in your own booth as many of the drills call for a low ready starting position. These target systems also include the ability to turn all room lights out, red light/night vision, or white light on; not only are you able to choose which booth light color you want you can also change the color of lighting on the target itself as well as the firing line lights to solid white, red, flashing red/white/blue (police), flashing red/white (fire/ems), or flashing white. I was more than impressed with these firing booths and target systems. So the DOWNFALLS for the rifle range would be that 1) The ventilation system is all connected together so regardless of being in your own private booth you can still hear the automatic fire (yes they rent our full auto weapon systems) from the other booths and 2) not supplying a full size cardboard backing/target for targets (isn't a big deal if you are doing stationary shooting but using the target system to its full potential, they should have the backers available in the booth {I'm not sure if they had them in the lobby or not as we brought our own paper targets} to use.
We finished up on the rifle range and went back upstairs to pay for our time on the rifle range, it's all based on room rental/number of people and not an hourly rate. We completed our checkout at 5:45pm and also set up a 6:30pm simulator time which we paid for up front at a rate of $30/30 mins. I took the firearms back out to the truck and we went back inside to go over to .357 Burgers, the ranges own grill which provides excellent burgers and fries as well as shakes. Our food was done and ready within 10mins, after enjoying our double cheese burgers with all grilled toppings, which was made directly in front of us and sodas we spoke to one of the guys who dual hats at .357 Burgers and the range. He told us about the classrooms, green room, gunsmith room and armory as well as all employees must be equal to the level they are trying to cover for (i.e. a janitor can't cover a guy behind the gun counter unless he has been trained on it or a line cook can't cover the gun counter unless s/he has been specifically trained).
We made our way over to the counter to be escorted to the simulator for our 'range time'. As we entered it was a massive 300* white screen on an elevated platform with a few chairs for spectators to sit and watch as the other is running a scenario. The operator asked us which 'firearm' we'd like to use I chose the Glock 19 and my wife chose the full size M&P. These were live firearms that have been modified with a CO2 cartridge in the magazine and a laser in the barrel. With each pull of the trigger, the CO2 fires and forces the slide to retract back giving the impression of a live fire gun. We started off with a pepper popper game where we had to engage 15 targets in the full 300* screen moving from left to right in order and the distances increased as you moved further and further right as fast as possible. I thought I was fast at 7 seconds but the employee operating it told me the record so far is 4.3 seconds. After that we moved into a KIMs (Keep In Memory) game where a word would show on the screen (i.e. Red Triangle) and then the target would face you would have to identify the different shapes and colors to locate the correct shape and color and engage with two rounds in 3 secs (I believe) and both rounds must impact the shape to score the points. After we both did that we moved into the actual scenario based simulation. You can opt to have the taser/shocker on you or not to indicate you've been shot, I opted to wear it and have it for a 1sec shock. I started my scenario and everything was going well, engaged my first threat then I felt the feeling I didn't want to feel I WAS SHOT, pulled out of my tunnel vision and noticed a second threat. This simulator is an eye opener for sure!! I've done simulations and force-on-force training before but nothing like this before! My wife and I both agreed that next time we go we will be spending the entire time in the simulator.
I hope that this helps everyone make their way over to TNT Guns & Range in Murray! These place truly is an unicorn of gun ranges. 10/10 stars for sure!!
First doing a google search of the shop results in the normal links to their Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/TNTGunRange/ and webpage http://www.tntgunrange.com. Going into the google reviews you will not find a single review out of 25 that isn't a 5 Star rating, 4 of which are just stars without any comments. Upon reading the google review comments, one is to believe that this place is a unicorn and most of the reviews are probably paid yet I can vogue for each and every comment on there THIS PLACE IS A UNICORN!!
My wife and I went on Friday Aug 12, 2016 around 4:30pm. Just in time to ensure everyone getting off work would be there and the place would be packed. It is located at 5669 Commerce Dr, Murray, UT 84107 directly next door to the UHP station. There isn't any large signs or billboards out front (coming from the North) that would point you to its location and its set back from the road a bit. As we arrived, parking seemed limited as the street out front was full and only 1 open spot was seen directly in front of the shop (There is additional parking on the North side and behind the shop that we discovered when we were leaving).
Once we entered into the shop, it was what most dreams are made of! It was well light and laid out main floor, with round tables of different pistols from a basic 1911 to a fully custom Glock race gun. Directly in front of you as you enter is the round tables and behind that against the wall is a LED white lighted glass case of firearms. Before the door even closed behind us we were greeted by a employee and asked what we were there for. The attitude of the employees were so upbeat and lively. They wanted to help in every way they could, even offering to help carry my rifle bag and ammo can.
We were then escorted over to the payment counter and asked what type of firearms we would be shooting, which range we'd like to shoot on and if we'd like to rent any firearms. We explained that we had an AR, pistols, and a shotgun and that we would also like to do the simulator. The lady behind the desk told us that we could shoot the rifle and pistol on the rifle range but we couldn't shoot both on the pistol range. We opted to go to the rifle range and were again escorted down, and by down I mean downstairs underneath the facility itself, to the rifle range since we hadn't been there before. We were required to leave our driver licenses with the desk and would pay upon completion of our time. Directly next to the checkout counter was the range entrance, we walked into a room with the pistol/shotgun range door to our left and rifle range door to the right. We placed on our ear pro and entered through the rifle range door, immediately through that door to our right was the simulator room. We turned left and walked a few feet before coming to a stair well that led downstairs. Past the stair well, was a bunch of different doors which behind we later found out are classrooms, gunsmith work area, a green screen room for the simulator so they can create their own scenarios, and a few offices. As we proceeded down the stairs we noticed a normal sized gun vault door which I can only imagine enters into a massive room with firearms of all types (oh Narnia!).
We finally arrived at our own private rifle booth. Upon entering the room we noticed that a TNT Guns & Range mat was laying on top of a table to provide comfort for prone rifle shooting. These rifle ranges go up to 100yds down a solid concrete tube, where you can have the table up or remove it to stand and shoot pistols (you can go back up stairs to have the employees move it or do it yourself (if you do it yourself, they are constantly watching the video cameras and the original employee who escorted us down, came back down to ask if we needed help putting it back into position after shooting pistols). While shooting pistols on the rifle range they have Action Target System retrievers http://www.actiontarget.com/categories/target-retrievers/ and these systems are able to face forward, backwards and sideways. I highly suggest using a full cardboard backer to ensure that when the target is approaching you face on that the paper doesn't fly backwards and you aren't able to engage properly. These target systems are state of the art with pre-programmed drills, custom drills or regular distance shooting scenarios. Some of these pre-programmed drills include the full FBI qualification, shoot/no-shoot, and many different distance drills. If you follow the pre-programmed drills, I assume they don't care if you come from the low ready or even holster as you are in your own booth as many of the drills call for a low ready starting position. These target systems also include the ability to turn all room lights out, red light/night vision, or white light on; not only are you able to choose which booth light color you want you can also change the color of lighting on the target itself as well as the firing line lights to solid white, red, flashing red/white/blue (police), flashing red/white (fire/ems), or flashing white. I was more than impressed with these firing booths and target systems. So the DOWNFALLS for the rifle range would be that 1) The ventilation system is all connected together so regardless of being in your own private booth you can still hear the automatic fire (yes they rent our full auto weapon systems) from the other booths and 2) not supplying a full size cardboard backing/target for targets (isn't a big deal if you are doing stationary shooting but using the target system to its full potential, they should have the backers available in the booth {I'm not sure if they had them in the lobby or not as we brought our own paper targets} to use.
We finished up on the rifle range and went back upstairs to pay for our time on the rifle range, it's all based on room rental/number of people and not an hourly rate. We completed our checkout at 5:45pm and also set up a 6:30pm simulator time which we paid for up front at a rate of $30/30 mins. I took the firearms back out to the truck and we went back inside to go over to .357 Burgers, the ranges own grill which provides excellent burgers and fries as well as shakes. Our food was done and ready within 10mins, after enjoying our double cheese burgers with all grilled toppings, which was made directly in front of us and sodas we spoke to one of the guys who dual hats at .357 Burgers and the range. He told us about the classrooms, green room, gunsmith room and armory as well as all employees must be equal to the level they are trying to cover for (i.e. a janitor can't cover a guy behind the gun counter unless he has been trained on it or a line cook can't cover the gun counter unless s/he has been specifically trained).
We made our way over to the counter to be escorted to the simulator for our 'range time'. As we entered it was a massive 300* white screen on an elevated platform with a few chairs for spectators to sit and watch as the other is running a scenario. The operator asked us which 'firearm' we'd like to use I chose the Glock 19 and my wife chose the full size M&P. These were live firearms that have been modified with a CO2 cartridge in the magazine and a laser in the barrel. With each pull of the trigger, the CO2 fires and forces the slide to retract back giving the impression of a live fire gun. We started off with a pepper popper game where we had to engage 15 targets in the full 300* screen moving from left to right in order and the distances increased as you moved further and further right as fast as possible. I thought I was fast at 7 seconds but the employee operating it told me the record so far is 4.3 seconds. After that we moved into a KIMs (Keep In Memory) game where a word would show on the screen (i.e. Red Triangle) and then the target would face you would have to identify the different shapes and colors to locate the correct shape and color and engage with two rounds in 3 secs (I believe) and both rounds must impact the shape to score the points. After we both did that we moved into the actual scenario based simulation. You can opt to have the taser/shocker on you or not to indicate you've been shot, I opted to wear it and have it for a 1sec shock. I started my scenario and everything was going well, engaged my first threat then I felt the feeling I didn't want to feel I WAS SHOT, pulled out of my tunnel vision and noticed a second threat. This simulator is an eye opener for sure!! I've done simulations and force-on-force training before but nothing like this before! My wife and I both agreed that next time we go we will be spending the entire time in the simulator.
I hope that this helps everyone make their way over to TNT Guns & Range in Murray! These place truly is an unicorn of gun ranges. 10/10 stars for sure!!