The Central Otago Piston Club is hosting the sports shooting events of the Dunedin Masters Games this year.
The club is hosting a wealth of events, which involves handling and operating some of the oldest weapons available.
"They're basically pre-1850 firearms, muzzle loading.
"Basically, they're dropping black powder down the barrel, a big chunk of lead goes down there and they're set off with either flint, so flint and a spark, or percussion caps.
"It’s a very detailed process ... people were reloading and starting on the next target in about 45 to 50 seconds, so it's not too bad turnaround time."
Yesterday, a group of two dozen or so tried out some late-19th-century handguns.
They included father and son Euan and Alec Butters. Euan shot with an 1873 Colt .44 he bought in the 1960s, and Alec shot with an 1847 Colt Walker.
Their Masters Games tags described the pair as "athletes", but Euan did not take that too seriously.
"For us, it’s all about having fun."
Shooting with black powder was "messy", Mr McManus said.
"Everyone leaves the shooting line with a big grin on their faces.
"Some of the shooters here make their own black powder, and black powder is just a blend of charcoal, charcoal wood — so willow normally — saltpeter and sulphur, so potassium nitrate and sulphur."
The equipment could also purchased from the supermarket, he said.
"You can buy it commercially, but if you're making your own and you're shooting the flip-lock and you're casting your own lead balls, you've got total control of the whole process. There's no-one else you can blame for missing the targets."
The Central Otago Pistol Club first hosted the Masters Games two years ago, when they realised there was no-one in Dunedin able to host so many shooting sports.
"We want to show that we're out there having fun, safely ... over the course of the seven days shooting, there will be something like 25,000 rounds fired.
"We've never had an issue. The worst thing we've had is maybe a bit of hot brass caught someone and they've had to rip it out from the back of their shirt." — Additional reporting Stephen Jaquiery
