Rifle Range Reef sits directly under the Long Bay Rifle Range cliffs at Malabar, a couple of hundred metres north of Yellow Rock, and is another of the sites McFadyen and the St George Scuba Club opened up after the 1990 deepwater outfall cleaned this coast. The layout is two distinct walls separated by a gentle rocky slope. The main, inner wall drops from about 10 m to 15 m and is built of big boulders that form overhangs, swim-throughs and several small gullies – the most interesting part of the site.

Seaward, after the slope, a smaller and less dramatic lower wall drops from 20–22 m to the sand at 24–25 m. Both carry good sponge and sea-squirt cover, and the kelp on the slope between them is seadragon country. The fish life is described as excellent: seapike and yellowtail in dense schools over the walls, one-spot pullers everywhere, eastern blue devilfish under the boulder overhangs and giant cuttlefish in the gullies.

The site's character is set by its position – it lies under one of the most dangerous pieces of rock platform in Australia and can only be dived when the ocean is completely flat, which limits it to a few days a month, mostly in winter westerlies. When those days come it is an easy multilevel dive: deep wall first, then the boulders, then the shallows against the platform. Like Tyre Reef, Red Flag and Yellow Rock it has no charter support and is dived almost exclusively by private boats out of Botany Bay, usually as one of two dives along this cliff line.

Private boat only. Leave Botany Bay through the heads, turn north and run about 4.5 km past Little Bay and Long Bay to the rifle range cliffs; the site is 200 m north of Yellow Rock, the notorious rock-fishing platform at the range's south-eastern corner. Approach from the east and anchor in 18–20 m between the two walls.

Allow 20–25 minutes from the Kyeemagh or Foreshore Road ramps. No charter operator services this stretch.

Only in absolutely calm seas. The reef lies directly under the cliffs beside Yellow Rock, which has killed more than a hundred rock fishers in a century because of the way swell rears up on this shelf; the same swell makes the 10–15 m wall a surge zone in anything over about 1 m. Westerly winds and a flat ocean, most often in winter and early spring, are the only conditions to plan around.

North-easterlies bring afternoon chop. Visibility since the 1990 outfall is usually 10–20 m.

Descend to the deeper eastern wall at 22–25 m, follow it for about 10 minutes in one direction and 10 minutes back past the anchor, then head west up the slope to the main wall and work shallower through the boulders, overhangs and gullies. If the sea is flat, finish right up against the rock platform at 10 m before returning to the anchor.

No regular charter – private boat or dive-club (St George Scuba Club) only