Gun Safes?

T

thisflatearth

Joined
Feb 11, 2010
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As a lot of the Rat Packers here seem to have a multitude of excellent looking firearms as well as cutlery, I will ask.


What do you all have for gun safes. I am looking to get one for my father in law and I to share. I understand that like a gun, it is a life time purchase so do it right the first time.

So, what are the suggestions? Hidden in the wall between some studs in the back of a closet or giant 700-800lb. monster in the basement? (Luckily there is a set of storm doors to get it in there)

Looking to store for the majority long guns, no more than 12 long term (have 4 now) and some pistols and would also stick important paperwork in there. Fire proof is a must.

thanks

dave
 
get the biggest you can afford, even then you run out of room. or i do at least.

liberty makes a good safe, winchester makes a good one for less expensive.

mine holds 40 long guns and as many pistols and knives as i can pack in it. weighs about 800lbs it was the biggest i could get in the house and its still not big enough.


look for one that has the longest fire rating you can get and that has a heat seal if you have a fire. when my house burned down last year my safe leaked water vapor inside and the locking dial melted off, it was a huge pain to get open and all of my guns needed finish repair. but they all survived the fire and so did the paperwork i had in there.

take it easy
cricket
 
Wow Dave, never knew you had a fire.

I share Dave sentiments. Fire protection is big so buy the best safe you can afford. It’s all a big balance of capacity, price, security and fire protection IMO. A safe is an investment and it’s best to “buy once, cry once” and to get something that will last forever. Ask anyone who deals in safes and the #1 thing they will tell you is that 90% of people say “I wish I had bought bigger.” A 30 gun safe for example will in reality hold 30 single shot shotguns and lever action rifles. Something slim with no optics and no bolt handle adding to its width. I usually say if you have guns with optics, etc. take 60% of the capacity and that’s what it will really hold.

Security. The more locking bolts in the door the better. A big misconception is that the door is the weak link to a save, when in a lot of cases the cabinet itself is. Lots of people have the tools in their own garage crooks could use to get in to their safe, they just need the time to do it. Most smash and grabbers are going to see a safe and not mess with it because it’s too much work. If they have a whole weekend they will most likely get in. Bolt it to the floor! It took 3 guys and an appliance dolly to move my safe. They are much easier to get in to lying on their backs, door up so didn’t give thieves that option.

I prefer dial over digital locks because if the roof gets blown off my house and it rains on it for a couple days I know that a dial most likely will still work. And if the S has HTF like that, I want my guns. :D

The biggest lack of innovation in the firearms industry is the rack system inside safes. It sucks. Taking out guns, ducking barrels down trying to get them out, etc. A company has come out with a product called Rifle Rods that is an interesting storage system. Check it out.

Basement location. If you put it in the basement, put it somewhere the fire department (and you) can locate. Think of it like this. If God forbid, there was a fire and your house burnt all the way down, your safe is now a dutch overn covered in coals with your belongings inside. Being able to tell the FD to hose the NW corner of your basement to try and cool things off can really help. One guy posted pics of how this happened and the synthetic stocks on his guns bent in to a J shape as they melted and the weight of the barrel/received pushed down on them.

If we ever build a house, I will 100% have a full concrete gun room. Family member of mine has one and it's awesome.
 
texastonydobbs said:
Biggest you can afford and oneday it will not be big enough....
Click to expand...

Yup-that's gospel right there !! You think your done buying and discover you aren't because another great deal comes up. Kinda like like the way the ESEE population keeps growing.
 
Luckily, I slowed down a bit on guns since I’ve discovered ESEE blades. AR hobby gets expensive REALLY quick and it’s bad when you really start having a crisis over what the next purchase is. I’m random. I’ve debated between another AR build or a Marlin Guide Gun in .45-70 before. Talk about variety. :D
 
bigger is always better with safes and bolted down. as i said a fire will really ruin your day but a good safe will make a big difference i had a couple of rounds detonate in the safe during the fire didn't do any damage the worst of the damage to the guns was the instant rust on the guns, you just dont have time to clean the guns first thing you have too many other things you have to do.

this is what happens when i cook a brisket.
006-3.jpg

007-1.jpg


most expensive july 4th cookout ever! coming up on a year now and we have a new house and all new stuff, but man at the time it was a real disaster financially and emotionally.

take it easy
cricket
 
i hike in with a gun...i hike out without a gun. repeat step 1. i bury them all over the woods for the upcoming zombie invasion :eek:

ditto what the guys said - get the largest one you can afford. optics, bipods, etc. effectively makes one rifle into two or three so factor that in.

cricketdave - holy! that sucks. glad you seemed to have recovered pretty quickly from it.
 
I'd go with one of those 7-800 pound beasts that can hold many guns, with some shelves for other stuff...basically, the biggest you can afford
 
When I bought my safe almost 20 years ago, Liberty and Fort Knox were some of the best on the market. I bought a Fort Knox, which weighs about 1100 pounds empty, but my collection outgrew it after about 10 years. It now holds ONLY firearms and magazines. Theres just no room left for anything else I wanted to store in it (other gun accessories, ammunition, jewelry, camcorders, cameras, important documents, knives(!), etc....). I picked up a Cannon brand safe about six years ago that is about the same size as my Fort Knox but has a thinner door and walls, and it holds all my knives (around 400), my (good) swords, and miscellaneous other edged weapons. However, it is filled to capacity too. I also have a cheap Homak brand safe that's getting filled with the overflow blades. Both my good safes are fire resistant. The Homak one is really a POS, but it's better than air.

The moral of this story? Definetely get the biggest safe you possibly can.
 
You can make a safe more fireproof with the fireproof sheetrock used in kitchens etc. Alot of safes are basically 2 metal boxes with this sheetrock in between. That is part of why they are so heavy.
 
+1 on get the biggest you can afford.

i have two, not as big as riversidedep, but when i got the first one i thought it would be "big enough". guess what?

if you are concerned about fire and protecting documents, i'd not on;y get a firelined safe, but get one of the small "security boxes" that will hold your papers. keep that inside the safe and it will add another layer of protection.

a digital lock is much easier to get into, so you're more likely to actually put stuff away in a safe with a digital lock.

some vendors may have big discounts on "scratch and dent" safes. ask. if you're sticking it somewhere out of sight thers no reason to worry about the paint. but then i've known people who had pretty safes in the middle of the living room with machineguns inside. i'd prefer to keep them out of sight.
 
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