Gun safe: Best place to store one?

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Mine is in my family room downstairs. I look at it as a piece of furniture (bolted to the cement floor). When I bought mine my wife wondered why I would spend $2000 on a safe, I pointed to her $1000 couch and said, "I bet it lasts way longer than that will."
 
tryshoot said:
It does not matter if it is in your livingroom,bedroom,basement,garage. I do recomed the dehumidfier.
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Second that! I've kept my safe in a place that does not have the "climate control" of the inside my house for over 20 years. Never had a problem but I've always had a dehumidifier in it.
 
If you live in a desert environment like Arizona or Nevada, you may not need a dehumidifier.

Whereever you put that safe, keep it out of sight.
 
Must one place it on a slab floor, or can it go in a house with a crawl space and joist supported floor?
 
My safe came with recommendations to place it at the periphery of the house as far from likely fire ignition points as possible (kitchen, etc.). We have a slab foundation and it sits in the corner of the master befroom in full sight.

I don't agree that it needs to be kept "out of sight", if a burgler has entered your house to look for things to steal it would be hard to overlook, like trying to hide an elephant. Besides, it's purdy.

Dan
 
My house is not built on a slab, I consulted with a contractor and he recommend that I add additional bracing and support where my safe will be located. Both he and I were concerned that over time that much weight sitting in one spot would cause sagging. So if your house has a crawl space, consider consulting with a contractor just to be sure you do not run into problems years down the road.
 
Mine has sit in an unheated room off of my living room. Something like a mud room I suppose. Its been there thirty years, has no humidifier, and is about six feet from an exterior door. Nothing has rusted (South Dakota). This place is a farm so I can walk in with my muddy boots, grab whatever I need and walk back outside without going through the main part of the house. That has worked pretty well over time.
 
I'd advise against placing a safe in a basement. If there is a fire and the walls of the home come down, they are going to make a nice little oven for anything the walls fall down upon. A home safe's fire rating is going to be severely compromised by spending a few hours beneath smouldering walls, furniture and ceiling.
 
I'd advise against placing a safe in a basement. If there is a fire and the walls of the home come down, they are going to make a nice little oven for anything the walls fall down upon. A home safe's fire rating is going to be severely compromised by spending a few hours beneath smouldering walls, furniture and ceiling.
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True enough, but placing it in a basement could make it harder to steal.
 
Inside securely bolted to a concrete or reinforced wood floor with walls limited access to sides and top. That's ideal IMO. A closet (or similar space) comes to mind. The more secure the underlying anchor and the less room/space around the safe to get leverage the better. The larger and heavier the safe the less it matters.
 
in an interior corner bolted to both walls and floor would be ideal; although when I lived in northern NV, it was not possible so it was in the garage with blanket over it so someone walking by would not see it as it was placed between two shelving units and looked like a covered up bunch of junk - no rust over 23 years
 
Mine is the unfinished basement area where I've created "Das Bunker." Determined to be sure we are the first family on the block to be the LAST family on the block.
;)
 
Corner of a basement.This helps protect the safe/rsc on two sides.I have common concrete foundation walls and the safe goes in the corner.I built a base out of plywood sheets,laminated to help elevate it off the ground.I installed a sprinkler head above the box.
 
opsman said:
My house is not built on a slab, I consulted with a contractor and he recommend that I add additional bracing and support where my safe will be located. Both he and I were concerned that over time that much weight sitting in one spot would cause sagging. So if your house has a crawl space, consider consulting with a contractor just to be sure you do not run into problems years down the road.
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Weight and location depend on where you are in the span of floor joist and the orientation of the load with the joist. With stick built homes and conventional lumber, the middle third of the span causes the most deflection with weight. Engineered lumber could be weakest in the middle third, or like (TJI's) are strongest there, go figure. Typical main level joists are designed for 40 pounds per square foot at a deflection of L/360 (1" in 360"). The heaviest thing in most homes is a fully loaded refrigerator in pounds per square foot on the floor system, as a comparison to a safe, weight wise.

Unless it is a really old house, if your safe is next to a load bearing wall, or bears directly on the foundation and perpendicular to the way the joist are running (the wall that the safe is against has joist perpendicular to it and not running parallel to it), you will be OK with most any size safe you can get through the door.

I put a 380 gal salt water aquarium in a house once (figured 9 lbs per gal), with no sagging floor meeting the above criterion.

Engineered lumber is a different animal. Some, like the TJI's mentioned, may need squash blocks installed as the web is essentially a 3/8" piece of plywood. In most areas, these are supposed to be placed under load bearing walls or have a rigid band at the ends of the TJIs or both. Sometimes stuff gets missed. The guys actually doing the work any more can read a ruler but not much else and will slide through such blocks if given the chance.
 
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Samari Jack

Great post, but I thought it best to consult with a licensed contractor who builds houses for a living just to be on the safe side, no pun intended.
 
I don't think the garage is a good idea. Depending on the quality of your house security system, and whether you have one at all, it just seems like a less secure place whether the safe is bolted down or not.
I live in the Bay Area of California. We have to pay a lot extra to afford to live out here, but at least it comes with a dehumidifier built right in. :)
 
Bottom line here is, the best place you can store one is the best place you can get it into! If the Garage is it, well then so be it, make sure to bolt it down and plug in your humidity device. If you can get it in the house GREAT! but unless you have deep closets your not hiding it especially if it is of one of any significant size. Do the best you can, buy the best that you can afford, it will be worth it.
 
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