Fortifying your house

I have been thinking along the same lines lately. Most homes would be pretty easy to break into by a determined attacker, and especially a group. If the social order has any sort of breakdown, and there is not as much of a risk of police interference, this would be a big problem for people looking to stay safe.

Some new modular homes....

I've seen a brand new modular home that had vinyl siding, behind that was 1/8" foamcore (the same kind of stuff they mount pictures to and put inside picture frames). Inside the house the walls were 3/8" sheetrock. Studs were 16" o.c.

With the doors locked, someone could literally break into that house using only their bare hands (and possibly a sheetrock knife).

One advantage would be in a fire, one could easily escape from just about anywhere in the house!

tigger2,

Do you have any particular reason to be worried enough about a home invasion to do something like that? What I mean is, yes, it would work, but why would you think it necessary to do?

lpl

Nothing at all wrong with buying a few seconds. But barring the door only works when someone is at home.

Why not install something like http://www.columbiamfg.com/category.asp?catid=5 ?

lpl

The doors Lee points to are steel and while they are a relatively thin gauge, if someone starts to mess with them they make noise. If the 400 # bad guy kicks it the door may deform but it will make lots of noise, but he probably won't reach the primary door -- that will take time. I have one of those doors and in a break-in situation it will give me enough time to have a call in to 9-1-1 and a Rem 870 ready to go.

Getting a security door (like Lee suggested) a storm door or wrought iron over the porch would make it VERY difficult for an attacker to gain access that way.

However once you create a strong point, you have created another weak point. A chain is only as strong as it's weakest link. Once you fortify the front door, the back door and the windows will look more enticing to the perps. So, you start layering. Motion Sensors (can be had cheap / standalone or you can get an alarm), storm door or the like, camera system (again you can get a relatively cheap system for $150 or so or you can spend $10,000 easy), landscape to minimize the ability for perps to get in through windows easily or without being seen, flood "choke points" with light and observation points with motion lights.

Obviously over time you re-enforce the back door (the entry point of choice these days) and the windows.

Also, if you have a family, they need to be security minded. The proverbial "inside man" is how most people get screwed, in this case it is your daughter forgetting to lock the door or something like that. Have a plan and some loose procedures and follow them.

Good luck.

#1, a 400 pound bad guy is going to move awfully darned slow, unless he was a pro-linebacker. #2, if the door didn't break in on the first kick, why wouldn't i just break the glass, or use a window. you could probably do as much for your door by cutting a 2x4 on an angle, to rest against the door knob, and putting a soft rubber footing on it so it would stay in place. if you truely want to fortify your home, replace all the window glass with lexan. i was locked out of my last house, with no way in, and it was about 3 degrees outside. i figured i would use my wifes "hanging plant" steel hanger (6" long, 1/2' diameter) to bust out the window, then just put cardboard over it until my wife got home 4 hours later. then i would go get a new window. i tried my hardest to break the stupid "glass". i found out later, that it had been replaced by lexan by the previous owner. he worked at a plastics place. i am telling you, that stuff is T-O-U-G-H! even with my 20 or so hard as i could blasts against all parts of the window, it would not even crack. all it did was put a few scratches in it.

...400 pound bad guy with heavy boots on.

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A lot of those around lately? If your door can withstand a guy like that, what about two guys like that? If you fortify it to withstand two of them, what about two guys with a 50lb breaching ram?

CoRoMo said:

A lot of those around lately? If your door can withstand a guy like that, what about two guys like that? If you fortify it to withstand two of them, what about two guys with a 50lb breaching ram?

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What if they hook your door to a mac truck, or have a gang of gorillas or build robots the size of the Empire State building... What if Aliens land in your back yard?

What about virtual attacks from space!

THE MATRIX HAS YOU

SKYNET WILL WIN

NO FATE!

I have a daughter and son-in-law in the military 1 hour away from LA and they told me that FEMA is ratcheting up their program on or near 6 military bases around the country close to large populated areas in case of civil unrest. I believe that because of loss of jobs and unemployment insurance running out, the ability to find and buy food to sustain might be hitting a peak in the near future. Those that need to protect themselves and their families should be aware of what might be coming down the pike! I didn't believe in W2K but this one has me quite concerned!

Here's something I've been thinking about. I recently installed a wimpy storm door on my back door. I keep that locked too. Why? Because if someobody wants to kick the door in they are going to have to open the storm door. And if they want to open the storm door, they're going to have to either yank it hard or pry it open. That takes time and makes noise.

Just making it more cumbersome for someone to break into your house could convince someone to try the house down the street instead.

Just for kicks you could make a false front door with brick wall behind it. So someone would break their leg trying to kick it in.

True value hardware sells a jack that fits under your door knob and slopes to the floor. It's portable and doesn't affect your property values. individual alarms can be purchased for the windows (buck a piece at the dollar store). and a drive way alarm can be had for a few dollars more. Most of my home alarms are very loud with the specific intent that the bad guy KNOWS he tripped an alarm and , one hopes, decides to git while the gittin's good.

I have found that what works best for me is to construct a moat

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If you'll stretch your definition a little I HAVE a moat. The road dead ends at my place and there's a drainage ditch across the front of my property. You come down the road, over the culvert and stop at my gate get out, open the gate, drive through the gate and set of my drive way alarm before you drive the last 100 feet or so to my dooryard. by that time my dogs have surrounded your car and the chickens are going nuts.

Not too many folks show up completely unannounced

I have fair amount of paranoia, I'd like all exterior walls to be solid concrete or at least filled cinder block with rebar and quickcrete, to 1M thick (or more) and the door & frames to be stainless steel solid, with the frames secured deeply into the walls.

All windows, at least on the first floor, should be too small to fit a person into, and should have integral heavy-duty shutters

is that what your house is like now heavenly sword? i'm not knocking your preferences, i cannot deny it would be able to withstand even a short artillery barrage...but i dont know how i would feel about living in a bunker

Definetly stay cool in the summer

indoorsoccer, no, it is not, but i have lived in one like I am describing before.

While it may slightly resemble a bunker, its not. The second floor windows are bigger (although a large man may suffer while trying to get in) and the third floor even has small balconies.

The insides are fairly bright, and the outer walls have vinyl siding secured to them. The doors have a wooden exterior bolted on.

Oh yea, little bigman, you can circumvent alarms by simply popping the windows out of their frames, I have seen my friends do it before

You underestimate the strength of a solid core wood exterior door.
With a pair of dead bolts into the proper 2x4 frame, the thing is very very strong. Any brackets would have to take advantage of the strength of the entire wall. Anything you lag bolted on to the inside would only have the lateral strength of the wood, pine likely, and that is not very much. You could pull off the trim and put 4x4's around the frame, but they would have to be strapped to the house.
I could do this all night, and have loads of ideas off the top of my head, but I really need to finish my work before it's due!
Here I am being the ultra-procrastinator.

Fortification is as solid as the weakest point of entry. What about windows? Any ideas on how to fortify windows without installing bars? I've read about film, applied much like tint, that will hold the window together even after it's been hit with a bat several times.

you can circumvent alarms by simply popping the windows out of their frames,

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Layered defense my friend. you can't circumvent an alarm you don't know about. I'll know you're here before you get to my windows.

My mother did a good job of fortifying our house, by putting crap in front of every single door and window of the house, and leaving few usable walkways. Hoarders suck! With very few exceptions, I estimate it would take 30 seconds, at a minimum, for an intruder to gain entry through any given window AFTER breaking it. That's how long it would take them to gain entry and be able to defend themselves.