Gun Safe Room Oh My!

[HANDLOADER]

One of my friends has recently found out about my magic with metal work. And you will never guss what he wants me to do. Build a gun safe room for him. He has all the tools and sippliess but I was wondering what I should rig in it to make sure that his collection is safe. I am thinking about putting a quarter inch sheet of steel on the back side of the door as well as using locks but what kind of locks should I use he wants them as he said " uncutable, un breakable,un pickable, all round good" So I was wondering what else I should build into the safe room. So please leave your ideals, opions, and gripes in that order please.

God bless
Handloader

 

[pioneer461]

There's no lock that can't be cracked, and reinforcing the door is a good idea. You may want to consider reinforcing the interior walls, as well as steel reenforcement to door hardware and door frame.

To be as secure as possible, I'd recommend storing the guns inside of a quality gun safe, or safes, in addition to the hardened room. If the room is also going to be used as a fall-back room (I hate the term panic room) I'd also consider separate power circuits, ventilation, alarm and telephone system.

You may want to tell your friend to take a second mortgage to pay for all of this.

​

 

[stevemis]

There is no perfect lock. Every single lock has at least one vulnerability.

 

[Dravur]

Afiak

any lock can be picked. Maybe not by your casual moron with picking tools. but by a professional. We used Medeco Locks at a casino I worked for and they were pretty darned good, but I watched a pro open one in a few minutes.

 

[Funderb]

frame should overlap the door in steel.
2 deadbolts and you're good.

but then you can move on to the actual room.

 

[burningsquirrels]

more layers of security = longer for them to get his guns. hope he's got some serious coin.

 

[lucky_fool]

A seriously hardened door in standard interior construction is like locks on a convertible - it's only going to keep honest people out. Unless you reinforce the walls with something it's still extremely easy to bust through sheetrock.

Also, "uncutable, un breakable,un pickable" locks? Ain't no such animal.

 

[ilbob]

Another common thread. After he finds out that anything realistic is 5 figures worth of his cash, he may decide it is not all that important to him.

Most existing basement floors are not structured properly to hold the weight of effective armor (steel, concrete).

I would look at a poured or block wall, on a poured foundation. You will need to break up the existing floor to do this. Wire or rod throughout makes the wall a lot sturdier. Don't forget to tie it into the foundation.

You can get pretty secure steel doors and frames, or just weld one up if you have that capability. Locks are another problem. Most keyed locks are fairly easy to defeat, a whole lot easier than you might think. Even the high security padlocks are easily bypassed with bolt cutters. A vault type door gives you a lot of security, but is very pricey.

The ceiling is actually one of the hard problems to deal with. If you do not armor it in an effective way, it is fairly esay to just cut a hole in the floor above.

 

[burningsquirrels]

can't say where it was - but there was a server "room" in an office building. we warned them that putting a card-key door wasn't enough, but they didn't want to spend money. guess what, some robbers broke in a back door, and saw the keycard door, and then punched their way through the regular office wall into the server room and made off with tens of thousands of equipment. the fire alarm went off because they damaged some wiring but that was it. the keycard door was never touched.

 

[Flyerman]

OP, check this site out


http://www.theultimatelock.com/


it has residential and business applications.


getting one myself soon

 

[Z-Michigan]

Something that might be realistic would be cement block walls, with rebar and concrete in the interior of the blocks. Floor (hopefully slab on ground) and ceiling need to be reinforced. A vault door like they sell at Midway USA would be a decent door option. I'm going to speculate you maybe could do this for $10k or so, maybe less if the owner does all the labor.

For reference, a relative does maintenance for banks, working for a large company that has that as a business area. One of the other banks near his service area (but serviced by someone else) had a vault lock problem. It was temporarily jerry-rigged awaiting parts, with a different than normal locking sequence. A bank employee got back from vacation, didn't know the issue, and locked the vault using the normal method. No way to open vault. So, guess what, they break into the vault - using contractors with concrete saws, going through the 2' wall which is apparently heavily reinforced with rebar and such. I guess they took 4 days to get in, open the door, fix the lock, and completely repair the wall. He didn't know how much of that was just to break in, but I would speculate a day or less, given the time it would take to repair that wall.

Moral of the story - there is nothing that can't be broken into, with time and tools.

 

[bogie]

Ultimate lock?

I can get past that sucker in five minutes.

Do you want the room to be "hard to break into" or "hard to shoot into?"

To make it hard to break into, I'd basically just reinforce the walls with a layer or two of good grade of concrete board, glued and screwed on with liquid nails, sandwiching a layer of chicken wire/fencing between each. Yeah. They can get through it. Eventually.

I'd put a couple of Medco locks on the door. And the door frame would be heavily anchored into the surrounding wall. You're gonna have to do a tearout and rebuild the area around the door. And figure on installing a steel door - a wood one with a steel back ain't gonna cut it.

 

[Rembrandt]

Don't do it......remember what the Egyptian Pharaohs did? They had secret chambers built in the Pyramids for their afterworld treasures, then killed the laborers to keep the chamber locations secret. "Only one person can keep a secret"

 

[CYANIDEGENOCIDE]

sippliess, what does this word mean?
IMO best locks is electronic locks check out www.smarthome.com
residential grade of anything is crap, you would be better off starting from scratch.
or http://www.texasshelters.com/post.htm

 

[Flyerman]

Medco locks?

concrete walls?




i can get past those in less than a minute!

















foolish mortal

 

[Funderb]

who the crap is going to go to the ends of cutting down a wall or floor just to get into what may or may not hold something of value.

a good oak door with two deadbolts is enough to discourage a thief. This isn't "the italian job" or some stupid movie.

 

[ctdonath]

Every single lock has at least one vulnerability.

That includes what is called in some circles "rubber hose cryptography" - if it's too hard to open conveniently, and the value of the contents high enough, a rubber hose suitably applied to whoever has the key/combination will open it in a hurry.

 

[Ohio Gun Guy]

Whatever you do, make sure you can get out of it if you get locked in.

 

[bobbarker]

"who the crap is going to go to the ends of cutting down a wall or floor just to get into what may or may not hold something of value." - Funderb

IF i was a criminal, and had broken into a nice house like this(Obviously gonna be a nice place, if he's got the coin to have this all done!) and I found a room like that, I would probably invest some time in getting in. But, I'm not a crook, so, maybe a moot point.

 

[TCB in TN]

Personally were I in the market for a real "safe/storage room" I would look at combining hide and harden. There are a number of good ideas out there as to where to start, but doing a little hiding, along with your hardening (and maybe a few items out in the open) to reward them if they do get in would go far towards protecting your real valuables.

 

[neviander]

Can you say bunker? Put it underground, with a serious steel door. Nothing beats a few feet of earth as a barrier. I seriously doubt the crooks are going to bring a back hoe with them. Like bogie was saying though, if they want in, and they have the time, they're getting in. Even the pyramids were looted, eventually.

 

[Rmart30]

Steel walls and concrete are a great idea..... but how about something hidden also?
Buddy of mine has a wall with a workbench and some 4x8 pegboard sheets on either side of it. One of the sheets hangs on hidden hooks and conceals the door to his collection. It would be a one in a million chance of some random burglar stumbling across it.

 

[Stevie-Ray]

who the crap is going to go to the ends of cutting down a wall or floor just to get into what may or may not hold something of value.
a good oak door with two deadbolts is enough to discourage a thief. This isn't "the italian job" or some stupid movie.

Now you've stepped in it! Here come the security guys!

 

[clarence222]

Safe Room

I built mine out of poured concrete including, but did during construction of my house so it was a lot easier

 

[esmith]

You can't steal what you don't know exists, which basically means, if the BGs don't know that theres a room with a bunch of valuable guns, then they can't get in there to get them. Making them concealed will be the best in the long run if he wants them really secure, and he appearently has the money, so he might as well.