Help with my gun safe

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DownUnder1

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Hello all, just wondering if any of you had any input into my situation.

Down here in Australia one of the rules of owning guns is that you HAVE to have a gun safe and if it is under 150 kg (330 pounds) it has to be attached to the wall or floor, I'm renting at the moment so attaching it isn't really an option, the safe I'm getting http://www.gunsafes.com.au/gunsafes_5.htm is only 47 kg (104 pounds) so I was thinking of bolting a concrete block to it.

Does anyone have a better idea for me how to make up an extra 103kg (230 pounds) besides buying a larger gun safe?

Thanks
 
Add weights to the bottom of your safe. I don't know how much room you have but you can always stack steel plates (or iron- whatever you have access to) to get you over the 150kg limit.
 
230 pounds of concrete is going to take up a lot of space in your safe. Just bolt it to the wall. When you move out, fill in the holes and pait over them. The required hassle won't be much more than the hassle it would take to make that custom chunk of concrete, and in the interim you'll have more real estate in the safe.
 
I was thinking of going the ugly way and attaching it to the exterior of the safe but it you do make sense with the whole hassle of it, also the steel plates is a good idea but I don't know how much it would cost for that much metal
 
I Agree with others.

Either secure a flat steel plate to the bottom in some way that it cannot be removed (maybe even several steel plates stacked inside), or bolt it to the wall studs (if they have such a thing down there).

Concrete will be harder to make just the way you need it, I would think.

It seems bolting into wall structure may be the easiest, then as others said, just spackle the holes when you move the safe out.

What I first read didn't click in my pea brain. I just realized you need to add 230 pounds! Bolt it to the wall stucture or buy the larger and heavier safe AND BE DONE WITH IT!
 
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Rediculous.

Glad I don't live in Australia, and hope this is not a sign of things to come here.

Who comes and weighs your gun safe?

LOL...

Lovely when the GVT tells you how to live.
:barf:
 
It hsa to weigh 330 pounds empty :(, and the police come past to do checks and if they think it isn't correct weight (without weighing it) they will take your guns and ammo until you can prove it is correct weight :banghead:
 
If I were you I would buy (4) 4 inch x 1/2" lag bolts.. aka 120mm x 13 mm lag bolts bolts, and 4 flat washers.

Find the wall studds, which I have no idea what is on center where you are, but is 16 inches on center here, and align the safe to them, drill the safe, then drill the walls making sure you hit the studs and run in the bolts.

A little joint compound and paint will fix these easy, when your time to leave comes.

Concrete isn't all that heavy, and steel 1/2" thick is expensive. When you get checked the cops will freak out and say you cheated with external weight.

Junk steel in the USA is more than $1.00 a pound, so in theory you could buy a gun or a heck of alot of something else for the price of the steel.

Lag bolts cost maybe a buck and a half with taxes and that price probably would includ washers. Wall filler might be 3 bucks for a small container. Probably the paint is hanging around and flat white.... A wet sponge works on near to dry wall filler, and then sand paper is still far less than Steel.

Just do it once right, and keep what ever it is they let you keep... You don't have the Cons and the Bill of Rights like we do.. Sorry 'bout that..
 
heres a thought a bit of a pain but if the door to your place is 36 inches wide get a plate that is at least a couple inches bigger and square get some bolts welded on that fit through mounting holes would make it real hard to get out even with a hand truck
 
Junk steel in the USA is more than $1.00 a pound, so in theory you could buy a gun or a heck of alot of something else for the price of the steel.



where? i'll bring a truck load right over heck coppers only a dollar and a half
 
Thanks for the ideas guys and as for what we can keep, lemme give you an idea

Category A
Airguns; paintball firearms; rimfire rifles (includes pump action not semi-automatic) shotguns (not semi-automatic or pump action); any combination of a shotgun and rimfire rifle; muzzle loading shotguns.

Category B
Muzzle loading firearms (except shotguns); centre fire rifles (includes pump action not automatic or semi-automatic); any combination of shotgun and centre fire rifle; black powder ball firing cannon.
(Category B licence automatically allows you to use Category A firearms).

Anything else is damn near impossible to get:(
 
DownUnder1

You didn't post the size of the container, so I'm going to make a few reasonable assumptions. A typical container such as you've described will have about a 1.5 to 2 inch lip from the bottom to the door threshold. So, let's say the interior dimension available in the bottom is 22" X 16" X 1.5", or 528 cubic inches.

In round numbers, lead weighs .4167 lbs. per cubic inch. That's about 220 pounds that's available to put in the bottom in a fairly permanent fashion. As an added bonus, it could always be melted down for bullets if necessary.

900F
 
I thought it would be a nice place to live, however, it only seems like it would be a nice place to VISIT now that I hear all that!

I was thinking lead, that makes the most cents, however it may be costly.
I guess you need to weigh out how much would the lead cost in comparison to the larger, heavier safe. Then again, as mentioned, the lead could always be sold or re-used in the future should you desire a heavier safe down the road.
 
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It has to weigh 330 pounds empty , and the police come past to do checks and if they think it isn't correct weight (without weighing it) they will take your guns and ammo until you can prove it is correct weight
Click to expand...

Well that pretty much removes any incentive to take a light weight safe and make it weigh more. Even if you could come up with a method to make a lightweight safe actually weigh over 330 lbs, it would still appear to weigh less and be a trouble magnet.

Either get a heavier safe or bolt it to the studs. It's not that hard to repair a couple of 1/4 holes in drywall.
 
Get a bigger heavier safe. You will thank yourself later, besides, you always need more room. Then line the bottom with lead ingots to make up the extra weight, and it should be bolted to something anyway.
 
cassandrasdaddy, How much is 1/2 " thick or thicker in plate no less than 3 feet by 3 feet? And or still usable but somewhat rusty anvils?
 
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