cbuttre85, I have actually dealt with one fire safe company as a customer of ours. They showed me the fireboard they use, etc. Interesting stuff. They actually tested their models in an industrial oven. So, they just heat it up to temp, whatever that may be for the "average house fire" that they care to use, and see how long it'll stay under around 300°F-350°F inside the safe. They don't take into account cool-down periods in an actual house fire, that I can tell. Maybe other manufacturers do, I dunno...
I'd agree that a high reflectivity would actually be a very smart way to keep your safe cool. There's a significant amount of radiant heat in a house fire, I'd imagine. But short of chrome-plating your safe, I'm not sure what you could do. Some sort of coating, maybe...? But a safe with black paint surely can't help much to reflect some of that radiant heat.
By the way, the Brown safes I mentioned in my last post, those were tested in an actual house fire. I guess they partnered with a fire department doing some training and put a couple safes inside the home before they burned it down to the ground. Now THAT sounds like a good way to test your fire protection. And that's one of the main things that impressed me about what I've read about them. (I swear, I'm not just trying to spout advertising for them...! I'm just really impressed, so far.)
I'd agree that a high reflectivity would actually be a very smart way to keep your safe cool. There's a significant amount of radiant heat in a house fire, I'd imagine. But short of chrome-plating your safe, I'm not sure what you could do. Some sort of coating, maybe...? But a safe with black paint surely can't help much to reflect some of that radiant heat.
By the way, the Brown safes I mentioned in my last post, those were tested in an actual house fire. I guess they partnered with a fire department doing some training and put a couple safes inside the home before they burned it down to the ground. Now THAT sounds like a good way to test your fire protection. And that's one of the main things that impressed me about what I've read about them. (I swear, I'm not just trying to spout advertising for them...! I'm just really impressed, so far.)