Thread: "Safe Room" wall safe?

I've been thinking about making some modifications to our walk-in / master bedroom closet to make it our "safe room". My initial thought have been to replace the door with an exterior metal door, install a receptacle for powering a spare cellphone, and to install an in the wall gun safe.

About the safe... I was excited about getting a handgun sized safe designed to fit between the wall studs until I started shopping around. Seeing photos of safes made me realize I'd prefer a safe capable of holding a defensive shotgun {taller}.

Do you use one of these in the wall safes? Any disadvantages?

Remember, most interior walls are only two layers of 1/2" wallboard (hardly stop a .22lr, no matter how strong your door.

Jack

Originally Posted by Capn Jack

Remember, most interior walls are only two layers of 1/2" wallboard (hardly stop a .22lr, no matter how strong your door.

Was thinking more of providing a place for the women in my life to escape the home invasion/robbery, would be rapist, type rather than an invading hit man. Our hollow-core door wouldn't stop an angry cleaning lady

What about cutting a hinged escape hole through the floor.
What you have now will not stop someone with just a regular hammer to break through in minutes.
Do you want it bullet-proof?
That's a whole different story.
An exterior steel door is only two very thin sheets of metal with foam in-between.
Think and plan twice - build once.
Good luck and good thinking about a safe room. We should all have one.

Originally Posted by skydiver

What about cutting a hinged escape hole through the floor.
What you have now will not stop someone with just a regular hammer to break through in minutes.

The escape hole is already there but only goes to the crawl space. I need to think that one over... To get the girls to go down there I'd have to convince them I'd killed all the spiders.

"Minutes" is plenty of time to open the in the wall safe, get armed with the shotguns and phone 911.
There are enough shoes in 'her closet' to stop a pretty large caliber round so bullet proofing isn't in my immediate plan. LOL

My thinking is that an exterior door will be much harder to get through with a pocket knife than would the hollow core door.

I'm thinking of drug addicts needing quick cash to buy drugs. Not invading armies.

Just had a thought about the escape hole going into the crawl space. A heavy plywood sliding door, which could be operated only from under the house, would present a blank surface to a bad-guy trying to follow... Properly braced it would be nearly impossible to break through.

Originally Posted by twoclones

Just had a thought about the escape hole going into the crawl space. A heavy plywood sliding door, which could be operated only from under the house, would present a blank surface to a bad-guy trying to follow... Properly braced it would be nearly impossible to break through.

Good thinking again! The crawl space is a safe place, since those above don't know exactly where you are under it. It could even be made to exit to the outside.

When we were remodeling houses we ended up with one where the previous owners had replaced the drywall in the bedroom with a layer of metal mesh (like a dense chicken wire) covered by a layer of tile board then covered by another layer of mesh and a final layer of tile board. It took me and my buddy forever just to crack through it with a heavy sledge. Our blows would crack the tile board but the wire held it all in place. We finally beat on it until all the tile board broke away and then cut through the mesh. It turned a 45 minute tear out into a two day job.

I'd like to build a house in the next 5-7 years, and want my bedroom to be a "safe room". One thing I am planning on, is having a light switch in my room that will turn on atleast on light in every room, so I don't need a flashlight and nobody can easily hide. I don't know how easy it would be for you to add a "master switch".

that would be good to have a master switch capability....but there is also an advantage to the darkness. Concealment is an issue for you and the bad guy; you'd have the strong tactical benefit of "home field advantage"....that bad guy would be operating in the dark in alien territory...unless it was your wife trying to take you down. Then you'd probably better just surrender

I want a trip wire and 250K candle power spot light that shines at eye level into anyone coming up the stairs. Instant blindless. For ayone coming down the stairs (LIKE ME IN MY SKIVIES with a Bulldog pug in my hand) the light would be behind me (think fighter ace attacking from the sun) In fact when I rebuild our stairs this next winter I am going to do just that. Put a pressure switch on the first two steps up from the landing. And install a pair of H4 bulb driving lights in the top step. Then add an alarm siren.

Our bedroom door is closed and locked and would take more then a couple minutes to get through which would give me plenty of time to wake up roll over grab the M1 Carbine or Bulldog pug and confron the blinded guy or guys at the bottom of the stairs.

another reason to have a reinforced concrete basement room with 2-3 inches of steel plates sandwiched with say...kevlar or sand......and roofed with armor underneath the floor. basically build it as if its a bunker what about one of those...vault doors that looks like exterior doors?

If you are serious about having a safe room to retreat to, the first step is to reinforce the door and frame. A steel door and frame with a good deadbolt will slow down most intruders long enough for the residents to arm themselves and call 9-1-1.

I have been considering installing a door like this to deter thieves from getting into the "man cave" where the armory is located...
Security Door, 17, Browning Gun Safe Product

To reinforce the door frame sounds like a very sensible idea but I doubt the girlfriend would approve of the vault door. She doesn't fully approve of my current plan. Yet. Next year it will be her idea

Bright lights, master switches, etc. Has anyone thought of triggering the smoke alarms? Ours went off earlier this year and being all wired together, every damn one of them was screaming. It was disorienting! Kind of a low tech sonic weapon...

How about mounting a klaxon outside with a switch in the safe room and telling the neighbor to immediately phone 911 if it sounds off?

If it's your house, you can do more mods.

For selling it to the wife/GF, remember that solid core doors not only stop intruders more effectively, but are more effective fire doors. Most modern interior doors are just hollow veneer construction, and veneer burns through in a couple minutes. A solid door could take an hour. Not to mention MUCH more effective sound barriers when engaging in adult activities.

Every door in the house I will be building will be solid.

I recently upgraded a bedroom door for one of my renters, because of her stalker ex-boyfriend. I installed a solid door with a deadbolt and 5" hardened screws on hinge and strike plates. Gave her one of those adjustable crutch poles that prop under the door knob for the entry door and a can of foaming wasp spray that shoots over 20' for her night stand.
After a couple of weeks looking over her shoulder every where she went and seeing him following her, she found out that he had installed a tracking app on her Iphone and was using that to follow her every move.
Restraining order proved worthless. What did work was the retired Marine who has the adjoining apartment. He caught the guy trying to pry open her window one night.
For legal reasons I will not go into any details, but the guy moved out of state rather quickly. The retired Marine was very motivated in helping her, she looks like Uma Thurman's younger sister.

Originally Posted by PlayboyPenguin

When we were remodeling houses we ended up with one where the previous owners had replaced the drywall in the bedroom with a layer of metal mesh (like a dense chicken wire) covered by a layer of tile board then covered by another layer of mesh and a final layer of tile board. It took me and my buddy forever just to crack through it with a heavy sledge. Our blows would crack the tile board but the wire held it all in place. We finally beat on it until all the tile board broke away and then cut through the mesh. It turned a 45 minute tear out into a two day job.

I helped a friend build a reinforced closet out of the heavy mesh wire screwed to the studs under the sheet rock. His idea was to buy time and it looked very fortified when we finished. He added a layer of plywood on the outside of the studs prior to sheet rock which made it much more difficult to kick in. The door was a work of art, swing out, solid core, with long bolts into triple 2x6 studs for framing. The door had four hinges and two additional dead bolt locks into the framing, one high and one low. I wish I had this setup when we finished. Great place to go if we ever had a big wind storm. The best thing was the low total cost since we did it ourselves. The trap door into the crawl space would have been a nice touch for quick escape.

A room is great, a house is better.

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How about just living inside a castle? A big stone castle! With turrets and murder holes, and a drawbridge and a moat filled with Pointy sticks!!!