Where did you mount your gun safe?

[cbzdel]

I am 99% sure I will be making an offer on a house after this week, there are 3 possible locaions where I could mount this safe, I dont really want it out in the open.

My first choice is the bedroom closet, and I can thru bolt it to the floor and possibly to the wall if the studs are lined up correctly.. It would be out of the way and close to me if I need to get into it. (I do have a night stand gun so getting to the safe is not first priority if a BG is lurking)

Second choice is out in the garage, out of the way, plenty of space to store it, close to the work bench to make cleaning simple, plus I can cover it up with a sheet or something that way no one would know whats there if the garage is open. My grandfather did this and I never knew a huge safe was under the cloth until he passed! So it worked at fooling me hah! I then could bolt it to the concrete floor and the wall. The con is if someone breaks into the garage while I am asleep then I wouldn't know if they are raiding my safe.

Third choice is a detached work shop, it would be the same as the garage but then they would be even further away from me.

Thoughts?

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[gunnails]

That's great, glad you got the CC thing cleared up.

I have my safe in my garage, without seeing your new home I am afraid I can offer no advice on where to locate your safe.

 

[NK777]

Bedroom because you are most likely to be in there durring a home invassion type of situation. I highly recomend that you do not make your guns useless in the name of keeping them safe. They are there to keep you safe!

 

[smurf hunter]

The con is if someone breaks into the garage while I am asleep then I wouldn't know if they are raiding my safe.

Do you have such low confidence in the safe? I'm assuming raiding the safe would involve drilling, hammering, maybe some cutting - all pretty noisy.

Unless your combination is known to the thief, I think you would have a heads-up in most cases, and can employ your nightstand gun to investigate.

 

[cbzdel]

yeah the CC thing finally got resolved. We just kept having to ask "let me talk to your supervisor" when we called, we got maybe 4 or 5 up in the chain of command before anyone was able to help us. We had to fill out a bunch of forms, and really all we were able to do was remove it from the credit report, we were not able to pull the card from her name completely.

It was a LONG annoying process!

 

[Trlsmn]

I am 99% sure I will be making an offer on a house after this week, there are 3 possible locaions where I could mount this safe, I dont really want it out in the open.

My first choice is the bedroom closet, and I can thru bolt it to the floor and possibly to the wall if the studs are lined up correctly.. It would be out of the way and close to me if I need to get into it. (I do have a night stand gun so getting to the safe is not first priority if a BG is lurking)

Second choice is out in the garage, out of the way, plenty of space to store it, close to the work bench to make cleaning simple, plus I can cover it up with a sheet or something that way no one would know whats there if the garage is open. My grandfather did this and I never knew a huge safe was under the cloth until he passed! So it worked at fooling me hah! I then could bolt it to the concrete floor and the wall. The con is if someone breaks into the garage while I am asleep then I wouldn't know if they are raiding my safe.

Third choice is a detached work shop, it would be the same as the garage but then they would be even further away from me.

Thoughts?

The fact that the safe needs to be mounted makes me think it might be one of those super light gun safes/lockers. I can tell you from experience that one of those light gun safes that are bolted to the wall/floor will be dislodged in under a minute with a crowbar and then they make a nice convenient package for two guys to carry all your guns off in. Never again would I trust anything under 700lbs.

 

[uscsoldier]

bedroom closet, I have a sold slab foundation and its bolted with 4 8inch lag bolts Also my weighs 600empty but I still wanted to bolt it down

 

[cbzdel]

Do you have such low confidence in the safe? I'm assuming raiding the safe would involve drilling, hammering, maybe some cutting - all pretty noisy.

Unless your combination is known to the thief, I think you would have a heads-up in most cases, and can employ your nightstand gun to investigate.

I dont have low confidence, I just dot know what it take to break into a safe. Its a Stack On safe, not their sheet metal cabinet but a real safe. I always thought if someone wanted it bad enough it would be theirs.

With it being in the garage, you could cut the studs its attached to as there is no sheet rock, then maybe with enough force you could blow out the metal on the bottom of the safe. its not a huge several hundred pound monstrosity, its just a tiny 10 gun safe, so it being in a closet does give alot of prying room, but that means there is not much room for me to maneuver around in there either.

I guess I shouldnt just say asleep, if they break in in the middle of the day, they could make as much noise as they want.

(years ago my dad has his huge rolling tool chest stolen while he was at home, he was out doing yard work and he took a break and went inside for a drink, came back out and his tool box was gone, the neighbor said they seen a guy with a truck come and back up into the driveway and they put some boards out and rolled the took box right up onto the truck, they were in and out in under a minute, and were quite enough not to have my dad even notice. I know its different than a safe but still keeps me worried!)

 

[rdb241]

Don't mount it on an outside wall. I have heard stories of people backing up to a house and using a 2' bar on a chain saw. They cut a hole in the wall of the house and tip the safe into a truck.

 

[smithmax]

Another reason for the closet is climate control, less worry about condensation and big temperature fluctuations.

 

[onearmedswordsman]

Large safe on the garage and an later, as your collection keeps growing, a smaller in closet. Don't keep all your eggs in the same nest.

 

[PlayboyPenguin]

I mounted mine in a small utility room inside our garage. I have con=fidence that noone is getting inside the safe when I am home without me knowing it and I feel the safe is more secure mounted into concrete with 6" lag bolts than it is screwed into 2x4's in my bedroom closet. Plus it make it so the guns are very close to my work bench and right outside our family room door.

You can always keep a small finger safe inside your bedroom to have a gun stored close by if you do not want to leave one in your nightstand.

 

[jbuck]

Sorry if this had been posted before, but it was a huge eye opener for me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBhOjWHbD6M

 

[longcolt]

I think that the majority of smash and grab meth heads that break into homes will not spend much time with a safe. Too much chance of getting caught by spending time in the home. Many of these are young teens and folks under 25 and they will be in and out quickly. Usually in the morning after you and you family leave for work and school. Thats when my town-home got hit.

But a professional can get into the cheap safes quickly and probably some of the more expensive ones if they have a torch or grinder. But they will make a lot of noise and will be after big money if they take the time to target your home.

A friend of mine had no safe and had a large collection of firearms hidden all over the house. He got burglarized and they found over half of his hidden guns. As he told me later, he could have bought 6 or more safes with the money he lost. Many people don't buy their fist safe until after the first robbery. So give the safe option some serious thought and buy a good one.

 

[jbuck]

Thats for sure. All it would take is one rifle to go missing to pay for a new safe. Finally bought one a little while ago. But that youtube video was pretty scary and just goes to show you to bolt that bugger down.

 

[beavernation1]

I just acquired my first gun safe....36Gun Cannon...it is sweet...700lbs though..lol. I put it in the garage and will mount it to the concrete floor someday. Safe has built in power box to plug in a golden rod for humidity control...anyone know where I can pick up a golden rod....for a decent price?

 

[Dr.Z]

Maybe I'm just paranoid, but the one trouble I see with putting it in most peoples garages.
Is IF someone finds out you do have one bolted to the floor in your garage, they could drive up break into your house/or garage, take a nice 15000# tow strap or winch cable wrap right around it and give it a yank with their 4x4. Most likely just about any concrete anchors would shear off and rip out. They could then load it and take it home to take all the time they want to get in.
While this may be a bit of a stretch, you really have to think like the bad guys to defeat them, they never cease to amaze in odd and bad ways how 'creative' they can get.

Personally, I like the idea of having a concrete floor ( and wall if possible) to anchor it to, in an area where vehicular traffic would be difficult to get to. AND, build it in into a false wall or cabinet type thing, so that they could not easily get any kind of strap around it. (it would also assist in keeping it hidden to start with)

DocZ

 

[jbuck]

Roger that, I had to take out the door frames to get my safe into its final location and them lag bolted down. There is no way anyone is going to pack out out unless they just take a chainsaw to the exterior wall then maybe. But I would surely hope someone would say something before they got to far with the saw.

 

[spectra]

Well I have mine in the garage. Am really thinking of mounting in there. The safe is 600 plus and do not really want to lug it up 2 flites of stairs. Plus the factor of easy access to the bench works for me.

As for someone hooking onto it and yanking it out of the floor. Well I have been in construction for years and the anchors we use well lets just say that a 5000lb forklift stopped in its tracks trying to yank one out of the concrete floor.

 

[Dr.Z]

As for someone hooking onto it and yanking it out of the floor. Well I have been in construction for years and the anchors we use well lets just say that a 5000lb forklift stopped in its tracks trying to yank one out of the concrete floor.

Not to be argumentative, but rather food for thought....I'm guessing that when the forklift tried to pull out those anchors it was hooked fairly low to the ground (please correct me if I'm wrong).

Most gun safes are around 5(ish) feet tall, if some BG decided to get it they would most likely hook on as high as possible creating a huge amount of leverage.
That is another good reason to not only anchor them well, but situate the anchors as far towards the edges/corners as possible.
Mounting to the wall in addition to the floor, is another excellent way to combat the whole compounding leverages thing.
I know maybe I'm giving the BGs too much credit for actually being smart enough to figure stuff like that out. But just from my experience I've found that BGs will get stuff that you never would have expected them to.

DocZ