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Practically Shooting

Gun Safes - GunVault


Pablo

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I have had a safe since the 1980s and what I found about safes is check with you accountant as you may be able to deduct the safe because you store your tax papers/buisness papers in it. I would worry about the electronic lock. and bet the next size bigger of down the road buy another. To divide you things between two locations. You end up putting other valuables or keepsakes in it. Then bolt it securely to the floor and or wall to make it harder for the safe to get stolen. Also the safe is a long term purchase so take a little while longer to look at others. Made in USA and the high quality locks pay off.

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This may or may not be useful to you, but I will pass it along anyway.

Just in the last week or two, I heard from a guy who has one of the smaller GunVaults; one of the handgun case sized ones like you are supposed to keep by the bed. He tried to open it electronically and couldn't, and had to use the key backup. The electronics had failed somehow.

He contacted GunVault, and they were aware of some problems when his was made (I don't know when that was- last month or ten years ago), had him send it back and they sent a new one. There was something about not having any in stock, so maybe they would have sent one immediately, before his got back to them, I don't know.

While I think the customer service was good, I would have reservations about buying one IF using it as a quick access safe. As a regular safe, I suppose it wouldn't matter, but if choosing one based on the quick access finger pads...I wouldn't. Anything can have problems, I understand that. A key lock could maybe just as easily failed. The thing that gets me is that GunVault said they were aware of it and had done nothing. That cost them a lot of points in my book.

If you sell a safe on the basis of being quickly accessible without keys in an emergency, and the thing doesn't work, AND you know about it....I don't like that.

Now...

Whenever safes come up, I always offer this suggestion, although it's not an easy solution because you aren't going to walk into any old shop and buy one:

If you can, try looking around for a real-deal business type safe. I have seen then listed in the "Business Equipment- Other" section of the local ad paper. They don't show up that often, but they do show up. We have a pretty big ad paper here, and I see a safe that's big enough for long guns listed in it maybe four-five times a year.

So they aren't exactly growing on trees, but if you can get one, you'll have a much beefier safe than any "gun safe" I've seen, and they don't cost any more than a Ft Knox or Browning level safe.

They won't have a nice carpeted interior with gun holder racks, and an exterior paint job like a show car, but will probably be a lot stronger built than a "gun safe". Mine has walls around 5/8" thick and the door is made of two layers that total well over an inch. There are some thick doors on gun safes, but I've yet to see any walls that come close.

I admit didn't look all that hard for mine. My best friend's dad found it. He is a safe nut, who buys them and fixes them up. He finds safes in the craziest places. I think he can smell them. And he knows where every old building is with an old safe in it, so when they start to remodel or tear the building down, he is there, asking if they want to get that safe out of their way. They often give them to him to get them out of the way. He found this one in a supermarket in another state, and called to see if I wanted it. I did. But I have seen similar ones in ads since.

Another option if you only want or need one for handguns:

A few years ago, some surplus stores around here had ex-Army safes for sale. (My friend's dad told me about this too.) They were cubes about 15-18" on all sides, making them a good size for handguns. I bought one for $100. It's not quite as heavy built as my big one, but still pretty stout. I don't know if there are still any of these in surplus stores, but if you run across an ad for an "Army safe" it might be one of these and not some small letter safe or lockbox, and worth looking at.

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