Feedback on walk in gun safe/storm shelter

[rbstern]

The wife and I are finalizing plans for our retirement home build. Have a plan picked out, have met with the builder a couple of times.

I have a spot picked out in the basement where I'm going to have a couple of extra walls poured, along with a concrete ceiling (in a galvinized pan), while leaving a rough opening for a vault door that I will eventually fit. Since it's going to be an enclose concrete shell, with the exception of the door, I figure I should plan for a conduit to run electrical.

Wondering if I should add a vent, or even ductwork for hvac. Can't imagine the temp swings will be wild (mild climate, and below grade, insulated by the concrete and the rest of the house), but if I'm going to keep my firearms in there, I may need the dehumidifying via the house hvac. Also thought I should paint the room with something like Drylok.

Would welcome any feedback on construction considerations.

 

[Redlands Okie]

Any moisture issues need to be stoped OUTSIDE the walls, once the moisture gets to or in the concrete then solutions such as drylok are iffy at best. One could spend a great deal of time discussing this issue. But its simple, if no water reaches the wall then no water can leak thru the wall.
Hvac vent could possibly help on moisture from condensation of the house air. It can always be blocked off if needed, hard to add later if needed.
Remember the door needs to swing INWARD. Usually a good idea to let local emergency out fits and those close to you know to look for the room and any occupants if the house suffers damage.

 

[CurlyDave]

I would put several conduit runs into a strong room like the one you describe. Sounds like a great place to put a backup hard drive, the recorder for security cameras, etc. Definitely want ventilation of some sort, but try to make it fireproof.

 

[EddieWalker]

One of my future projects is to build a safe room in case there is a chance of a tornado hitting us. Piece of mind and knowing that we have a place to go has a lot of appeal to me. I also like the idea of storing guns, important papers and whatever else we want to keep secure in there. FEMA has some good information that's worth reading. https://www.fema.gov/media-library-...709/FEMA_P-320_2014-ConstructionPlans_508.pdf

At a local hunting show, I spoke to some guys that install Browning safe doors that are approved for tornadoes. Apparently this is fairly common. Installed, they where at $3,000 but in this link, it says they start out at $4,000. So there is some difference in pricing. There are also a lot of other companies out there to look at, but this gives you an idea of what to plan for.

Universal Vault Door - In-Swing

One of my elderly clients decided at age 80 to build a new house. She has a lot of money, so there was never a consideration of what things cost, just what she wanted. One of the things that she did was make her master bedroom closet a safe room with a vault type door and concrete walls and ceiling. This was a fairly new thing for the City of Tyler to deal with in their code department, and required multiple back and forth meetings between the engineer who designed it and the city engineers to approve it. The biggest issue was ventilation. The city required it to be ventilated to the outdoors in case of power loss to the house. From what I understand, this complicated the concrete pour for the ceiling. This is all second hand, so I don't know the exact details, just that it wasn't a simple thing to figure out. Another thing to keep in mind is that her master closet is big enough for a full sized sofa and TV, along with all her clothes and shoes. What it cost never came up, she doesn't care what it cost.

 

[Cord]

I second the need to stop moisture on the outside. There are numbers us foundation waterproofing systems that utilize a hot sprayed rubber coating with a mat which covers the wall. The mat has pins which holds a fabric away from the wall. This provides a drainage plane to direct the water to the footing drain tile. Don't cheat the floor slab either. You'll need a quality vapor barrier. The only one I'd recommend is Stego wrap. Be sure the contractor uses the correct red tape. Contractors also like to heat on the foundation drainage.

For the room, you'll want a little airflow to the room, but I'd suggest using electric heat and a dehumidifier to really control the temperature and humidity. The dehumidifier will require a floor drain. Don't worry about the electric as the conduit can be surface mounted when you finalize the design.

 

[RNeumann]

It depends on the use of the room and the level of SHTF you are prepping for. The last one I was involved in had a vent to the exterior and no HVAC. It did have one electrical circuit that came in next to the wall and all other conduit for the plug, switch and light was surface mount. The hvac can be handled with a small dehumidifier in the room and a small electrical heater if you don't want the hole for the duct and a second hole for return air. The humidifier will need a floor drain.......add some type of back flow device and plan to keep things off the floor- more of an issue if the door is sealed. The better option may be a tube through the wall down low that feeds a drain outside the room.

Sealing the room will need to be done from the outside. Trying to waterproof from the inside is like trying to catch rain drops with a tennis racket.

As stated above in swing doors have a lot of advantages. Typically vault doors swing out though. Again, back to the level of security, you may want to pour the metal frame and or latch detents into the opening.

 

[rbstern]

Thanks for the input, gents.

I have confidence in the builder. I watched him build my neighbors house, saw the foundation work while it was being done. Also saw excellent results from him doing a tricky renovation on another friend's old home. The water table isn't high were we are (our well is 200+ feet deep), and the area where the house will sit has natural slopes away from the foundation area. I'll discuss exterior waterproofing with the builder and see what he suggests.

I think I'll plan for two small vents on at opposite ends of the room. The room will share a wall with the mechanical room. If I find that the humidity needs more than natural ventilation, I can tap into the ductwork of the HVAC for forced air, just on the other side of the wall.

I'm reading up all I can find on doors. In the $1000 range, it seems like there are a few 12 gage steel doors weighing about 350lbs. One is dressed up as an entry-level safe door (Snap Safe). Others are commercial fire and security door variants. Can't imagine that 12 gage steel would stand up to a pounding of any kind of effort, or power tools, for that matter. It seems like the next step up is to about $2500 to $3000, which gets into doors with significant amounts of steel (1/4" plate or better), relockers, etc. Weights of 600+ pounds. Certainly preferable to sheet metal. I'd prefer an inswing door. With an outward swinging door, I'd invest in redundant communications mechanisms and better/wider "be sure to come dig me out" notification systems.

 

[Cat_Driver]

What I would do is put in the safe room NEXT TO the basement wall if you have the room, with a connecting door to the basement. Then I would add an escape hatch straight up so you can enter the safe room from inside or outside.

My thoughts are always add more than you'll need for future. 20 years ago I ran 600 feet of conduit from the front gate, while I has the trench open along with power I added conduit for phone, video, water. It wasn't till years later I used all three things I added "just in case" saved me a lot of digging, time and money if I added each one when they were needed.
I wouldn't live in Tornado area with a safe room. I would put in a safe room before I hooked up the washer and dryer, or had cable TV installed.

 

[RNeumann]

The snap safe uses lag screws to attach the frame/door to the structure. With a little planning before the pour you could save some aggravation and or make for a stronger connection.

From my experience you will be ahead if you disguise the door and room to look like wood paneling or a book case etc. Those who want in will get in.....unless they don't know about it.

 

[Dadnatron]

Make sure you have a good and separate ventilation option. If you are using it as a storm shelter, and get hit by a tornado which knocks your house down around your ears, you will need to breathe until someone has the chance to dig you out.

As doctor, I recommend breathing at least 3 x a day!