Handgun Safe recomendations

[YoPedro]

It's a long story, so rather than bore you all with my tales of woe, I'll cut to the chase:

I need a recomendation for a bedside handgun safe. Any opinions would be appreciated. There are no kids in the house, just looking for some accessible immediate home security to store my favorite self defense sidearm.

I'll post the whole story in another thread.

 

[camslam]

I've got a DAC Sportsafe with the 4 finger buttons on top. The safe door is spring loaded for a quick soft opening. It has a light on the inside and fits my full size Glock with a spare magazine. There is additional space, but that is all I keep in it.

You can find several of these types of safes including safes that open from the top and will fit in the top drawer of a nightstand. Cheaper Than Dirt has several to choose from.

Good luck.

 

[Daisy]

Handgun safe

I'm not really sure how much security and fire protection you are looking for. That said Stack-on makes a small safe that can be opened either by key or a touch pad with a programable combination (4 no.s & a letter A or B). It's not heavy duty by any means but will work to help control access, cost is roughly $60

 

[Rustynuts]

Gunvault line, or for even faster access, get the $400+ wall safe with fingerprint access! Saw one at the gun show and it was pretty slick and faster than the keypad access (unless you only use one or two digit codes)

 

[Im283]

Marlboromenthol, why can't they just take your nightstand?

never understood these types of security systems, unless they are bolted to studs in the house.

 

[AJ Dual]

I use a GunVault too, with the security cable option running looped through several parts of the bedframe.

I would lag-bolt it into the sub-floor, but I'll have to wait until Mrs. Dual stops rearranging the bedroom every couple of months.

Honestly, one could just as easily argue that lag-bolting most of these quick-access boxes just gives a thief more leverage to pry them open with a crowbar. Almost all of these devices are a compromise between security and access, as they should be. And the security level provided is only enough for the safety of children and house guests who don't know firearms safety, and against casual theft.

 

[Soybomb]

http://www.handgunsafe.com/safes.htm

 

[Elza]

AJ Dual: I would lag-bolt it into the sub-floor, but I'll have to wait until Mrs. Dual stops rearranging the bedroom every couple of months.

Go ahead and bolt it down. It should slow down her rearranging a bit.

 

[Unisaw]

Check out V-Line: no batteries required due to use of a Simplex lock.

http://vlineind.com/html/home.html

 

[Rustynuts]

I got this one

http://www.handgunsafe.com/401s.htm

It's built like a tank! No flimsy sheet metal here. Most safes are 16 gauge or so, this one is 7 gauge!

The simplex locks are cool, but I wish they had at least one or two more buttons to make the combination even safer. You can only punch each button once to form your combination, unlike most electronic locks. But you can use more than one button simultaneously as a single "push"

 

[karz10]

+1 for handgun safe, although I haven't gotten mine yet, I did order one. I'm getting one for the SUV, but planning on playing around with it in the house, to confirm whether I want one for house, or an alternate model I was looking at. Good thing about this one is it's big enough to hold a few things, has a spring loaded door, and can be bolted down. The guy told me that the spring is designed for lateral movement, mounting the safe on its side as pictured, but if you want to mount it vertically w/ the lid up in the air (either bolting to floor, wall or back of nightstand for example, w/ lid up) they can put a heavier spring in it to open the heavy door faster against gravity.

Other option I'm looking at is www.titangunvault.com although the lid isn't spring loaded, when you open the lid, it presents the weapon from a universal holster attached to the door. He is also working on an attachment that will reveal an extra magazine. This one is nice to mount under the seat of a vehicle, most cars you could reach under the passenger seat to accss this from the driver's position, and keep it out of view from the outside.

Another one, similar to the one above, but harder to get info on is the quikcase, which I've seen a few places, but haven't talked to anyone about it, here are various links for same product line, some have keypad entered in to price, some charge extra for the keypad FYI, from what I've read:

http://www.qwikcase.com/cgi-bin/qwikcase/scan/fi=products/st=db/co=yes/sf=category/se=Sporting%20Goods/op=eq/sf=prod_group/se=Gun%20Safes/op=eq.html
http://www.oregontrailsafeco.com:80/qwikcase.html
http://www.woodsandwaters.org:80/members/store/old/quikcase.htm
http://www.cactussafes.com/products/qcCases.asp

This one has the option to buy a two/three gun model, which may come in handy, but seems a bit bulkier than the titan, and the titan is more versatile and portable, and better in a car IMO...

For what it's worth, whether you look at the handgun safe, or one of these that present the weapon to you, my reasoning for these are the option for the simplex lock seeming less to worry about compared to electronic, and depending on where you mount it, may be easier to access the weapon w/ the way the door opens. I actually went and bought one of these from my local gun shop http://www.winchesterevault.com/ which is much like the gunvault or the dacs sport safe from walmart, but has an option for a bigger one, and like gunvault (unlike dacs) has the security cable option. But for the bedside, where I wanted to put it, I found it difficult to access it from positions where the door opened into my hand. In other words, mounted upside down under the bed, in a position where I could reach the buttons, or mounted to the nighstand (on back where you can't see it from front of room) w/ the buttons on the 'top' of the safe, it makes it hard to reach them, or if you can reach them, then the door is opening into your hand, making it tought to get inside and grab something. So, you have to mount it in a more conspicuous fashion, or I also looked at mounting one on the floor under the bed where you couldn't see it, but I found it difficult to position in such a way that I could get my hand UNDER the bed, but ON TOP of the box for the buttons, or if I did get it positioned right, which was usually at an angle, then I couldn't get my hand under there in a consistent way to reach all the buttons w/ my fingers, so I'd practice w/ a shoe box made up like one of those gunvault/dacs/winchesters to pretend that you mounted it somewhere and think you can access the buttons w/out the door becoming a problem to get around, before you drop your money on one. If you do buy one, the dacs at walmart is the cheapest, but the gunvault or winchesters have the option of a security cable...

Otherwise I'd look for one of the handgunsafes, titan, or quickcase that have their buttons on the door itself, and the door opens to the side, making for more flexible mounting options (vertically on floor or wall w/ lid up, back of nightstand w/ lid up, back of nightstand horizontally w/ lid dropping down open, mounted under bedframe w/ door opening to side, etc.)

My .02 from researching this more than I care to admit...

Karz