Tag: safe service

Getting Service After You Buy Your Gun Safe

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A man whose gun safe we drilled open in late November relayed the following story:

Early in 2015 Jeff purchased a gun safe at a box store thinking it was decent quality and American made.  (It wasn’t because this “manufacturer” imports 100% of their product.)  Jeff’s safe malfunctioned and locked him out in late September.  He was disappointed but not too concerned because opening day of deer season was still eight weeks away — surely he would have no trouble getting to his favorite rifle by then.

Jeff tried numerous times to call the company’s warranty department to arrange for the gun safe to be opened.  Eventually he got an answering machine and was able to leave a message.  After waiting a week or so without getting a return call the process was started over again.  A few weeks later he reached a real person who apparently dropped the ball, because nothing happened again.  He started over once more but the “customer dis-service” continued until after opening day of deer season.  Jeff ended up borrowing a rifle to hunt with.  He was not happy.

Obviously, few warranty issues take that long to get resolved, but some gun safe companies are known for their poor customer service.  A little online research will tell you which companies to avoid.  Buying you gun safe or vault door from a business that can service them will also save you from this kind of trouble.

Where You Buy A Gun Safe or Vault Door Affects Security

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About six years ago a California company wanted me to buy some of their chinese made gun safes which have a nice patriotic, all-American name. The prices were very good for safes with 11 gauge steel bodies. I ordered two to test the quality. When the gun safes arrived the steel was 2.5MM rather than 11 gauge — 17.7% less steel than advertised. (This is a very common lie, Chinese steel is usually in millimeters but importers advertise guage thickness.) The paint was also flawed, shelves were weak and the seals were coming off. We sold these units at our cost and never bought any more.

That company is still selling these products online directly to consumers, and through a few resellers. A small number make it into our area that way. We do service work for this California company when their products have problems. Their quality still sucks!

Last week we got a call from a lady whose husband had purchased one of these gun safes online. He has died and she did not have the combination. We told her that we could open it for a reasonable fee. We also told her that if she could find the serial number the company may have a record of the combination; but it might be a hassle to get it from them because they have no idea who she really was. I explained that they would probably want a notarized letter proving who she was, and might also ask for a death certificate. That made sense to her.

The woman called back 20 minutes later. She was shocked that the company gave her the combination without even asking her last name!! She thought we should know how careless the company is with people’s security.

People selling gun safes talk about protecting your valuables. But you need to be aware that many of them, especially online sellers, are just there to make easy money. Once they get your money they don’t care about you or the fact that you may put your life savings in their safe. They don’t want to be bothered by following appropriate security procedures.

Think about this: A visitor to your home might be able to write down the serial number of your safe, and then get the combination just by making a phone call! He could open your safe when you’re gone and empty it, leaving you to wonder how someone cleaned you out. Comforting, isn’t it? How much would you lose if this happened to you? You need to be really careful about what gun safe or vault door you buy and where you buy it.

How To Fix Cheap Shelves in a Gun Safe

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Cheap gun safes, especially Chinese made safes that are sold in big box stores, almost always have weak shelves.  The shelves are made of inferior particle board which is thinner than it should be, so the selves hold very little weight before they sag or break.  I have seen brand new Chinese made safes that sag just from their own weight.  Naturally, the wider the safe is this worse the problem becomes.

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In my opinion it should not be necessary to fix a problem like that with a new safe, or avoid using the shelf for fear of it breaking, but there is an easy fix.  The clips that the shelves rest on are usually 1/2” or 5/8” wide.  At your local home improvement store buy some metal u-channel or square tubing that is big enough to go over the clips.  Cut the material to the correct length and slip it over the clips on both sides of the safe.  Your shelves will then lay flat and hold much more weight than before.

Fort Knox being a quality oriented company uses better, thicker shelving material.  And on 51” or 61” wide safes they install tubing for support at the factory.  As I always tell people, don’t save a few dollars by buying Chines made junk – buy an American made gun safe from one of the few trustworthy manufacturers.

Insulation in Chinese Made Gun Safes

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Part of what you typically get with cheap gun safes / Chinese made gun safes is insulation made up from construction scraps.  The pictures below show a new Chinese made safe in our shop for service.  Notice that the drywall is pieced together from different kinds of drywall.  The light and dark pieces are even different thicknesses.  They are glued into place and the seams are mostly covered with tar-like glue.  Some of the gaps are quite wide, which naturally allows heat to pass in a fire.

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In the light colored pieces at the lower left, you can see hammer marks from when these pieces were broken out from whatever they were previously nailed to.  Look close and you can see boot prints.  In a number of places the paper backing is loose – it pulls away from the gypsum when the pieces are broken apart carelessly.  Frequently with this type of junk safe, the drywall pieces will be smaller than what is in this safe, as small as 5” X 5”.

Remember a few years ago that many homes, especially in the southeast U.S., were left uninhabitable by Chinese drywall with very high levels of formaldehyde?  Well, that same drywall was (still is ?) used in Chinese gun safes.  I have read that those formaldehyde emissions promote rust (guns), as well as lung cancer, heart disease, etc.  Do you suppose they still use that crap in gun safes?  What do you think happened with all that high-formaldehyde drywall?  Where in the world could you possibly re-use that stuff?  Think about it.

Do yourself a favor:  Buy an American made gun safe.

Buy Guns From a Gun Store, But Buy Gun Safes From a Safe Store

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It may seem like a natural fit for gun stores to display and sell gun safes.  But just like we don’t know enough about guns to provide proper advice and service for weapons, gun stores don’t have the appropriate knowledge to provide advice and service for safes.  To them, safes are a sideline, a way to boost sales and profits.  At Hoogerhyde Safe, safes are our business — you can tell by the name, right?  We know more about safes because we work on them every day, just like a gun store works on guns every day.

We have the tools, training and years of experience to do any service work that might be required after the purchase.  It is common for customers to tell us “I bought my safe from the gun shop. Now that I have problems with it they say they can’t repair safes.”  When you are out buying a new rifle and you are tempted to buy a new gun safe at the same store, ask this question:  “If the lock fails and the safe cannot be opened, what specifically can YOU do to fix it?”  If they do not have the ability to open it themselves that is the wrong place to buy a safe.