# Gun safe lining



## roscoe999

I have taken part of my closet in our new addition and constructed a gun safe. It is made of welded 1/4 inch cold rolled steel plate. It is 63 " wide 73" high and 23" deep. My problem is what to line it with? I have looked at felt and other materials but can’t decide which would be best. Ideas and where to get material will be greatly appreciated.:nuts:

I think I need to explain a little more about my safe so folks won’t think I have wasted materials and energy. The 1/4 inch cold rolled steel plate are on all sides and top all welded together except for one end it is 3/8” plate. The box weighs over 1200 lbs. so few will be able to lift it even if they could cut away from the 6” concrete slab. The door is hinged with three 12” long ¾” ID pipes cut in half with ¾” sucker rod pins welded to one end and pivoting in the other. I used five dead bolts three to one side and one top and bottom the fronts are covered by a closed pipe with a hole large enough for the key to be inserted. A large sucker rod bar through the door pulls up outside and angles against the 2” x 2” x ¼” angle iron surrounding the door welded to the backside of the front. The door edge closes against this angle iron all around the opening being recessed to flat with the front of the safe. The bar pulls the door closed and if jammed outside should someone decide to lock me in the inside end of the closeing bar can be removed with tools hanging on the wall inside and the dead bolts are workable inside. The light has battery backup in case the power fails. I hope this makes sense trying to describe the creation as my wife calls it. I had the steel stored for several years as collateral for a debt. He never returned so I decided to use it. I not too worried about the house burning because it is made of 8” steel “I“ beam and c purling construction with all steel studs and covered with 26 gauge steel panels later to be rocked over . The gun safe part is covered by two layers of 5/8” sheetrock glued on all round including the top except the concrete floor that the safe is anchored to by twelve ½” - 6” drive in anchor pins through sections of 3/8 angle iron welded to the bottom edge of the walls. It will have a small dehumidifier and restorable desiccant silica boxes. I am putting pegboard on one end and above the long guns and shelves on the other end. I have also completely covered with red oxide paint. Now I need to decide on the liner.


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## kyhoti

Felt, with a spray-on or brush on adhesive would be a good base, and then use egg-crate type foam as your real padding. You can get the material at fabric stores like JoAnns (the foam is used for seat cushions). Moving pads are a thicker felt; some UHaul locations still carry them, and you could skip the foam if you wanted to. Have fun building it out!


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## backlash

Mine is just painted inside.
I would worry about moisture collecting on the lining.
If I was going to line it I would consider thin plywood or thin close cell foam.


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## Magus

Mine's lined with wood.


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## Norse

If you line your safe, DO NOT USE OPEN CELL FOAM. It can trap moisture and cause mold and humidity problems.

I hope you built this thing in your basement. Clever thieves are quite resourceful. Make sure you line the ceiling with steel plate also, as a seasoned thief will bring a battery powered saws-all, to remove those joke safes that lag bolt between two studs. 

I bet my friend who had one of those I could remove it in less than 5 minutes with a saws all and a screwdriver.

Your best bet is to line it with simple type x drywall and paint it. Store all your firearms on non porous constructed racks, and DON"T USE WOOD. Get a couple of goldenrod dehumidifiers and mount them somewhere, if possible on a part of brick wall.

If you built this "Closet safe" on a second floor, I hope you do not have a fire, because what you have is a steel death drop, if the framing underneath catches fire, the weight will cause the floor to collapse.

Anyone who has witnessed a house fire can attest, once the fire reaches behind the drywall, a house can be completely consumed in a matter of minutes.


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## testhop

if you are going to use felt how about pool table felt you can get from a pool repairman . 
even some used thay are glad to get rid off it it is still good for what you want.
my son does pool tables and i get some when he has it use wood in the safe sprayon glue and then the felt . this can be done with any felt


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## Victor23

Ditto what Norse said about the type X drywall. Type x is typically rated for about and hour depending on the application. If you can mount it next to a masonry wall that would be good. Also if you mount the door opening where it swings away from the wall that is really good to help slow thieves down. The idea here is to keep a pry bar from being used to force the door open. Watch youtube on breaking open safes and you'll see what I mean.


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## GeoMonkey

I wouldn't use anything that could absorb or hold moisture. I'd vote for closed-cell foam or a spray on rubber-type coating, like what is used for pick-up bed liners.


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## HozayBuck

Since I've been wintering in East TX for the last couple of years I can say that I've never seen anything rust so fast in my life, if you don't wipe down your guns at least once a week you "will" have a problem... I've used more lube on my weapons in two winters here in E TX then in almost 40 years in MT...I swear my replacement knee is rusting!...

Whatever ya do, wipe em down often!


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## Victor23

If you are concerned about moisture, you should be using dehumidifier in your safe. They are cheap insurance. closed cell foam is not going to give you fire protection. You should also consider looking at the lehmans website for some oven gasket. it will help keep heat out of your door gap as well as smoke. The smoke can inflict significant damage to your firearms.


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## drifter0069

i would use something to make it fireproof. just in the event of a fire. you dont want to bake your fire arms. especially if you keep your ammo in there as well. just my opinion.


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## roscoe999

I decided on a heavy light gray felt material from the local cloth shop and the floor will have the ends of various shell cases sliced off placed under 1/4" plus of the clear poly coat used for table tops. I am also going to put in with the shell cases the ends of ammo boxed. My wife wants me to make a table with the same design as the gun safe floor. I appreciate all the inputs.


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## Virgil_cain

BTW, if you want this to be a fire proof safe (or more accurately a fire resistant safe) I'd box the outside of your cool rolled steel box with several layer of gypsum board (i.e. sheetrock or drywall). That's what commercial fire safes use (they actually have two layers of steel (one thick and one thin) and put the gypsum between the layers. If you just boxed the outside with several layers of 5/8ths Type X Drywall you'll get several hours of fire resistance. You can figure roughly 1 hr of fire resistance for each 5/8ths layer of Type X. Note that you'd have to sheath the door as well to get your fire resistance. Ideally after you put your drywall sheathing around your cold rolled steel box you'd cover the whole thing with some reasonable thickness sheetmetal (galvanized or plain steel, not aluminum). Just sheathing with drywall will help tremendously but it helps to have an "overbox" so that if the drywall crumbles in a fire (and it will) it won't fall away and expose the steel.


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## roscoe999

Virgil_cain said:


> BTW, if you want this to be a fire proof safe (or more accurately a fire resistant safe) I'd box the outside of your cool rolled steel box with several layer of gypsum board (i.e. sheetrock or drywall). That's what commercial fire safes use (they actually have two layers of steel (one thick and one thin) and put the gypsum between the layers. If you just boxed the outside with several layers of 5/8ths Type X Drywall you'll get several hours of fire resistance. You can figure roughly 1 hr of fire resistance for each 5/8ths layer of Type X. Note that you'd have to sheath the door as well to get your fire resistance. Ideally after you put your drywall sheathing around your cold rolled steel box you'd cover the whole thing with some reasonable thickness sheetmetal (galvanized or plain steel, not aluminum). Just sheathing with drywall will help tremendously but it helps to have an "overbox" so that if the drywall crumbles in a fire (and it will) it won't fall away and expose the steel.


The sheet rock I used is the "type X" as recommended by my builder supply folks I never knew it existed before. The sheetrock is covered with 26 gauge steel sheet metal that is overlapped and screwed together under the finished 1/2 inch sheet rock. I had to buy the Type X sheet rock and sheet metal not having any on hand and they cost more than I have in the rest of the creation. I appreciate everyone's help and inpu:wave:t.


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## Virgil_cain

roscoe999 said:


> The sheet rock I used is the "type X" as recommended by my builder supply folks I never knew it existed before. The sheetrock is covered with 26 gauge steel sheet metal that is overlapped and screwed together under the finished 1/2 inch sheet rock. I had to buy the Type X sheet rock and sheet metal not having any on hand and they cost more than I have in the rest of the creation. I appreciate everyone's help and inpu:wave:t.


Sounds like you got the right stuff and that you ended up with a heck of a gun safe.


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