Visit our retail store in Hagerstown Maryland and let us show you the quality and value of a safe from Heritage Safe Company. Heritage Safe continues to set the standard in home security, fire protection, value and elegance. Every Heritage safe is custom built using only the highest quality materials, with extra care taken to ensure your satisfaction for a lifetime. No matter what you choose to secure in your Heritage safe – heirlooms, guns, important documents, jewelry - Heritage has a make and model for you. At Keystone we make safe shopping fun and easy with:
- A good selection of sizes and colors
- 12 months same as cash financing option
- Availible delivery and installation assistance
- Special orders welcome
For more information on safes from Heritage Safe Company please visit heritagesafe.com
Gun Safe Hints
Gun safes are like garages, it does not matter how big you get them, you always find yourself wanting more space. Thats because the main reasons for owning a gun safe, theft protection and fire protection, apply to many other things in your house. The secure nature of a gun safe make them perfect for jewelry, documents, coin collections, and other storable valuables. The fire resistance of a Gun Safe make them perfect for storing family photos or heirlooms. When safe shopping think ahead to other things in your house that you or another family member may want to protect.
Most gun safes (by Heritage and other manufacturers) list their capacity by the number of guns they can hold. This number may be a variable based on the different interior options of the safe or a single number which usually is the most from all interior options. This number may be true if all your guns are slim such as shotguns or scopeless lever actions. Often times one scoped bolt action rifle will use the space the manufacturer allowed for two guns in the safe. (unless you are willing to jam guns together like a jigsaw puzzle) This is true for all gun safe makers so we suggest taking the manufacturers capacity and reducing it by a quarter to a third to get a "real world" capacity of a safe.
Often two safes of the same size and appearance will carry vastly different prices. The biggest reason for this difference is the amount of steel in the safe. Safes manufactured from thin steel and composites (two layers of thin steel sandwiching a fire resistant board) may appear solid and carry just a good fire rating as safes made from heavy gauge or plate steel. They will not, however, be as secure as their heavier counterparts and may be vulnerable to being "axed" open.
Pay attention to the listed weight of the safes you are examining. Weight can't be faked, plate steel safes will be far heavier then composite ones. You can also rap on the door with your knuckles, a composite door will have a "hollow" ring. Quality safes will also carry a UL listed label. To be listed the safe will have passed the Underwriters Laboratories test which consists of giving common burglary tools such as crowbars and drills to experianced safecrackers and giving them thirty minutes to enter the safe. If they enter the safe in that time period the safe fails.
There are two types of finishes found on gun safes. A textured paint finish or a glossy "car paint" type finish. The textured finishes are sprayed on in a single layer while it may take twenty or more layers of paint to acheive the smooth glossy "car paint" finish. The extra labor involved in building a glossy safe increases their cost at retail by up to several hundred dollars for a same sized safe.
Glossy finishes are most often selected for safes that will be on display in rooms such as living rooms or offices. They show dust and fingerprints very quikly so you will have to clean them regularly if you want them to look their best. Textured finish safes take much less care to look good.
If your safe will be in an unheated room or garage, or in an area of high humidity it is recommended that you install a dri-rod or use dessicant packs in your safe. The dri-rod is a small heater that installs on the inside of the safe. It provides a small amount of heat to the interior of the safe to keep rust and mildew off your guns and valuables. It is powered by elecricity, a small hole is drilled in the safe near its bottom, (predrilled by manufacturer on most safes) just big enough for the electrical cord to pass through. Dessicant packs are large packs of silica gel that absorb moisture from the air. Over time they lose their effectivness and will need to be replaced or dried in a oven.
A big part of protecting your valuables from rust and mildew is to keep moisture from entering the safe in the first place. Firearms wet from use in the field should be dried throughly before returning them to your safe. Anything else stored in the safe should also be dry before storage. If your safe is in an area that may be subject to flood or seepage install it raised off the floor high enough to be above any entering moisture.
