Large safe placement help

leemschu

Got a question for you gun safe owners or anyone smarter than me. I went yesterday to get a gun safe Browning SP49, around 650#s. Got there they had sold it but had the SP49T at 790#s. It was marked at $1850 told me he’d sell it to me for $1400 with in home delivery. I asked to look at the dimensions turns out the safe was marked wrong. Was supposed to be $2,350. So I couldn’t pass up on the deal (I checked to make sure it wouldn’t cause him any grief). 

Ok for my question... My house is on a crawl space. Do you think the safe will be ok on a crawl space? Do I need to reinforce my joist with jack stands or anything? The safe is 41x24x 72 and will probably be against an exterior wall.

Sea2Ski

Not an architect here but I will state that it being on an exterior wall is a good thing. That puts the weight in the joist corner and that corner is with the sill plate.  Better than the middle of the room. 

Surprised there are not requirements somewhere in “plain English” for someone like us to look to see if what is present is sufficient.

Wait.....   not really....  that would be logical.  

Hopefully someone will will be along soon with something more meaningful and scientific. 

MattBTI

I've got a 650lb safe on top of a crawl space along an interior wall. Hasn't been an issue to date. 

epcotisbest

While I have no personal experience, I am in the better safe than sorry camp. I  say get under there and add some additional support directly under the safe. A couple of 4x4's and a header should do the trick, or some adjustable jack posts, and you won't have to worry about it in the future.

Woodchunk

Will it weigh more than your fridge?

leemschu

Woodchunk said:

Will it weigh more than your fridge?

I’m sure loaded it will be around 1000lbs so yes

etherdome

Im positive it would be fine. However, I understand your concern and would have the same concerns. I would look under the house first and then find a spot to put it that is directly over a main joist on an outside wall. Probably overkill but that’s 100% what I would do. Not an architect here so my terminology may be off but you get the picture. Visually find a spot that you see has the best support possible. 

HeavyG

EDIT: Ooops, I see @etherdome has already said what I said here.

I'm sure it would be fine but one thing I would do is to make sure that the wall you are placing it against has the floor joists/beams running perpendicular to the wall.

That way you'll be fairly sure that at least one and maybe two joists/beams will be directly underneath the safe.

If you place it on a wall where the joists/beams are running parallel with the wall most of the weight may be relying on the subflooring to distribute the load to the closest structural members.

That would depend  on the dimensions of the safe and  the spacing of the joists but it may turn out that the safe is deep enough and the joists are spaced such that it might still be directly over a joist.

In any case if it does turn out to pose problems, as has been mentioned, it will be easy enough to get into your crawl space and add some additional supports.

stlcharcoal

You might post something on ar15.com under the "Safes & Security" forum under the Armory category.  Lots of safe guys on there......installers and dealers.

Depends on how the joists are aligned.  If you have two under there just inches from the sitting on the foundation you're probably find.  But if you're mid span on one running longways, then you might think about something.  That's how my fireplace is......midspan on an outer wall.  They just doubled up the joists because of all the weight.  I don't remember if they're screwed together or bolted together.

Either way, that's really not that heavy of a safe and I've seen plenty of them NOT sitting on concrete.

CornfedMA

I’ve always been told by “safe guys” and a few others that generally speaking, most safes are good to go on the first floor and basements. It’s when you get to the 2nd floor that things get a little more tricky. That bring said, a little extra support definitely won’t hurt. 

The_Stache

Weights less than a king size waterbed! 

Killit_and_Grillit

@leemschu feel free to PM this if you don’t want it out there but I have been through this a few times and you only have about half of the info you need to consider. 

1) how many guns (specifically long guns) are you gonna put in and what type are they? Obviously older firearms specifically with wood are going to weigh significantly more. 

2) Are you going to bolt it down to the floor and/or the wall? And are you going to put it in a corner?

3) How often will you be getting in it? (Does that area get a lot of trafffic?

Legume

You could always build a box twice the width of the safe  that’s only ~4” high (2x4s on edge topped with plywood) to distribute the weight over a greater span.  Put as much bracing as you want under the safe in that box.

Wpilon

41 x 24 = 984 square inches so, even with 1000lbs it would only amount to about 1lb per square inch (psi) of ground pressure. A 160 lb man walking is about 8 psi. I think you're good.

Kent8621

I would agree with the above statement.  everything is shear at that point and its next to one of the strongest parts of the house.  I would caution about adding structure underneath without a lot of calculations.  the problem with it, is that if it is not done properly you will create stresses on parts of the house that are not normally seeing those loads. If you want to get some measurements and pictures of what your working with in the room and under, in a couple days I could run the math and make sure in an advisory capacity.  PM if you would like that. 

edit.  if you felt better safe than sorry, sandwich that portion of your floor joist in the same material along the span.  wood is more likely to stretch in the grain direction than against the grain. see terrible paint picture.  the main risk is the red line you see of the wood stretching in the grain direction over time but unliky based on the foot print.  the three boxes you see to the right is the sandwich theory, doing that increases the strength quite a bit because the sandwich pieces take extra load now as well as the fasteners. hope it helps.

stlcharcoal

On other thing to think about if you're putting that on an exterior wall......is your house brick or siding?  If siding, can you get a utility trailer over there?  I've seen picks of the bad guys that take a couple saws and cut a hole in the wall and tip the safe into a pickup truck bed.  It's still bolted to the wall and floor, which are now in the back of the truck.

First line of defense is hiding the safe.  Build a closet around it and/or never let anyone know where it is.  If the bad guys don't know it's there, they're not coming prepared to get into it.

Woodchunk

A 41" safe should be able to span at least 3 joist. If they are 2X10's you should be fine. You could always go underneath and sister the middle one out

mEGG_My_Day

Not quite the same thing.  About 10 years ago we did an upstairs renovation.  My wife picked out a huge free standing cast iron bathtub - it has to weigh 400 pounds plus by itself - it holds about 80 gallons of water so that's another 640+ pounds before a human gets in it. I asked the engineer on the project if I should be worried about it.  He laughed at me as he pointed at the five huge construction workers (each weighing about 200) positioning the tub in place. 

Im guessing you will be OK.

td66snrf

I put mine in the garage. 

stlcharcoal

The scarier thing is when you have a big safe, and wanted to put it in a basement that isn't a walkout.  Figure a 700#+ safe and two big guys, or on guy with a 200 # stair climber.  Either way, 1000+ lbs on a set of steps that you have no idea of how they're secured or built.

When I was a busy real estate agent, I never would walk on a deck until we went underneath it first.  You wouldn't believe what these builders or out of work craigslist guys would do......band boards just nailed to the house, 4x4 support posts just resting on paver stones, no hurricane ties or anything holding the joists to the beam, etc.  Some of these I could have ripped down by hand if I tried.  We've had a couple deck collapse deaths in st. Louis over the years due to shotty construction.