Do you keep your ammo locked in a safe?

I_load_my_own

I_load_my_own

Happy to be here
Supporting Member
Multi-Factor Enabled
Joined
Jan 24, 2017
Messages
614
Location
Triad
Rating - 100%
8   0   0
I guess this goes for loaders and non-loaders but do you keep your ammo locked in a safe or not?
I am not asking about the 1 or 2 boxes but I have several thousand loaded at a time as I would bet many do so I am just curious if you keep your ammo locked up or not.
 
Nope, all my ammo is in a closet in a spare bedroom in my house. There is heat and air there so I'm not worried about any problems with it. No little kids living with me and when my son brings his family here to visit I just lock the closet door.
 
Is the garage no good for short-term storage (3 or 4 months max)?
 
Only loaded mags in the safe. The rest is in a locked freestanding cabinet.
 
I have a 7x9 "gun room". I just lock the door to that room to secure most everything, including ammo. Guns are in the safe behind that door as well.
 
Very minimal in gun cabinet. (I hadn't progressed to a safe yet, but it's on the bucket list) But there are mags and boxes for everything I own for quick grab and go. The rest is stored in Ammo boxes, tucked away.
 
Nope.

Note that ammo in a safe can eventually cook off in a fire and the safe then becomes a big bomb.

I search all visitors before they leave to make sure they don't walk off with anything!
 
A handful of loaded mags per each in the safe. Bulk ammo stored elsewhere mostly in ammo cans.
 
When I first got my safe, I was stuffing everything I could in it. Now, I just keep hard drives from all my old PCs in it.
 
Wolffy said:
nope. Make it during the week and shoot it on the weekends. One big cycle of ammo.
Click to expand...

This is how I roll. Stopped keeping bunches loaded and stocked. Just keep enough components to load 10,000 on hand. And that is kept stacked under the loading bench.
 
Last edited:
Jeppo said:
Is the garage no good for short-term storage (3 or 4 months max)?
Click to expand...

I keep most of my ammo in my garage. It's in air tight ammo cans with a few desiccant packs thrown in each can. Temp swings are slow and it's kept dry. I've got ammo that's over 10 years old and never once had an issue. If you keep it dry you'll be fine.
 
kcult said:
Now, I just keep hard drives from all my old PCs in it.
Click to expand...

Good idea here. Now I just keep firearms, hard drives and old smart phones in the safe. Ammo is kind of scattered around. Some in a locked closet, some anywhere I can put it.
 
Nope

I have a couple of bandoleer/chest rigs with loaded AR mags in safes, and various loaded mags on top of safes, but most ammo is stored in cans on shelves. All is under lock and key though.

Security wise, I have a boxer bulldog that sleeps on the couch in my shop where a lot of my stuff is kept. Somebody breaks into my shop they are gonna get more than one surprise.

Oddly enough, it's not even my dog. It's my neighbors. She sleeps in my shop most every night, goes home the next morning. Everybody is cool with it. Long story. LOL!
 
No. I bought a large trunk from a thrift store; did a little work on it to clean it up. I then organized my ammo in individual ammo cans and stack them in the trunk. I do keep a lock on the trunk.
 
fieldgrade said:
Good idea here. Now I just keep firearms, hard drives and old smart phones in the safe. Ammo is kind of scattered around. Some in a locked closet, some anywhere I can put it.
Click to expand...

Considering I'm actually still using the first smart phone I ever had, I'll definitely keep that in mind. Lol.
 
I shot all of mine. Except a couple boxes. Must have been 50 to 100 thousand rounds of training to be proficient in all degrees of bad assness. (Just in case anyone on the interwebs was thinking about making trouble in they Dirty D). Bwahahahahha!







C'mon you guys know me. I can hit a 10 yd target with an 11 yd barrel.
 
JimP42 said:
Note that ammo in a safe can eventually cook off in a fire and the safe then becomes a big bomb.
Click to expand...
Not really...unless ALL the ammo cooks off at the EXACT same time, which is highly unlikely.
First off, explosives produce massive amounts of energy and a shockwave. Ten pounds of C4 detonated simultaneously produces an extraordinary amount of energy and an unbelievable shockwave. However, 10-1 pound blocks of C4 detonated at little as one millisecond apart produce much less energy and shockwave. The effect is not cumulative. Miners have understood these physics for a couple hundred years now.
Ammo cooking off in a safe is different than ammo being shot from a firearm. The firearm chamber constricts the combustion gases and creates a high pressure situation that propels the bullet down the barrel. In a safe, there is no such constriction due to the massive internal volume of the safe as compared to a firearms chamber. This results in a relatively low pressure situation when rounds cook off one by one.
Yes, the rounds cooking off will incresse the temp and pressure inside a safe due to the closed system a safe represents, but not to the extent it will cause the safe to become a bomb.
The real danger of ammo cooking off in a safe lies in the shrapnel produced when it does. That shrapnel will cause damage to firearms, even in the instances where the firearms would have survived the fire that caused it all.
 
Not in the safe, but in 2 well built jail lockers I purchased from State Surplus for $3 each. These lockers are heavy and I lock them when the grandkids are around. Keep all ammo and reloading supplies in ammo cans in them.
 
Last edited:
Nope, dont lock it up
 
Mine is buried, in the back yard, the neighbors yard and various other places. Don't worry I've got maps to everything.
 
I used to, during the shortage, but my 6 rounds of .22 LR seem perfectly safe in my pocket now.
 
I probably have 30,000 rounds in my safe. It isn't a small safe. It's in an insulated room, and I have a large golden rod. Most of it that is stored for longevity is in ammo cans with seals with large desiccant packs
 
To be honest I have a hard time keeping ammo in stock. I load it as fast as I shoot it. Right now I'm down to 20-30 rounds per rifle. I was going to load some tonight but I fell into a really good pile of cheese and Cabernet and it all went downhill from there. :rolleyes:

Life is good. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom