Gun Safe Steel Strength

Steel Gun Safes in the Modern Marketplace

Since 1999, Champion Safe was founded with one goal: build the best gun safe in the USA. In today’s marketplace, many gun safe manufacturers no longer take into account that the sole purpose of a safe is to offer maximum security. Instead, they have been carried away by their quest for corporate profits and ended up developing sub-standard safes. These safes are constructed from thin gauge metal that is bent to look thick, offering very little security. Such safes can easily be pried open and your gun can be stolen, destroyed or even used by your kid to do something disastrous.

Back in the old days, you could see bank robbers in the movies using dynamite to blast a safe open. Why? Because the safes were solid, heavy, thick and too tough to break into using conventional tools. Unfortunately, today all a robber needs to break into a safe is a pry bar or fire axe.

At Champion Safe Co. we still build our safes the old-style way. All of them are built tough, heavy, and with thick American-made high strength steel to guarantee that they are up to a standard, instead of down to price like many of our counterparts in the market. No other gun safes for sale on the market are as heavy, strong, and secure like ours!

Steel Thickness & Strength

The quality of steel used in manufacturing any safe is vital in determining its strength. The better the quality steel, the greater the protection. The strength of steel increases by each square of thickness and thicker steel guarantees the protective potential of a safe. For example, if you double the thickness of a piece of steel, it does not merely become twice as strong, but approximately 8 times as strong.

A safe door made from a ¼ inch thick steel plate is over 9 times stronger than that made from 11-gauge steel.

Steel Thickness	Steel Thickness Decimals	Steel Weight by S.F. lbs.	14-Gauge (.075)	12-Gauge (.106)	11-Gauge (.120)	10-Gauge (.135)	3/16″ (.188)	1/4″ (.250)	3/8″ (.375)	1/2″ (.500)
14-Gauge	0.075	3.125		2.86x	4.15x	5.9x	15.9x	37.5x	126.5x	299.9x
12-Gauge	0.106	4.375	.35x		1.45x	2.06x	5.59x	13.12x	44.3x	105.0x
11-Gauge	0.120	5.00	.24x	.69x		1.42x	3.85x	9.04x	30.5x	72.3x
10-Gauge	0.135	5.625	.17x	.48x	.70x		2.7x	6.35x	20.25x	49.9x
3/16″	0.188	7.66	.06x	.18x	.26x	.39x		2.35x	7.04x	18.8x
1/4″	0.250	10.21	.03x	.08x	.11x	.16x	.43x		3.38x	8.0x
3/8″	0.375	15.32	.01x	.02x	.03x	.05x	.13x	.30x		2.37x
1/2″	0.500	20.42	.003x	.01x	.015x	.02x	.05x	.12x	.42x

Many gun safe manufacturers have been changing the designs of their products to make them look more like commercial safes, but making them weaker in the process. Although these gun safes seem to offer way more protection than an average gun owner requires, they still can’t meet the lowest Underwriters Laboratories (UL) burglary performance rating of UL 687 TL-15.

At Champion Safe Co. we take the quality and strength of steel used in the manufacturing of our safes very seriously. We only rely on American-made steel to build our gun safes because even though it is heavy and expensive, it is the sole base for creating any quality safe. Steel made in China can hardly compare to American-made steel in terms of strength and sturdiness. For example, the 12-gauge American steel is three times stronger and tougher than the 14-gauge China-made steel.

Many of our competitors have some or all of their gun safes made in China and shipped to America. But at Champion Safe Co. we guarantee you quality made in America products which are undoubtedly more secure than their counterparts.

Steel Thickness and Gun Safe Doors

A gun safe’s door is a critical aspect of its ability to offer high-end security. It is usually the first point of attack and therefore should be made from strong, heavy steel. When buying a gun safe, it is crucial to check whether the door is formed from thin metal that is bent to look thick, how thick the outer door steel is, and if the door has a second piece of inner door steel.

Most of our competitors utilize safe doors made from one layer of thin metal, 12-gauge or less, which is formed to look thick. The problem with such doors is that they can easily be pried open by robbers with everyday break-in tools. The 12-gauge safe also offers a manageable weight meaning it’s easy to move around when carried by several people, but that means it will also be easy for a couple of thieves to steal and carry it away. It is common to find gun safe doors with edge thicknesses of between 1 and 2 inches. These steel-deficient doors are mostly filled with sheetrock or partial pieces of inner door steel and although they are visibly impressive, they lack the steel to provide foundational rigidity.

Additionally, our safes have a double steel door casement around the door walls. Don’t be blinded by those thick appearing hollow doors on the market coming to you at a few dollars. Ask yourself, is what I am protecting worth gambling with? When it comes to offering unbreakable security, there is no substitute for steel. And the more steel there is on a safe, the greater the security guaranteed.

Gun Safe Steel Body

We construct all our safe bodies from American-made steel plates. The body is pressure-formed from a single piece of steel by bending and fitting it into shape before welding the top and bottom of the body with full-length welds in and out. We use continuous MIG welds for welding the top and the bottom unlike many of our competitors who prefer to use smaller pieces of strip metal and fill in the gaps with Bondo.

For additional strength and rigidity to the safe’s door opening, we add double steel door casement to the safe’s body. This casement, which is made from 2 or more layers of steel, more than quadruples the strength of the door’s opening. All our models feature this casement and you are not likely to find anything like it with other gun safe companies out there.

Champion Gun Safe Advantages