Fire safe

Purchasing a Fire Safe

Fire and burglary are two basic types of safes. A fire safe protects against fire and the burglary safe protects against theft. All safes will protect to some degree against both of them, but few offer both strong fire and theft protection.

The construction used in a fire safe or burglary safe is different from each other. A fire safe has thin metal walls with insulating material between them. This makes the vault vulnerable to a forcible attack. A safeguard against burglary needs thick steel walls and this can cause the interior to heat up quickly during a fire.


A strong safe is designed to protect against burglary and extreme heat usually has two strong boxes combined into one. A top notch product that protects against both fire safe  and burglary safe is expensive, but offer a high degree of both fire and theft protection.

To judge the fire capacity of a fire safe is that all major brand safes use the independent testing of Underwriters Laboratories or UL. This allows us to compare different brands. There are a few different ratings such as 350-1, 350-2 and 350-4.

To recognize in these ratings is the first number indicates the temperature inside the safe and the second number indicates the length of time in hours. This figure of 350-1 means that the internal temperature should not exceed 350EsF during the first hour of a typical home blaze.

Fire safe with a 350 class rating is good for storing paper documents because paper chars at 405EsF, but is not good for digital media. The external temperatures that these security products undergo during testing to receive a rating ranges from 1700EsF to 1850EsF.

One thing we should be aware that sometimes companies express their product's rating according to the outside temperature that the fire safe can withstand, but the inside temperature is what we need to know for protection.

Good fire safe is a priority to most major manufacturers. A survey conducting by Sentry Safe, fire safe protection at 69% is the most important type of protection that people are looking for. The second comes security then water protection and at last media protection.

According to Liberty Safe, there are three areas for optimal fire safe protection·        The amount of fire safe board, the more layers, the more protection we get. The overall construction is not just what materials of fire safe are used but how they are used. Browning mentions the importance of a high temperature fire seal surrounding the perimeter of the door. The steel content which provides the rigidity needed for the fire board.

Remember when we purchase a fire safe, none of them is fire proof. Due to the limitations of available material, all are susceptible to fire and heat damage at extreme temperatures for extended lengths of time. So a top quality product that uses the best material and is correctly assembled can be a fire resistant at high temperatures for long lengths of time. It is important to consider our personal needs when deciding what amount of protection we need in a fire safe.