For years, I thought about getting home safe. We don't have much in the way of valuables in our house, our most valuable items are electronics and those don't serve a purpose locked inside a metal box.
I did like the idea of putting our important documents in a safe place but with everything stored digitally, there are very few truly hard-to-replace important documents.
So eventually I abandoned the idea. We don't have a safe in our house.
That said, if we did, it would've surprised us to learn that those store-bought safes, the ones from office supply stores, are pretty much worthless.
Check this out:
If you can't watch the video, Mr. Locksmith opens a SafeSentry safe in two seconds with no signs of entry.
The basic gist is that there's a nickel solenoid that prevents the handle from turning and pulling back the bolts on the door. I'm not a safe expert so my explanation is my interpretation of what he's explaining in the video… but I do know how solenoids work. Solenoids create a magnetic field when you apply a current and with the rare earth magnet, we're applying a magnetic field directly and disengaging the lock.
Want one of the magnets? You can buy them anywhere online. They're Neodymium Rare Earth Magnets (though not actually “rare,” they're as common as nickel, the ferromagnetic metal being taken advantage of in the safe itself). They're also cheap, just Google it. 🙂
As they say, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.
In this case, that link is beatable in 2 seconds with a magnet and a sock.
Holly Johnson says
Maybe I am in the minority, but I don’t really have anything nice enough to lock up. Aside from the stuff in my purse, there is nothing of real value in my home. My wedding ring is my only “expensive” piece of jewelry and it was less than $500. Everything else is from Kohl’s. Ha!
fehmeen says
We don’t have a safe in our current house but did have one built into a cupboard at one of our previous rented houses. We never used that though – it was left in there by the owners, who had unfortunately been robbed once. But yeah, I agree with your point about safes being useless.
The same goes for padlocks. There’s a video on Youtube that shows how to snap open a padlock with two spanners. It’s ridiculously easy.
Jim says
I learned the padlock lesson in high school, someone would forget their combination in the gym and the janitor would just come by with bolt cutters. 🙂