Best defense scenario with kids?

S

sthsquid

New member
Just looking for people's 2 cents on this.

Back before kids, I felt little need to worry about keeping a loaded pistol in the bedroom. Now's a different story. I do have a gun safe in the basement but that's way too far away in case of any nightime troubles. We live way out in the middle of nowhere - on the one hand extremely safe, but on the other hand, if someone were to break in, help would be a long time coming.

Anyway, is a trigger lock the way to go? I'm not crazy about having to worry about keys, but a combo lock can be broken into by an inquisitive mind....eventually.
 
I bought this safe. It uses your fingerprint. Best balance of total security and fast access. I have 2 boys, I have talked to them about guns, but theyre still too small to shoot just yet. If its not in your control, it should be locked up.

They have several models, mine is walnut, holds to pistols, and sits on my night stand.

http://www.biosaf.com/

good luck.
 
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I teach my kids to shoot. We start by shooting spinners and such, but when Halloween comes around, we shoot pumpkins. It makes an impression.

Some would call my approach dumb, but at either end of our house I have a loaded 12 gauge inside a closet. Each one rests horizonally on bicycle hooks above the door. You can open the closet and never see it unless you clear out the closet and step inside. Obviously, a ten year old could get a chair and reach it. It is possible that it might be discovered by a child IF the child was not monitored and entered the closet. My own child is educated in guns, and respects them. She is a shooter. I do not fear having a loaded gun on the dresser with her. Her friends are the ones I worry about. They are monitored when they are over.

That being said, the safest place for a loaded handgun is on your person, children or no children. Visiting adults do stupid things too.
 
Anyway, is a trigger lock the way to go? I'm not crazy about having to worry about keys, but a combo lock can be broken into by an inquisitive mind....eventually.
Click to expand...

I agree about the combo lock. Even though I was exposed to guns (and gun safety) at a young age, there were plenty of times as a teenager that I was alone at home with some friends. Had there been a gun safe with a combo lock, I'd have gotten in! It would have taken a long time, perhaps, but I'd have figured it out. With that in mind, I have no doubt my two young boys will someday have the same inclination.

I keep my loaded Glock and my wife's loaded .38 snubby in a Mossberg Instant Access safe beside our bed. After five wrong entry attempts, the safe alarms for 60 seconds and won't accept further input until after that time. The kicker is, the next time I open the safe (practically daily), instead of the normal "click" sound when I push the buttons, I hear a beep with each pressed button letting me know someone tried to open it. I figure this will give me the opportunity to have "that talk" with the boys.

Meanwhile, following the great advice by Massad Ayoob in his book Gunproof Your Children, we have a standing rule in our home: ANY time the boys want to look at the guns in the locker, it is an automatic yes. They are too young (3 and 6) to handle them yet, but once they are older and can tell me the four basic rules of gun safety, then I will let them handle them as well (after unloading them, of course).

Jetdriver, I was intrigued by that biosafe, using your fingerprint to open it. Do you have one? How well does it work?
 
Wear it. When it's bedtime, have a place for it - like a holster screwed to the back of the bed headboard, bedside cabinet or such. When you leave the property, a safe, other secure place or other well-hidden spot.
 
Its up to the parents to teach there kids right and wrong. There was a 22 rifle sitting behind the door to my house for years and no one touched it. We understood that guns were bad and if we wanted to play with it we would be eating dinner standing up for a week. :D On finding out that my little girl is comming for a visit next month i went out and bought a safe.. well just to be safe. it has an electric lock and i can open it and load the shotgun inside within 10 or so seconds (yes i did time it and yes i am that bored at home). I would love to keep my pistol lying arround under the bed where i can reach it easy but .. times change and you never know who you can trust in your house. Im actually thinking about buying one of those fingerprint safes that i can bolt on the dresser next to the bed. my .02
 
My children grew up with loaded guns in the house as did I. Now my children's children are growing up with guns in their house. The guns are not readily available to the small children, but they start shooting at about 3 to 4 years of age.
As with others there is the milk jug and pumkin routine, shot with a high powered rifle. Makes an impression. Also the guns loose their magic, cause if you shoot my gun you have to clean it.

My children, now in their early thirties, were ask if they ever messed with any of the guns in my house as they were growing up. They replied, "Hell no, we might have had to clean it again".

I kept loaded guns around the house because of my occupation as does one of my children, the others just don't trust Humanity.

My olderst daughter heard a noise out in the back yard one night and got her S&W Model 65 and flash light out to investigate. My son in law was a patrolman on the graveyard shift then. My daughter left the pistol on the nightstand and went back to sleep. She awoke later because my grandson, who was four at the time was shaking her, saying "Wake up, Wake up, the toothfairy left us a new gun."

It's really important that if you leave guns accessable to children they know the rules and have been trained correctly.

Jungle Work
 
another

I felt like you do, not worrying one bit about safety and guns (or reading the newspaper or having health insurance for that matter) until i had a family.

So, not to replace but to add to the above posts.

If your kid(s) is young and therefore short, placing it in a place they cannot reach is another method. In a locked case, up high, it can be easily reached by you or your wife, or by a child as he/she grows taller and more responsible, btu be out of reach (and possibly out of eyesight) from a small child.

Personally, i am not bothered by wearing the key around my neck while sleeping; not even sleeping with a pistol in my waistband. (Don't ask, i just got used to it. Let's leave it at that). But most people are not like me, thankfully.

Anyway, out-of-reach is your friend.
C-
 
99 Million Combinations

Hi, I have the same problem. Kids in the house and the wish for fast access. You have to set priorities however. Mine are

1. Kid's saftey
2. Quick gun access.

So I bought a safe which is right next to my bed. It holds all my Handguns and the shotgun ammunition. So none of my guns can be fired without opening the safe. In the safe the Glocks are loaded but the chamber is empty. If a kid were to manage opening the safe, it would still have the knowledge, will and physical strength to rack the slide before excrement could hit the fan.

Opening the safe: In oder to avoid having to look for keys in the night and to avoid the possibility of kids finding keys, my safe has a digital electronic lock. Only one of 99 Million possible combinations would open it. That combined with the empty chambers is safe enough for me.

On the other hand, opening and loading takes me about 4 Seconds. Thats the risk I take in favour of my kids being locked away from my guns.

I live in Europe and have a "burg-waechter point-safe" for EUR 120,- (U$ 160,-) Safe. It has emergency-keys in case batteries fail or you forget your one of 99 million combinations. But these keys are not stored anywhere near my house...

I don't trust trigger locks. The lock can be broken, the keys can be found, the guns are too accessible.
Stay safe.
 
I like key locks. At night, I can keep the key between my watchband and my wrist.

I also like a "lockbox" type of container to keep it in, so the entire gun is covered, concealed, and protected. I don't like the trigger area being accessible at all. Trigger locks leave too much exposed for my comfort- more on that later.

I went with the clamshell-type lock that clamps around the gun and locks with a key. The name escapes me right now. LifeGuard perhaps? They make them in steel now I think, and also for long guns, and an AR-specific model.

In the morning, when my pants go on, so does the gun. At night, it goes right in the box. It's either on me or in the box.

I keep the gun in it, with two spare mags, my cellphone and a SureFire 6P flashlight next to it.

One big advantage to the HK P7 I sometimes use, is that the striker/firing pin/spring pops out with a push and quarter turn, deactivating it. It's a nice additional safety feature when in the lock box. That's also handy should I might have to be away from the gun, but am caught away from some form of lock. Like if I would have to leave it in the car to go into an airport or something.

I use cable locks some, but they are slow if you need the gun, so I use them on "stored" guns. They are usually disassembled anyway. Even though they are going into a safe, they get cabled up. I run a cable lock through the barrel and ejection port, and another cable lock through the magazine well. Revolvers get one through the cylinder opening in the frame, and perhaps another through a chamber or two of the cylinder. Rifles get a similar treatment.

But I hate triggerlocks- generally speaking anyway.

When I was living in IL, "they" were trying to push through lesiglation requiring them in about 1990. The gun club I was in, and other groups, fought it and beat it. One big reason the club was opposed to them was that trigger locks can give false security. The fear was that people who now kept their gun(s) locked away and unloaded, would keep them loaded and accessible, depending on the trigger lock instead.
The club made a short film showing how easily they could be defeated. Of course, there were only a two or three kinds available then. Some could be open by a pair of scissors. Others would allow the gun to fire even when "properly" installed.
Every one could be defeated.
For that reason, I wanted something that completely covered the trigger area for nighttime storage of my carry gun.
 
My kids are 15, 13, and 9.

My guns are in one of 2 places.
On my person, or in a safe.

The GunVault is a great way to go for bureau/nightstand.
QUICK access, code can be set by you, no key, and you're in in under 1 second.
 
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