room fortification

[tfish]

Anyone can say what about "burning you out". Its been made clear 90% of the people on this forum think people "wouldnt do that to us"

As for the room, iv thought about this.

I would put it either in the loft of under the stairs (iv found a great crawl space recently whe renovating).

Id simply make it out of brick or breeze block and leave one side off onto which you can make a hidden door that can pulled into place by the person entering the hidy hole. You can buy brick slips to make a door covered in "bricks" if its a dark loft your not finding that.

Other than that a "panic room" type is your only other option and your talking thousands. A steel room welded together and then covered in plasterboard. You would need several hidden air and vent holes.

I had a bespoke steel door and frame made and that alone was not far from £1000.

[bulldogeagle]

any room must have an emergency exit of some kind, what if your stuck in there and the house gets torched?

[tfish]

Any room in a loft could be exited by simply going through the tiles.

Mass produced American Panic Rooms dont have emergency exits they rely on emergency services.

The conversation here is for TEOTWAWKI so there would be no Emer Services but I think the OP meant as a last resort, I did.

If my home was breached and I had a steel room to retreat into, getting out wouldnt be on my mind tbh.

[triffid]

Regarding a hideaway in the loft have you read Arthur Conan Doyles' (Sherlock Holmes) "The Master Builder" - a hideaway that fooled everyone but 'the worlds' most famous detective!

[Ferricks]

Regarding a hideaway in the loft have you read Arthur Conan Doyles' (Sherlock Holmes) "The Master Builder" - a hideaway that fooled everyone but 'the worlds' most famous detective!

No - so you have to tell us!

[Moony]

Well in America, Land of the free, this (room fortification) has now been made a criminal offense in 1 state at least http://www.tulsabeacon.com/?p=3269(link via Survivalblog.com)

Amazing that it can be made illegal to make your home harder for the real criminals to break into ! Anything beyond a normal alarm, lock or deadbolt on any door or window is a crime ? Damn, I know it might be a sweeping over-simplification to see US cops as overweight donut-eating slobs, but clearly they aint fit enough to swing a battering ram in Oklahoma.

[Squirrel hunter]

Damn, I know it might be a sweeping over-simplification to see US cops as overweight donut-eating slobs, but clearly they aint fit enough to swing a battering ram in Oklahoma.

Have you seen the cop shows here in the UK?

Trying to use a battering ram against a normal PVCu double glazed front door takes a hell of a lot of energy.

The ones on the telly, often seen as the red enforcers weigh in at 35lb each and is a one man item



Strongest door, not UK

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PL454 ... peORY&NR=1[/youtube]

Now imagine an attempted rescue of life and limb.

I can see the need for a strong door at front and rear plus windows, but what keeps the bad guys out also keeps the good guys out and you in.

[triffid]

Regarding a hideaway in the loft have you read Arthur Conan Doyles' (Sherlock Holmes) "The Master Builder" - a hideaway that fooled everyone but 'the worlds' most famous detective!

No - so you have to tell us!

I won't go into the plot details but basically a guy faked his own death but was hiding in a room constructed behind a false wall in the attic. Holmes realsed there was difference between between the size of the house when measured from the outside and then the inside. The same idea was used by prisoners in Colditz in WW2 to make a room to construct a glider! (glider wasn't actually used because the war ended but apparently technically it would haver flied!). I suppose the notion is that of a priest hole (used by catholics to avoid religeous persecution).

Of course the problem of a 'hidden' room is that modern houses are usually too small for such a room not to be 'obvious'!

[Moony]

Regarding a hideaway in the loft have you read Arthur Conan Doyles' (Sherlock Holmes) "The Master Builder" - a hideaway that fooled everyone but 'the worlds' most famous detective!

No - so you have to tell us!

I won't go into the plot details but basically a guy faked his own death but was hiding in a room constructed behind a false wall in the attic. Holmes realsed there was difference between between the size of the house when measured from the outside and then the inside.

And to continue the 'burning out' theme..how did holmes prove he was right ? he didnt show the measurements to other people, he lit a small, smoky fire in the house, shouted 'fire !' and waited for the poor sod to come out by himself.

[Malamute Mitch]

Interesting subject, having spent along time in the fire service I regularly had to “break in to houses and premises” legally (fire service does it everyday) we where breaching six bolt steel security doors in about a minute and this was in the nineties. Obviously on an open forum I’m not going into detail about the techniques used but the sort of security and defences being described on here can be breached in minutes if not sec s, if a person/s know what they are doing.

The sort of security rooms that can’t and provide a medium to high level of protection start around £20,000 Built on the ground floor, with integral air supply and filtration/circulation system and withstand a 1500 C fire for one hour minimum.

So from a survival perspective it’s got to be about being invisible not necessarily security. Thought that comes to mind though, why go to great trouble making something look invisible from the inside of a dwelling, unless as has been said you are inside the disguised space too, as the design is saying your perimeter security has been breached and you re probably already dead. Or you are locked in a cubby hole with no defence, hoping and praying the intruders, have absolutely no clue you are there, (ie no evidence in house its been recently lived in umm!! ) they do not set fire to the place for the hell of it (London riots come to mind) or they decide not to make camp in your house for a few days. I’m doing a post about this sort of thought process and how to plan, strategy and the black swan.