Opened or closed?

[Fatal Wound]

Those of you who use gun safes, when you store your bolt action rifles, do you store them with the bolt opened or closed and why?

[Bucksnort1]

Fatal Wound,

Excellent question and something I had not thought about doing from a safety point of view. Except for the bolts on my semi-auto 22s, mine are always closed but they will now be open.

[2ndsojourn]

Closed on an empty chamber, trigger pulled. Same with lever actions. handguns too. Been doing it that way since forever. If I'm doing it wrong, correct me.

[KenL]

Closed, just because I haven't been presented any compelling reason to keep them open. I do however ease the firing pin forward (closing the bolt with trigger depressed) so that the spring isn't under tension during storage. Also use a snap cap in my AR for the same reason.

[Sevens]

Bolt action rifles in a gun safe?

ALL of them the same, ALL of the time:
bolts removed

Gives every rifle more room in the safe to not be banging up in to one another.

[hoghunting]

Closed on an empty chamber, trigger pulled

Same here, don't see any reason to open the bolt.

[Armed_Chicagoan]

I leave the bolt on my Mosin open just because it leaves more room next to it that way. The bolt on my .22 stays closed.

[madmo44mag]

Staggered open, closed.
That way I can get more guns in the safe.
If I store them with all the bolts open or all closed they do not stack cleanly in the racks.
By staggering, they stack straight and neat.

[Fatal Wound]

I have no reason for doing it either way. Just wanted to see other opinions and there are all good ones that were expressed here. Thanks.

p.s. Armed Chicagoan---Those Mosin bolts do get in the way.

[Yankee Doodle]

I happen to have 2 safes. All rifles have bolts removed and they are stored in the pistol safe. All pistol mags are removed and stored in the rifle safe. All revolvers have cylinders removed, and they are in the rifle safe.
Overly cautious, maybe. But, the dirtbags have to break into two safes to get anything they can load and use.
Needless to say, my EDC is always loaded and on my person or within arms reach.

[Sevens]

I like the idea up until here:

All revolvers have cylinders removed

I suppose if we are talking all single action guns where removing the cylinder is routine, then I'm more on board. But double action revolvers? I sure hope not.

Also makes me want to ask if all the pistol slides and/or barrels are separated from the frames?

On a similar note, I recall reading of one gentleman who had his big gun safe in his garage, bolted down, and also inside the safe were the tips of -ALL- the torches that he owned, so that he didn't have tools sitting next to the safe to assist in it's attack. Good idea, I thought.

[kilimanjaro]

My safe sits in a small locked room I built for it. The electrical outlet is on it's own circuit, so when on vacation I pull the breaker, just so a thief won't have power to run a tool. May not do any good, but he'll take more time.

[rickyrick]

Since this moved on to security, I used to store everything open as a visual aid to assure it's not loaded... I stopped doing that over time...

On the security note, I've considered putting my small safe behind a false wall... But haven't yet....

I do have bait items to keep them distracted from the gun safe...

Some cheap electric guitars... I always figure those would get snatched and satisfy the thieves from searching further...

[Doyle]

I've never worried about it with my bolt-action rifles but I do store my pump-action rifle and shotguns with the slide back (bolt open). It's not that I really have a valid reason for doing so - just habit.

[Kimio]

For me, my only bolt gun has it removed, all other guns have their actions locked to the open position and handguns slides locked to the rear to facilitate easy identification that they are clear and unloaded.

[Yankee Doodle]

Sevens
Like I said, "all" cylinders are removed. Can't see what the problem is. Small screwdriver and about 2 minutes. Been doing this for about 30 years. What problems do you see? Pistols are intact. No mags, no ammo, not much use.

[Microgunner]

All actions closed.

[Dragline45]

I happen to have 2 safes. All rifles have bolts removed and they are stored in the pistol safe. All pistol mags are removed and stored in the rifle safe. All revolvers have cylinders removed, and they are in the rifle safe.
Overly cautious, maybe.

That makes total sense.......

[Nathan]

Closed and trigger pulled. Lowest state of stored spring energy.

[Banger357]

Closed, trigger pulled/ decocked. I know it is second nature for me (and most other shooters I know) to immediately check the action of any gun they pick up, so I don't see it being a safety issue at all. I'm big on organization and things look much nicer all tucked in and closed up. Be it rifle of any kind, pistol, or revolver, the actions are closed but they still get checked before being removed from the safe.

[AllenJ]

I too store my bolt action rifles with the bolt closed and not cocked. If I get one more long gun I'm either going to have to sell something or get a bigger safe

[R W]

Bolt closed/de cocked.

[Sevens]

Like I said, "all" cylinders are removed. Can't see what the problem is. Small screwdriver and about 2 minutes. Been doing this for about 30 years. What problems do you see? Pistols are intact. No mags, no ammo, not much use.

For you, sounds like it works. 30 years is a long time to do something.

Problems that I would definitely see for me...
1) buggered screw is possible... not because I'm careless, simply because the more more more you do something, the -far- more you up your chance simply by the numbers.

2) where do I put all these cylinders? In little felt bags or pouches so they don't get dinged up? Is there is a special shelf somewhere with little name plates for quick identification? I'm now looking for a spot for somewhere around two dozen cylinders and the revolvers that actually HOLD them are occupying the perfect space on this planet for exactly those cylinders. In the revolver... they don't get mixed, misidentified, misplaced, dinged up or anything else.

3) what, pray tell, might I possibly have solved -- in any possible way -- by yanking all my cylinders from all my revolvers?! I suppose I could also yank mainsprings from all my revolvers also... and I could pull every slide from every pistol, maybe stow in a third location all of my barrels, too.

4) I shoot over 10k rounds yearly. Am I really wanting to add minor assembly to my checklist of things to do the night before a range trip? Plenty of my favorites certainly don't even get cleaned when I know they will be going out again in a week, I can't imagine disassembling them for storage.

5) I'll be darned if I ever did figure out how to even remove the cylinder from my double action Ruger revolvers...?! Come to think of it, I know how to get my S&W cylinders off and the two Taurus ones are same way. Colt, Dan Wesson? I'm not sure exactly how those come off either. Maybe just as easy as the S&W...

6) this is a 600 lb gun safe and it's bolted through the floor. If the bad guys bring an elite breaching unit of highly trained career professionals to enter it, will I really get much of a "last laugh" when they make off with bagfuls of revolvers that have no cylinders in them? If they do, what am I going to do with twelve pounds of cylinders with no revolvers to put them back in to? Pencil holders for the desk that has everything.

Isn't this like parking your car in the garage, rolling up the windows, locking the doors, locking the garage -- and then yanking the wheels off also and hiding them under the kitchen sink?

[mightyoakwildlife]

For me, relaxed pins & closed actions, unless an opened bolt allows more room. Handguns in protective 'socks', also closed & relaxed.

I've got a buddy that special-ordered a batch of MasterLock padlocks, with the vinyl-coated shackles & bodies, all keyed alike. He leaves his cylinders open, and puts a lock through the frame. Another batch of similar "cable locks" for his auto-loaders. Once in the safe, I thought THAT was over-kill. Now it almost seems reasonable, by comparison.

Security is also a State of Mind. If it makes you happy, go for it!

[Uncle Buck]

Most of mine are stored with the bolts/actions open.

If I need to use it, I can put the ammo in, close the action and go, as opposed to opening the action, load and go.

When I was in the military we used to store the M-16's and M-9's bolt closed, firing pin released.