Coke machine econo gun locker

SOLVER · 04-03-2004, 08:37 AM

Yes, I know.... everyone has already done this... This time, its different... affordably cheap, roomy, clean & surprisingly secure..... And I documented exactly how anyone can do this, step-by-step, w/pics, for under $ 200.00 with fire rated interior in a series of nine or ten posts for the average joe to do. Dont want to be a bandwidth pig, so if interested, post a reply and I will begin my series....Cool project !

The Champ · 04-03-2004, 11:39 AM

Let me ask you this, where do you get a coke machine, and how much did it set ya back?

Also, would be cool if you could make it dispense boxes of ammo instead of pop

SOLVER · 04-03-2004, 05:45 PM

Yeah ! put in some change, & out comes ammo !! great idea...
As far as your question, "where did you get a coke machine & how much "??... these questions are answered in the first installment (#1), which shall be posted this coming week, after my introduction post that shall be available tonight. I have already prepared six installments (out of nine), all complete with pics. However, since you did ask, I paid $20.00 for my coke machine, and passed up several free ones !!! (all of this is covered in inst. #1....I will explain how to acquire these things either free, or very cheaply....

SOLVER · 04-03-2004, 06:02 PM

[ MODERATOR, PLEASE DELETE THIS POST AND ALL SUBSEQUENT RELATED IF INAPPROPRIATE OR OF NO USE TO MEMBERS]

Project: Guncoke

This project is to turn a soda vending machine into a gun storage locker that is quite secure and this is my first installment of an ongoing conversion project that I am currently doing right now for myself. It took me a while to decide exactly which forum to share this project with. I decided on this one because this build is based solely on an economic standpoint, specifically designed for the cost-conscious family man who has little choice but to stretch his firearms budget to achieve maximum value for the dollar. Is this project the cheapest, safest, most secure idea on the planet ???? No it isn’t, and any type of storage product has flaws and weaknesses, and if you don’t care for this concept, do not trouble yourself with reading any of my follow-up posts. Am I the foremost leading expert on home-brewed gun-stashes like this one ???? .. No !... I welcome any & all comments, suggestions, concerns, ideas regarding the progress & affordability of doing this.

This project is NOT designed to replace a big dollar, super secure, high fire rated gun safe, but rather offer a budget minded approach to securing your guns in the interim, UNTILL you are able to afford a decent gun safe. There are actually those of us, with small, medium & large gun collections of various values (sentimental & $$$) that simply are unable to afford any type of professional gun safe at the present time, even a used one. This being said, please do not hound me with “you’ll be sorry” stories about how irreplaceable a real gun safe is, because I know this to be a true fact, and so does anyone that collects guns…. Matter of fact, I suffered a devastating house fire two days before Christmas this year, and it gave me thought and experience on how to economically offer a degree of safety & protection for both theft and fire.

My background is that I am a family man, married for fifteen years, two kids…. Money is tight, he77, money always seems to be tight, so I wanted a little more to protect my guns than a flimsy cabinet, or clever hiding places for them, but right now, a large sized fire rated safe that would hold my collection, isn’t in my immediate future, however, I can afford a hundred, or two hundred dollars for this project to reach fruition. We all have seen this concept on many other boards & forums, I do not claim to be the originator nor inventor of the idea, or the ideas involved in this projects construction, but, I haven’t ever seen exactly how the average family man can do it from start to finish, with all steps & stages wrote out (w/pics) plain to see. I will try not to get ridiculous on spending, or on elaborate tools and building concepts…Hopefully, anyone who will try this project will own, or have access (able to borrow?) simple basic tools and simple skills. The nice thing is that what little money shall be needed, can be applied over time sparingly, so the overall final cost is pleasantly digestible. Many of my material acquisition techniques have been refined over the years from me being a cheap-a$$, and I shall endeavor to explain them as needed completely when necessary. Also, since we are all not professional wood & metal workers, some mistakes are to be expected, and perhaps you can learn from my many mistakes !.. Of course, finished external appearance must be quite convincing, and any flaws or imperfections will be hidden inside. I try to use construction techniques that may at first appear puzzling, but in the end, each step shall have provisions for “hiding” / “concealing” previous step’s mistakes (hopefully).

O.K., now that I have bored you with my initial explanations and disclaimers, I shall start off the project beginning with the next installment. I am not an expert at posting, I am not an expert at writing, and installments may be added or subtracted as time goes by. Some installments will be short & sweet, others, long & wordy. I am hoping to keep the timeline from start to finish in around one month, working on it evenings after work, and perhaps weekends. I don’t want this thing to be an enormous time-killer, so I wont try to be fancy or elaborate. Bear with me as I am an average “ Joe”… This is my first time doing anything like this, or posting large amounts of info at one time. Also, please alert me if this crazy scheme is boring , useless, or simply eats up too much valuable bandwidth.

UPCOMING INSTALLMENTS:

How to cheaply acquire a donor machine.
Tools & techniques needed for project
How to strip the interior & remove door
Can I recover money by selling used interior parts?
Inside design concepts
Prepping the interior for rebuild
Rebuild
Completion
***************************************

Next installment: "How to cheaply acquire a donor machine"...

remy1492 · 04-03-2004, 06:09 PM

I think this is a neat thread. Kinda like the MonsterGarage auto conversions on Discovery Channel.

**Zoff12** · 04-03-2004, 07:04 PM

Yeah...I would be very interested in this.

SOLVER · 04-04-2004, 11:44 AM

Project: Guncoke

Installment # 1, (part one)

“How to cheaply acquire a donor machine”

Acquire a donor soda vending machine. Size IS important on this project. I wanted something large enough to contain around thirty guns, and maybe some storage area too. Problem is that this project’s mainstay is affordability, so pending whatever size you can afford and whatever donor machine you end up locating shall ultimately be the deciding factor. I was firm on wanting a larger sized donor machine, so I passed up a couple of soda machines (free) that were just too small. I liked the price of the free machines, and I tried to reason and justify that I could build several smaller storage lockers, and thus the idea of using several smaller ones has merit on the concept of being able to maneuver them into tight hallways, around close corners, e.t.c., but where I planned to put my machine, overall size wasn’t an issue. Moving a large machine into its final resting place is no small concern either. Large machines are heavy, unbelievably heavy !!!!... (this is good thing). It was of no small concern to me that perhaps it may not be such a hot idea to use smaller machines as any potential thief could easily just load the thing up (full of my guns) and drive away, so a large & heavy donor machine will be perfect to satisfy all my requirements. Of course, additional mounting lags into walls & floors is needed, regardless of its size, so maybe you might find using smaller has an acceptable risk quotient.

It goes without saying that whatever machine you ultimately end up using, it must at least be tall enough to hold the longest of your firearms, so explore the inside of any/all “donor” machines before acquiring them & bringing them home, keeping a careful eye on available inside dimensions. Obviously, the overall plan is to strip the guts out of the shell, then manufacture an interior designed to fit your exact needs. I have stripped the interior out of my Coke machine already, and discovered several problems that could have been avoided, were information such as this available. As I stated earlier, a large sized machine is very heavy, and this brings to mind a beginning problem area….transport of the machine to your home.

I found that hundreds and hundreds of pounds can be shaved off by stripping the larger heavy internal components on site, before you attempt to bring your “baby” home. I do not have access to a large truck, with needed liftgate, e.t.c. This way, a regular pick-up truck can do the transporting, perhaps in as little as two trips, one of which is to dump the stripped guts, and another trip to actually haul her home. A very good lesson is that the door to my machine is extremely heavy, so by removing the door prior to transport, the actual shell wasn’t too bad to load up with some help.

But how can I CHEAPLY acquire a donor machine ??? I found my donor machine by keeping my eyes open. It took about three weeks and I was ever-vigilant and on the look out at every availability. Good places to find donor machines are small towns, that are on the verge of dying. Out-of-the-way places are good to scope out as well. Remember, its easy to find soda machines in all sizes, shapes and costs, but what we are after, is either free, or at minimal cost, and in acceptable condition. As I explained earlier, I actually came across a few free machines before discovering my large Coke, but they were kinda small, and I would have had to build two or three of them to house all my guns. Where in the he77 can you get free machines, you ask ???? Look around. Find em unplugged , which indicates that they are broken, needing repairs, or simply wore out. Look for a machine that needs expensive repairs to the coin mechanism or refrigeration unit, and maybe has the beginnings of small surface rust, minor dents, and that the present owner is tired of looking at it, because of the painful reminder that his machine could be earning him money, but its just not cost efficient to repair it. The owner of my machine had it sitting at the side of his business, unplugged, and due to the extreme weight of it, he didn’t know how or when he could ever get rid of such an eyesore…. I stepped in and offered to help him out. He was sick of mowing around it, and when I offered him $20.00 for it and that I would immediately haul it away, he jumped at such a wonderful opportunity ! Also, don’t dismiss “no name” or “off-brand” machines either….Because these types aren’t COKE or PEPSI, they might be acquired easier than something more socially acceptable. New age retro wannabees have the idea that a soda vending machine in their rec room, basement billiards room, or outdoors at poolside is a great idea, until they have to deal with maintnencing it or stocking it… These disillusioned folks are often quick to rid themselves of a good idea gone bad….

Another place to look is on E-bay, or any of the dozens of forums dedicated to restoring “valuable” antique vending machines. I found dozens of machines free or for little cost in these areas just this month, but remember to keep an eye on their location as you will have to drive there to get it…..A free machine five states away isn’t a bargain. The restoration sites are good sources as there is always someone who has a machine that is broke, but is really just too new (1970-1980ish) to fool around restoring… Right before writing this post, I discovered three donors within an hours drive of my home that would make excellent projects, so look around. There were millions of various soda vending machines made over the years in a variety of flavors, sizes, and configurations, so keep your eyes open, and be ready to jump. Never be afraid of rejection….offer an owner a few dollars, and if he declines, come back in a few months and offer it to him again. If he again refuses, he is an idiot and let the dumb s.o.b. trip over the dead machine for the rest of his sorry bitter life with his walker when a few more years pass, and then while he rots in a nursing home with no visitors, having a stroke or suffering from broken hip pain, he can remember his worthless vending machine….maybe it will come to visit, as no one else will !!! (yes, I am bitter from three or four past rejections !)

Important links listed below....

http://www.colamachines.com/cgi-loca...ec7f81a83e5249

http://soda-machines.com/cgi-local/d.../ikonboard.cgi

http://collectibles.listings.ebay.co...istingItemList

http://66.70.130.84/T_lock_assembly.htm

SOLVER · 04-04-2004, 11:53 AM

Installment # 1, (part two)

Another good place to keep an eye on is behind small older strip centers with less than successful businesses within. Old style laundromats, bowling alleys, thrift stores, e.t.c. anywhere an old coot would have kept a vending machine inside, stubbornly clinging to his nickel, dime & quarter profits, resisting the advances of modern day vending services that might only offer him a portion of the cut. When these places finally go out of business, upgrade, or their machine dies, that’s your chance !....This is what is funny…When I started out on this endeavor, the first places that I called were my local soda pop distributors and bottling agents.. Absolutely no help at all as they are too greedy to let anything go, and whatever they encounter that is old or broke was promptly shipped off to auction.

And another good source is various want-ads, classifieds, local newspapers, word-of-mouth, garage sales, flea markets (especially dirty, cheesy-type flea markets!), or anywhere !!! Tell everyone you know to start scouring for these machines… Networking is always a good idea and many eyes do quick work….but be ready to jump when the time is right !!!..Have the cash ready & available to display, but don’t be a chicken and never be afraid to offer a low price, even if you are sure your offer will be refused. When making such low offers, deciding factors are waving the cash in front of the seller”s nose, so he sees that you are serious, telling the seller that you will do the transaction today, and right now. These factors easily sway people and by putting them on the spot, the rush decisions they make are usually favorable to your wallet !!. Also, if you make an offer and are declined, immediately walk away and act like you are firm on your offer and are ready to buy elsewhere. Most times, you will be called back as everyone hates to see money walking away, and even if you happen to not be immediately called back, you could always leave your phone number and tell him that….”if you change your mind in the next day or two, call me”. And naturally, if you simply cant live without it, you can always return later and pay his price, but usually, these techniques have proven themselves successful for me over the years ...Decide in advance if you are firm on must having a free machine, or if you are comfortable spending a few dollars to buy one…. The nice thing about this project is that our donor can be dead, thus big savings !!! Once you investigate deeper, you will discover that you can actually buy fully functional older used machines for about fifty dollars on up, so my budget ceiling was $20.00 which was perfect for me…

How much rust is too much rust ????....Good question, as rust is a bad thing, especially around guns !!... However, most of the time, exterior rust is just that, exterior rust. If the machine has been closed, and has the usual galvanized interior lining, interior rust usually is not present. Also, too much exterior rust will make your finished product look like a p.o.s., so tread carefully when selecting your donor, looking for the best example of overall condition with an inexpensive price tag to go with it. With my machine, the interior galvanized metal liner was kinda chalky, but in pretty good condition (even though I tore it up removing the vending rack like an idiot !). Although I plan to line the interior surfaces with plywood and/or fire rated panel, the original metal liner serves as a vapor barrier and as an additional security defense perimeter so usually a good scrubbing/buffing will make the liner shine in the event that you choose to not equip the interior of your machine with wood or fire stuff. Exterior damage is of no small concern either. A machine that is swelled & bloated badly is no good for our project, and severe external damage can be a no-no, especially if the door operation is affected, or the damage would compromise the overall security of your gun collection. Small dents, scrapes, faded paint, missing parts, e.t.c. shouldn’t be too bad, and any of the above items usually translates into an initially cheaper acquisition. Always keep in mind exactly what you want your gun stash to accomplish at the end of our project and always remember this….

“RUN YOUR PROJECT, DON’T EVER LET THE PROJECT RUN YOU !”.

In closing this installment, I want to thank the many people who sent me e-mails. It is amazing how many people are really interested in doing this, but are reluctant to admit it, or simply want to keep their own project secret, thus adding to the eventual security of it. I try to be as thorough and comprehensive as possible, but I am not an expert at writing “how to” manuals, thus I may miss something, or perhaps you have a problem area, or simply don’t understand a specific area or technique. I will try to answer every e-mail with better descriptions and/or additional pics that will (hopefully) be of better help.

Next installment: “Materials, tools and techniques needed”

The Champ · 04-04-2004, 04:58 PM

Browsed through some of the stuff you posted already. Very interesting. I was thinking, an extra messure of security would be to have the machine look as much like the original as possible. That way, a would be thief could very well pass it off as a coke machine, not even know there were guns in the house.

SOLVER · 04-05-2004, 05:41 PM

I agree. This is well covered in upcoming installments, and keeping the frontal light functional, and plugged in would deter would-be theives. Fully functional coin slot, the can chute, buttons that push in, e.t.c. will add an air of authenticity (and security) to the project and these things are easy to accomplish.

Thanks for your input and please keep these, any other good ideas coming in, as this project is very customizeable for each person, and is very helpfull. I will at the end, offer (for free) a CD_rom of the entire series, complete with all the photos that I couldnt post due to space hogging fears, to anyone who may want one, along with incorporating everyones thoughts and ideas into the mix for multiple options if and when anyone does do this type of project.... Its funny, I thought quite a bit before I even began this thing, and I thought I had it all figured out, but the original series of eight installments have now grown by a few more, as I really want to offer as much information as possible to the do-it-yourselfer (like me), and with good input from everyone interested, I shall add on all usefull ideas & information.

SOLVER · 04-05-2004, 09:25 PM

Project: Guncoke

“Materials, tools and techniques needed”:

Basic simple hand & power tools are the name of our game, baby, and everyone seems to either have them, or knows somebody who does. This project is designed for the do-it-yourselfer home family handyman, so we must always keep in mind that this project revolves around affordability, and the concept of any average “Joe” being able to involve themselves successfully. A drill, a saw, a wrench or two, maybe a screwdriver, really not too much is involved tool wise. Those with a large selection of tools and with lots of experience using them will find this project goes quicker than someone who does not, but anyone should be able to pull this off nicely.

Partial tool listing:

Screwdrivers (good quality)
Wrenches,
Sockets, socket extension, & socket ratchet
Wire cutters
Electric power saw or jigsaw
Drill or screw gun
Measuring tape
Utility knife
Dremel tool (if needed to cut off stubborn fasteners when stripping the interior)

:::::::::::Materials listing::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Plywood (thickness dependant upon what you are either able to scrounge, or what you can afford….I ended up using free ½ inch thick used crating plywood free from a furniture store…Other free supplies are warehouses, motorcycle dealers. Automobile glass suppliers, riding lawn mower sellers, or anywhere else they would use plywood for crates. Wood shops might also be willing to supply scraps large enough for the project…..ask em !!! My free plywood had some nails in it, and some screw holes, but go out and price brand new plywood….Its not cheap, thus the attraction of free…(any money you save now on materials can be applied later to other stuff that you cant seem to scrounge, or would prefer better quality than originally budgeted for)..Since I plan to cover this plywood on the inside with carpet, I wasn’t too concerned with a few holes & imperfections here and there. If you plan to stain & finish your interior, be more choosy about the quality. I decided to single layer this plywood, but if you want thicker, but can only obtain thin (for free) double or triple layer it up to achieve the sturdiness you seek.

Fire lining material (if used)..I plan to use 1/4 inch thick fireboard, and I guess I will have to purchase this as I don’t know of any “free” supplies of this stuff. For me, fire protection is important, even if it isn’t the greatest, highest rated deal, as far as fire protection is concerned, use as much as possible, and always hope that it is never ever needed. I like ¼ inch thick, due to the fact that this stuff is somewhat challenging to fabricate with, and I can more easily double layer it thicker for ease of milling. My fire lining came in manageable sheets, and is the type used underneath fireplace hearths & other hi-temp areas… Ended up using construction adhesive to secure it into position as I wanted to keep any screw mounting holes through it from breaching its fire resistant protective capabilities. How efficient is this stuff ?,,,I don’t know, and I guess if you want to go overboard, you could always slap some asbestos into the mix, as long as you don’t mind getting excruciatingly painful lung cancer & the subsequent death involved, but I had to watch my budget….He77, if I wanted to spend a thousand dollars building this thing, I would have trotted my buns out and bought a pretty looking appropriate gun safe, so some degree of compromise must be reached, and respected.

Hardware: Various screws, bolts, hinges, locks, & other misc. fasteners …Keep all fasteners from gutting process as they might come in handy later (free)… Even getting a good game plan before beginning building didn’t cut it with me and my project, thus I had several trips to the econo-hardware store to pick up more or better suited fasteners as time went on. One thing to keep in mind here is balancing your project’s initial budget with ending up with a finished product that is EXACTLY what satisfies your expectations. If you plan use any additional locks anywhere (I have several extra interior locking compartments) try to keep all the locks keyed alike to avoid the hassle of fumbling around with a big keychain wasting time trying to locate the appropriate key for whatever lock you want to open.

Paint (for interior if needed) You may have some already, in half full cans laying around at your house, family’s houses, or friends houses (free!)…Found some, but not enough of any one particular flavor ????....Heres a tip….Mix them all together and end up with a useable quantity…(Im serious !)…remember…FREE is good.. The exterior of my donor machine wasn’t too bad and I decided not to do alter the exterior appearance for sake of fooling would-be gun thieves. I did paint certain interior areas as a measure of rust prevention, like the bottom compressor area below the long gun storage, which I plan to utilize for bulk ammo storage (in ammo cans).

Metal: Scrap thin sheet metal pieces (available free from dumpsters behind home heating & cooling shops or in construction dumpsters on new home sites, e.t.c.) Use this to block off security breach areas, such as the coin slots, can dispensing chute, e.t.c.

Carpet: scraps, available everywhere (free), for covering the interior if desired…Stay away from pet pi$$ soaked free carpet that people are throwing away, as it is YOUR guns that will be mingling with the sweet, delicious stench of animal feces and urine. You may even want to use carpet padding in essential locations under the carpet to add “softness”. Its not too hard to find brand new scraps & pieces from anywhere that new carpeting is being installed. He77, I was even able to locate enough suppliers to pick & choose quality and color !!!

Hardwood: for making shelves, dividers, gun racks, e.t.c. and available everywhere….look for good condition free pallets or skids. Watch out for rough milled skid lumber as you will have to plane & sand extra to obtain “usability”.

:::::::::::Techniques used:::::::::::

Sawing:
Whenever sawing anything, strike a penciled line to keep as straight of an edge as possible on your saw cuts. If you have access to a table saw with a fence, all the better. A table saw used for cutting, leaves a perfectly straight saw-cut line as opposed to a somewhat rough & wavy jig sawed cut line, however, if a jigsaw is the only choice available, you can get by with keeping the factory straight lines out in the front viewing area, and leave the rougher quality cuts to the rear or in places where you can overlap these poor quality appearance cuts with the factory milled perfectly straight edges. If you are going to paint, you can always caulk any rough corner seams, then, paint over this. For carpeted interiors, the carpet can hide a multitude of “sins”, so this wont be as big of an issue. If you want the plain plywood look for your final finish, cut your wood materials first then assemble inside the box in this order…. First, the top & bottom, then the sides, then the back. If you do it this way, you can slightly oversize the lengths of your cuts on the sides & back by about 1/8 inch and then “drive” (hammer) these into final position with the extra lengths sealing up & firming the corner areas. You will be able to get away with this as the foam insulation behind the galvanized sheet metal liner has some “give”. A good tip is that if you are using a jigsaw, cut your material upside down (flip it over on your sawhorses) and cut what will be the back area, as the bottom portion of the material cut is usually chip-free or even chip-less. If cutting metal, use the appropriate blade. For thick metal cuts, especially when gutting the interior, a saw-zall or Dremel with a metal cutting wheel is a good idea. If using a circular saw to cut plywood for your interior, the trick about jig saws and cutting upside down applies here also, but you can employ a “straight edge” (make sure its straight !) and clamp this straight edge down to the material you are cutting and then run your saw fence plate against the clamped on straight edge to facilitate more perfectly straight saw cut lines.

Drilling & screwing: Drilling is closely dependant on exactly what and where you are drilling. If screwing off anything its sometimes best to pre-drill your holes with the proper sized bit. When needed, countersink your screw heads flush with any exposed surface. Professional countersinks ARE available, but a poor man’s counter sink is to pre-drill your hole (slightly smaller than the shank of the screw) then use a larger sized drill bit and drill a depression to permit flush-ness of the screw head. Use appropriate fasteners for long-term durability. Don’t use a wood screw if anchoring into metal, check your fasteners length so it doesnt “poke” through / out, use glues, silicones, e.t.c. when confident that you want the piece to stay… Better to infuse too much construction quality while building, than later discover that you didn’t use enough. Make your project last for a lifetime, even if only planning to use her for a few years….You can always sell the pig later when you buy an expensive professional gun safe.

Measuring: Old rule here, and well known…”MEASURE TWICE, CUT ONCE !” If ever in doubt, cut it long, then slim it down for an exact fit after trying the piece in its intended position. Cant read a tape measure ??? ..This is a good way to learn !

Making it look nice inside: Not too much too say about the usual painting, caulking, sealing, carpeting, e.t.c. Do the best that you can, and you could also involve friends and family to do jobs you are unskilled at…Involve the wife & kids on a sunny weekend !! Let em paint, or scrub, he77, let the wife apply wallpaper, or fabric, or carpet…..Women are usually very patient & good at these activities due to the fact that they are skilled at folding & tucking. Every kid loves to take anything apart, and you can let them help gut the pig….besides, spending quality time with the wife & kids is an excellent bonding adventure, and when using friends, make it a party, & always drink lotsa suds to remain hydrated…. It is nice, however, to keep some chores all to yourself for some much needed “daddy’s private time”…. Good to go out and work on your machine to clear your head. You might want to be very, very selective about exactly who all will know about this project as “loose lips sink ships”….nuff said about that !.

Electrics: Be very careful if using any of the factory electrics to help fool would-be-thieves, such as retaining the front display lights, circulation (anti-rust) fan, e.t.c. I wanted most of these space-hogging areas non-functional so that I could better apply them to more & more storage, so its up to you. I did end up using a smaller front light instead of the large factory unit thus all of my electrics are fresh & safe. Just don’t burn down your house (and find out how fire-proof it is) by having faulty electrics involved…Remember, one reason you got a free (or cheap) machine is that it was probably broken, somehow, somewhere. If wanted, the brand name front plexi-glass advertising panel could be retained and when lit, this simple decoy can prove to be most convincing to anyone not in the know. The actual light fixture in my machine was a simple fluorescent 2 bulb unit that runs on 110v, and could most easily be wired directly to a wall plug, thus giving the illusion that this gun locker is just an ordinary pop machine, and certainly not an armory. Fully investigate the integrity of the factory electrics BEFORE you plug anything in.

Safety and Tool safety: For God’s sake, don’t hurt, maim, or kill yourself, or anyone else by doing ANYTHING unsafe (or stupid)…If in doubt, STOP!...When manipulating your machine’s position, use help when needed, don’t let it tip over on you and smash your brains out of your face in a bloody, gelatinous puddling ooze. Matter of fact, I suffered a plethora of deep cuts while working on stripping the liner out of my machine, a task I hated to do, but due to the initial damage caused by my blundering attempts at removing the can vending racks, and my subsequent discovery of a lot of hidden rust behind the liner , I ended up just trashing all the interior galvanized metal liner. As I have access (brother-in-law) to thin aluminum coil, used by roofers, vinyl siders, window installers, e.t.c. and his brake (used for shaping & bending it), I plan to install all new metal to act as the original galvanized metal liner did. This is probably a good thing, as I discovered that my factory liner had significant rusting on its back side, against the hard foam insulation, and I don’t want any rust anywhere, so I tore it out (resulting in tissue damage & volcanic eruptions of my own plasma !)…

Problems: You will encounter problems…Hopefully, if I have done my job, you wont have too many, and when you hit a trouble spot, stop, step back, take a break. Most times, a fresh approach the next day reveals options previously undiscovered. If your problem is tool related, ask the pros. If it’s a fit / finish problem, don’t get mad and try to beat it into position or submission. You will just have to fix the damage YOU caused later !.. If it’s a design problem, get more info from the internet, go to a gun store and casually “browse” their safes, or try out your different options, even going as far as making cheap cardboard “templates” of whatever component you are wrestling with….Sometimes these mock-ups will solve your original problem and give you a different feel or look regarding your design and work out other potentially upcoming problems.….Cardboard is free, you can always pick up used boxes behind shopping centers, stores, e.t.c., and it’s a darn good idea to make a template of the overall size of your finished product and use this to make sure it will fit where you plan to put it, through doorways, around corners, up & down steps, e.t.c. I ended up using a lot of cardboard boxes….A lot of them !

Next installment: “How to strip the interior & remove the door”…..This is where the fun begins and we get busy actually working on your machine, instead of reading thousands and thousands of my blathering non-sensical words. Playtime is over, gentlemen…….

ProngsAK-47 · 04-05-2004, 11:08 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by SOLVER
Project: Guncoke

Paint (for interior if needed) You may have some already, in half full cans laying around at your house, family’s houses, or friends houses (free!)…Found some, but not enough of any one particular flavor ????....Heres a tip….Mix them all together and end up with a useable quantity…(Im serious !)…

Just a side note. You cant mix oil based paint with latex. They will never mix. Aside from that I think anything goes. Obviously you shouldnt mix poly with paint and so on. On metal though, I would try to use oil based paint such as rustoleum. Latex paint is water based and may cause rusting (good chance). Spend the extra bucks on this part and paint all metal with an oil based paint. Yes its harder to clean up and takes longer to dry but once dry it is very durable and will block rust better. Latex paint stinks for metal, especially smooth or glossy surfaces. I worked in a hardware store for 4 years (mom and pop type). I learned a lot about paint while working there.

ProngsAK-47 · 04-05-2004, 11:10 PM

By the way, nice thread and keep up the good contributions to the site!

SOLVER · 04-06-2004, 07:45 PM

Prongs....good point about the paint mixing....shows what an idiot I am regarding paint !...Sometimes, trying to stretch dollars too much is a bad idea...I shall include your contribution to the final cd rom if you dont mind, and I look forward to any/all suggestions, tips, ideas regarding anything to do with this project that you and everyone else can offer to make this post usefull.......

SOLVER · 04-08-2004, 03:58 PM

Auxillary post #1

From time to time, I shall endeavor to add supplimentary information in what I title "auxillary posts".. This info can range anywhere from odd stuff that doesnt seem to fit in any paticular installments to cost tallies, to just a post to add a few more pictures into the mix... Todays info is a cost tally plus my new lock pics... I will cover the entire subject of locks & locking your machine in my usual blathering, lengthy, sleep-causing diatribe in an upcoming installment already penned, however, the ease of refitting my machine with a fresh, new, high security "T" handle suprised me and this quick projectwas perfect for todays unexpected sunny warm Ohio weather and resulted in no personal bodily injury (rare)!

Costs sustained thus far...

$20.00 for machine
$29.96 for complete factory front locking assembly

Total $ 49.96

A few pics of this new lock assembly below....

One last thought.... Due to the ever-increasing additions of more & more pics, loading times for this thread may increase exponentially, but rest assured that I resize all pics down, to assist in more expedient loading....Please be patient...

Gr8Scott · 04-09-2004, 10:37 AM

One question...

Why debrand the machine? Why not leave the coke on the outside of the machine so that potential thieves really think it's an old coke machine that you've turned into your own personal drink machine. That makes more sense to me than painting it and giving thieves a clue that you might have modified this machine. To me, the more original this thing looks on the outside, the more secure it is on the inside.

**charger0122** · 04-09-2004, 11:00 AM

just be careful about moving the machine mine about broke my back when it fell on me.the gun dispenser is a good idea i keep my homemade wine in mine it gets a little colder than my fridge and i can lock it up

Richard Simmons · 04-09-2004, 11:47 AM

The paint if for the interior of the machine. I believe he is leaving the exterior, except for replacing the large light with a smaller one as is.

John Lapin · 04-09-2004, 05:41 PM

Great Idea. Thanks for the suggestion. Never would have thought of that in 100 years. Opened up a world of possibilities. Thinking outside the box. You'r hired!!!!

SOLVER · 04-09-2004, 05:42 PM

Project: Guncoke

“How to strip the interior & remove the door”. [PART ONE]

Before beginning this installment, several of you have e-mailed me or posted threads with a few additional suggestions that are helpful to our project, such as where you might also be able to procure a donor machine, and these are listed in no particular order… Run-down crappy used car lots that have failed, or are in the process of doing so….Behind small time pizza shops, old gas stations, auto body shops that are less than successful, also, check local salvation army & goodwill thrift stores. As a new thing, I will post all suggestions received regarding previous installments at the beginning of the next segment, this way, we can more easily stay well informed & current about all options….. o.k., then, lets move on, shall we ??..(RS, you are correct)

O.K., Its time to lighten your pig up for transport & rebuild…. Thoroughly look her over, inside & out. All machines are kind of the same….They all seem to be built as an exterior box with door, then they have interior vending components, coin mechanisms, and a refrigeration unit with its sub assemblies. While looking her over, you are looking for how these interior parts are fastened to the shell. Also, while looking her over, inventory its condition, weaknesses, what it will need, repairs, e.t.c. However these interior parts are fastened, they will have to be un-fastened.. There usually isn’t any way to “bully” these out without removing the fasteners…..believe me, I tried, and almost ruined my machine. One thing I found was that virtually all fasteners used on my machine were one of three different sizes/types…. #1 = Phillips head sheet metal screws, #2 = 3/8/ inch head lags…#3 = 5/8 inch head bolts holding the compressor into position. Everything inside & out was either #1 or #2….most convenient !

Remove the door. All doors are removable (hopefully!) so examine the hinge areas both top & bottom. My machine has the top hinge fastened to the shell with five bolts. Three of these are lags that screw down into the box from up top, and are easily removable. The other two are security carriage bolts, with no actual top head to hold (so thieves cant rob the machine simply by removing the door easily) and a square type recessed head into the square-ish plate hole. One on my machine tried to be real funny and began to strip and turn..This is because the underneath nut had rusted to the bolt, so I used medium sized vice-grips to grab hold of the upper rounded head and was then able to proceed. This setup is common and is, of course, designed so that anyone interested in breeching the security measures of the machine by simply removing the door, would have to be able to access the interior to do so. A small metal plate covered the access hole inside for me to be able to gain access to the two nuts inside on the security carriage bolts up top. This thin plate was held into position by a small Phillips sheet metal screw. The bottom hinge was simply lagged down into the bottom with two 3/8 inch lags, easily removed with the door open. All of this info is wonderful, as long as you have access to the inside of your machine, such as it being unlocked or you have a key… If not, then sooner or later you are going to have to either call a locksmith, or break into it. I read a thorough and comprehensive internet post somewhere on how to do this without causing severe damage, but at the time, I wasn’t planning on recording this entire how-to saga, thus I didn’t save it, and now I regret it as it was quite complete, but I did do some sniffing around and got some info on this subject… I will try to locate more and include it in the “Completion” installment but for now, heres a few tidbits on the subject (authors unknown)…

QUOTE...

Posted: April 04 2004,11:56

"I don't remember seeing an earlier thread on this but have done the procedure and it's pretty simple. I have a 1976 Cavalier C6 machine with the same lock you are describing...Take a look at the lock assembly. Looking dead-on into the ring-slot (where the key would fit) with a good light source (like a snake light, etc.) you should see the ends of 7 brass pins. They are equally spaced around the ring-slot. Use a drill with a small drill bit (small enough to fit into the ring-slot) and drill out each pin. Being brass they'll drill pretty easily. Once all seven are drilled the rectangular face piece of the lock should pop out. Sometimes it may require a small amount of assistance by a flat screwdriver or other prying device but shouldn't take hardly any effort to pop it out. If it doesn't easily pop then one or more of the pins are still in place. Re-drill each until you get the lock to pop. It took me about 20 minutes the first time I did it but I was going slow and being careful not to damage anything other than the pins.
Once you pop the lock, replace the "innards" (good southern word) with a new lock assembly purchased from any lock-smith. Usually around $15.00 and comes with two keys.
Let me know if you need more help."

END QUOTE....

**********************************
QUOTE

"Lock and Key assembly....$8.95 - If you need to remove the old lock from your machines and know the key Number, we can match the number. If not, you will either have to drill the lock out, have a locksmith open it, or break the colored (maroon, green) body and unscrew the center rod to separate the machine."

END QUOTE...

This one is from a nefarious anti-social website, but may be helpful…

QUOTE...

"There are basically only two ways to get into vending machines without a key. Through the lock, or directly.
LOCKS
You can always try and pick the lock, using the standard method. The only problem with that is that there are usually at least eight settings, so you have to pick it three or four times to get the cylinder to travel enough to open the lock. That can be entirely too time consuming and generally not worth it. So, here are some better methods for opening a lock without picking it. It can be very easy to get into tubular locks or very hard, depending on how cheap the lock is.
Gematic-type: cheap as hell locks. Their main weakness is that the cam (small piece of metal on the back of the lock designed to hold the cylinder in place) is held on by a single, small, weak-threaded screw. Most of the time the cam is also only an aluminum alloy. To defeat this type of lock, you can use a tubular key. File it down so that only the pin that sticks up from the cylinder is left and when inserted into a lock it rotates freely, but you can't pull it out. Attach a chain to the key, then wrap the chain around a bar of some sort. Yank hard. Voila! Cam either comes completely off or is bent to hell, open sesame.
Ace-type: somewhat more expensive, better secure. The cam is held on by a nut over a larger bolt-type end. This makes it mainly pull-proof. However, the lock is only coated in carbon steel. Beneath that millimeter thin layer of hard metal there is only a nickel alloy. Insert a small drill bit into the cross section where the key slot meets the circular opening and go at it. After you get past the hard metal, the rest will give like soft cheese. Keep drilling until either the cylinder falls out, or you drill right through the lock and through the bolt in the end of the lock. It only takes me about five minutes to do this with a hammer drill.
American-type: you can tell these locks from the others by the fact that the face is completely flush. Instead of a tubular cylinder, these locks rely on a set of pins on the key, mounted at irregular depths. The face is drill-proof. These things are the Fort Knox of locks, if you see one you're pretty much XXX trying to open it without a key. So, on to the next method!
DIRECT
Let's not kid ourselves here. We're not trying to get into these things for the aesthetic value of the job. We want the stuff inside. C'mon, you want to try to dump salt water into these things, thinking it will completely ruin the machine and only work part of the time? I'm guessing we're not all that concerned with the well-being of the machine in question. Face it, this is a grab-and-go job. So xxxxth lock, let's just get in.
Almost every single vending machine has the T-bar locking system. This means there's a steel bar traveling the length of the machine, securing the door at the top, bottom and side directly next to the lock, opposite the hinge.
This is a pretty good system. It doesn't work against someone determined to get in. Why? Because the point where the locking bar intersects with the machine's walls may be steel, but it's only about a quarter inch thick.
Bring a prybar and a hammer. Unplug the machine. Climb on top of it. Track where the locking bar intersects with the roof by going in a line straight up from the lock. Insert the prybar (you might have to hammer it down in) about an inch to the side of that position, toward the hinge. Pry the sucker open. Once you've got the top open, you can see where the locking bar goes into the side, pry that open too. From there you can yank the door open and grab anything you want.
A successful break-in to a vending machine should take less than three minutes. Doing it this way also doesn't damage the machine enough to make it unusable. In fact, it takes less than five minutes of welding to fix, thus the vending company loses very little... some product and a couple hundred dollars is chump change compared to the $7000 it costs for the machine. If you don't trash the machine, there's less of a chance the company will follow up on busting you for breaking into it."

END QUOTE...

Im going to stop pasting these tips about now as after doing various inquiries to most internet search engines, the info about breaking into these machines appears to be bad mojo….There are a lot of sites dedicated to illegal activities, but I think that including some of this stuff may be helpful as long as it is used for good….never evil !!!!!!

(Please go to “How to strip the interior & remove the door”. [PART TWO]

SOLVER · 04-09-2004, 06:02 PM

Project: Guncoke

“How to strip the interior & remove the door”. [PART TWO]

This brings us to an important point… What if there is a lock, but the door is open ??... What if the is a big gaping void where someone vandalized the machine in order to steal its riches (2 or 3 dollars in change) ???.... Vending machines are pretty well designed to protect against theft, but they do have some weaknesses. Remember, these things do sit alone, all the time, in all areas without guards, so they must be theft deterring in order to remain productive.. There are also ways to considerably beef up the factory locks with a few add-ons, which we will cover in teeth-grittingly boring detail later upon the completion segments…. Additionally, the internet has thousands of vending lock sites that offer virtually everything you could ever want vending machine lock-wise, but since my machine was already open and missing the lock, I ended up using my local locksmith for my replacement parts need..(see auxillary post #1)

These guys do this stuff for a living, and they should be able to outfit you with new locks or lock assemblies even if you drilled out your existing lock to gain entry… Use extra caution if you do have to break in so that you can easily return the locking system to its factory state, even if planning on adding some of the well made auxiliary vending locks that are available on the market..These offer factory looks and blend right in, and are easily installed as they are flush mounts and seem to be idiot proof (we’ll see !)…The ones I am looking at mount at the opening side and coupled with the original front mount lock, should beef up our locking duties nicely. I definitely want to stay away from anything suspicious looking like the typical padlock & hasp that might make a would be thief give this ol coke machine a good looking over….Keep it as demure looking as possible, because Mr. Thief can just keep on trucking right on by my gun collection without a second thought.

Remove the refrigeration components…. The compressor was bolted down to the floor in the very bottom area of my machine with two 5/8 inch bolts, with the nuts welded to the floor plate, and after removing these bolts, the compressor unit slid out from the front on a type of tray. The evaporator (radiator?) was screwed to the walls inside the upper opening, directly below the can vending racks. Remove all cooling system mounting hardware and be careful not to puncture any of the lines as inhaling Freon is a big no-no !! The way my machine was set up was that the entire cooling system could be removed together, without having to dis-assemble any of the lines.

As far as the factory electrics are concerned, you will have to do something to the electrical subsystem in order to separate the door from the body, and my machine
Had large bundles of wires and fat “looms” that contained them.. I simply just cut through them as I had no need for any of the electrical sub assemblies. You may want to retain the factory product light for theft-deterrent reasons (throw thieves off the trail) or you may not…Its your choice. I was, at first, going to set it up so that I could plug in the factory light fixture to light up the front Coke plexi-glass bezels, but then I decided that this light area could be better used for pistol and ammo storage as it is a generous sized region, and we will cover how to make this area more secure in future installments if so desired... I ended up using a smaller "slimline" fixture here...Same illumination as the factory, and runs cooler which is good for this area being used for pistol & ammo storage, and is significantly smaller, thus more storage space yeild with the original functionality of the big ol "COKE" that draws thirsty patrons from miles away to the machine, much like an unholy beacon which beckons to soda-addicts like the sirens of yore. Also, if you can sell off any of the electrical or cooling components, use better caution than I did in order to keep the value / sell-ability of these items… I knew I wasn’t going to sell off anything, so that gave me license to speed things up considerably and I could hack & tear out at will….. Im glad that I decided to use a more smaller, thinner lighting fixture behind the advertising bezels, that way, I enjoy a delicious compromise between keeping up machine functional-ness looks and having my much needed door storage areas. When you see how much storage is available between the front of the inner door and the auxiliary middle door, one can become space greedy, and I plan to add extra locks to secure this middle door to the actual front door for an extra measure of security. This middle door is somewhat thin, but could be beefed up to accommodate racks mounted on either (or both) sides to hold pistols, ammo, e.t.c….Something to consider when we sail into the “interior design” installment…

One thing to keep in mind is to carefully examine all the crap that you strip out of your machine for material that you can use later…. For example, there was a galvanized metal “box” that protected the evaporator (radiator?) inside the main area below the can vending racks, and this box was open on both ends…..It was held into position by a couple of Phillips head sheet metal screws and after removing this, you may want to keep it instead of trashing it because it can be used in a few different areas later, such as cutting it in half width-wise and using one of the pieces to screw off in front of the can drop door to prevent unauthorized intrusions into the inner door sanctum… additional cut down pieces can also be utilized for closing off the coin change return chute, bottle opener hole, behind the push buttons, e.t.c.

The soda can vending rack on my machine was a bear to remove, and unfortunately, I missed two essential fasteners that were semi-hidden, thus I almost completely ruined my inner metal liner. This vending rack is EXTREMELY HEAVY !!. Removing it lightened up my donor machine by about three or four hundred pounds and was cleverly secured through its back using two lags that went through the rear liner and into a steel reinforcing plate hidden behind the liner….I looked and looked and looked, but I could never see these fasteners until I had manhandled the rack out a little, (bending the he77 out of my liner) and that’s when I discovered them. From initial inspection, there was no visible lags anywhere, but after attempting to tear out this rack, I found that near the center, rear of the rack, you could easily remove the thin backing strips of the soda can holding bins at the rear of the vending rack, thus enabling you to see the two lags and remove them…. After discovering them and their subsequent ease of removal, I felt like an a$$, and almost screwed up my project before it really began. My vending can rack was also positioned into the cavity of the shell, raised about ten inches off the floor by four flat metal legs.. These legs were only attached to the walls of the shell, and not to the vending can rack itself, thus they were simply propping the vending can rack up tight against the ceiling.

These flat legs were somewhat tough to remove. They were fastened through the walls of the liner into backing plates, much like the back of the vending can rack, and there is no way to chisel, pry or force them off, or use any crowbars behind without ruining your liner. Take your time, you need to carefully remove these legs. Mine were held on with the usual combo of 3/8 inch head lags and phillips head sheet metal screws. The two rear ones were especially difficult to remove as there wasn’t much clearance to turn tools in the corner area. A lot of patience is in order here, and I found helpful was a PROPER sized screwdriver with a vice-grips clamped onto the screwdriver handle, thus giving me more leverage to POP them loose in this tight area…..DO NOT STRIP THE HEADS OF ANY OF THESE FASTENERS !....Once you are able to “POP” them loose to begin with, then they turn most agreeably thereafter. You may want to break out the dremel for a wee bit o grinding on any of these fasteners that you have difficulty with...Much faster than stripping your fingers & knuckles raw to the alarming sight of fresh bloody meaty bone......Its good to remove the door first, then remove the can vending rack as the thick door wont be in the way of sliding the rack out of the opening… One other good piece of advice is to think carefully about which position you want the machine to be in when removing these components (upright, on its back, on its side, e.t.c.)….I left the machine sitting upright to remove the door and the cooling components, then laid my machine on its side to remove the can vending rack.

Next installment: “Can I actually recover money by selling used interior parts ??”

SOLVER · 04-10-2004, 10:25 PM

Auxillary post # 2

Here’s some pics of the factory lighting set up….top pic is of the outside looking in at the lighting & coin changer sub-component area doors (closed). Although these doors are thin, they do possess rigidity thus they shall survive the strip-out nicely. Once relieved of their back-breaking thankless burdens, a variety of possibilities now become known, and initial interior designing concepts are beginning to swim uncontrollably in my head, much like the talking dog who advised Mr. Davy Berkowitz to perform his monstrously savage acts of destruction, but we shall endeavor to focus our energies on gentle acts of creation……

As you can see, this pic reveals the actual factory lighting fixture door in the open position… One can most readily imagine how the simple substitution of a smaller slim-line lighting fixture shall yield generously ample storage space, cooler operating temperatures, and less interior fire risk.

Above, we see another view of the same… It is written that one should employ either a heating element, or a light in a gun safe as this assists in retarding the interior humidity that can cause rusting…It is also advised that you should employ these devices near the bottom of a gun safe, as the rising hot air shall circulate around your guns (see outdoor life / J.Carmicheal column this month)..This may be a good idea, but another excellent idea is to be able to see the interior of your gun locker, all the more made brighter by some type of light, to aid tired old eyes (like mine) in the selection of that days gun choice, and fumbling around in the dark may have worked for Helen Keller, et. al., but it doesn’t cut it with me. I need to see !! Testing shall prove whether my slimline front COKE light will provide enough spare illumination to brighten up all interior areas for ease of viewing. If not, we shall have to incorporate addition means of luminosity.

And finally (thank god?) is a close-up of the original factory twin bulb fluorescent lighting fixture which resides directly behind the front plexiglass “COKE” advertising display panel… This fixture is typical of the time period, with clunky ballasts, and fluorescent starters, and is time proven to be somewhat reliable. Although the starters & ballasts are subject to maintenance, especially given that these machines usually were plugged into non-surge protection type electrical outlets, and I imagine that there has been an old soda machine or two that when struck by lightening, fried itself completely, yet the design that incorporates subsystems, should have been an easy rebuild, with minimum tools.

Why was it so necessary to extrapolate this info in mind-numbing detail ??? …..Because I wanted to share these pics to better help you understand upcoming installments regarding the pistol & ammo inner door storage areas, and how much real estate the factory light pigs up, and also, the factory subcomponent access doors that I hope to retain as an additional measure of security (which shall require the installation of locks) and these doors will assist in keeping door stored items in their respective positions.

Heres a Saturday night “teaser” pic (below)…. As you all know, I am several installments ahead (in terms of my project’s construction status) of what is currently being posted, and I do this for various reasons… The main one being that any feedback, suggestions, ideas, e.t.c., that you all contribute, can be applied, & tested before you read about that particular area (when possible) and this is just such an event… For example, it has been suggested recently that the incorporation of “rope” lighting may solve a few dilemmas I am having, so I have been keeping an eye out for rope “donor” lighting cable. This cable will solve a few problems, especially in regards to lighting up the Coke plexiglass advertising panel, but I don’t want to lose inner door storage space. By trimming down the depth of the pistol & ammo storage component directly behind the COKE panel by 3/4 inch, I am now able to route lengths of this “rope” lighting between the wood back of this door storage box and the plexiglass ad panel. Long term testing has shown that this rope lighting runs nice & cool, thus my machine wont erupt in a fiery he77-sparked inferno of pistol & ammunition fueled flames making me cry like a doting mother of a pre-teen , upon discovering a birthday party invitation in her son’s underwear drawer to the Never-land ranch. How much for the rope lighting, J.T., you may ask….???...After all, we have a final budget to keep in mind, and we cant just fly off and buy any trinket who’s shiny appearance catches our eye (and our fancy), now can we ?...

As luck would have it, today was a very windy day here, and I spent most of it working on my machine, and trying to keep my nosy neighbor from crashing the party….. This guy is a bit of a snob, and when he saw me off-loading the Coke machine into my garage a few weeks ago, he directed some cleverly snide remarks my way about how I am an entertaining “junkman” who never fails to amuse & delight him with my schemes…. Junkman, I may be, especially in the heat of a battle, such as this project, but I refuse to entertain this a$$hole, so myself & my supporting cast, dedicated the day to replenishing our nearly exhausted hydration levels, via another type of adult canned beverage, and our boisterously loud behavior drove Mr. Snooty inside to be amongst his equals ( inbred halfwit wife & kids), but a little later, when my happy group discovered that our supply of suds had dwindled to an alarmingly low level, we trotted on down to the nearest drive-thru and purchased hydration aids, and while there, I spied the owner removing a couple of thick cardboard beer advertising displays that the wind wreaked havoc with today…. These two displays had ¾ inch diameter rope lighting around the perimeter, and around the product logos, thus giving these cheap advertising aids a “neon-ish” appearance, and each was about 2 foot by 4 foot in size. I inquired about what he planned to do with them and he informed me that they were headed to the dumpster.. So I ended up with two twenty foot long sections of high-brightness ¾ inch diameter rope lighting for free !!!...Self contained, brilliantly bright, and best of all, very affordable… As for Mr. Next-door-neighbor clown, this guy is so snobbish, and carries his nose pointed so far into the air, that he should have flashing red lights installed on it so airplanes don’t slam into his face..

Oh, and for the “teaser” tag used two paragraphs above, it merely describes an out-of-sequence photo posted ahead of its respected installment, thus hopefully stimulating obviously dwindling levels of audience enthusiasm levels for this project.

SOLVER · 04-14-2004, 08:20 PM

Project: Guncoke

Major setback #2

“What the he77 do you mean, the gun dont fit ?”

This is a new department, and it shall subsequently titled “Major setback”…
You all know about my first setback, and that was when I caused significant interior damage to the galvanized sheet metal liner by going berserk, trying to thrash the can vending rack out, not knowing about the two “hidden” retention bolts that held said rack in. I bypassed this setback by justifying the removal of the liner due to b.s. rust worries, and I moved right along….This really wasn’t a “true” major setback, something along the lines of derailing the entire forward momentum of the whole project, per se, and so I was able to salvage the galvanized sheet metal floor (with the drain) and just tore out the two side walls, the back, and the ceiling, leaving exposed hard foam insulation. I was going to use this to our advantage by employing the same principles of a vacum bottle (thermos) to the interior by sandwiching insulation and fire retardant board in between an outer metal shell, and the interior plywood, thus perhaps giving some measurable degree of fire proofing. At least that was the idea, and it sounded real good, especially after ripping the flesh off my hands in a bloody, drunken carnage…..

Soon, everything was back on schedule, and progress being made, sutures finally removed, and my wounds healed (flesh, but not my mental wounds!)…

Decided it would be a fine idea to play with some interior design concepts the other day, as I only had an hour or so to kill, not enough time to really accomplish much of anything, and I was experiencing mental-block when it came to picturing final upright gun position placement, so I decided to employ the aid of some props (guns) to help get a “feel” for what I wanted to end up with. My oldest son was stupid enough to be in my vicinity at the time, so I barked off an order to fetch me a gun, so I could prop it up inside, and maybe do some experimental tracing… The buffoon came back with what is probably the most obnoxious gun in my collection, an old AR with about twenty five pounds of #$%& hanging off it (various lights, lasers, vert grips, scopes, radios, washing machine, e.t.c.) and due to its bulky size and shape, I grew agitated with the boy for bringing me the least likely universally shaped long gun, that would be useable for tracing, and besides, the thing is too short to be used in comparison to the overall average length of the rest of my guns, so I politely requested (by bellowing rude obscenities) that he come back with just a shotgun, a regular old shotgun, any old shotgun, JUST BRING ME A #$%&ING REGULAR SHOTGUN !.... Well, he finally did bring me back a shotgun, and as I had now moved to working on the rear of the machine, I told him to prop it up inside and see how it looks…

That’s when I heard his timid, quivering, shaky, scared voice (he is 23 yrs. old) meekly inform me that.. “dad, the gun don’t fit !”

“WHAT THE HE77 DO YOU MEAN, THE GUN DON’T FIT???”

I scrambled around to the front, and sure enough, the gun is too long, and it certainly wont fit between the floor and the ceiling, seems to be about a half inch too long……. O.K. Time for a cold bottle of life-sustaining “happy juice” (beer) as I try to figure out exactly how in the world I broke my own cardinal rule, one of the first suggestions offered to you all, at the beginning of our installments, namely, “carefully size out potential donor machines”…..

What went wrong ???..Too much drinkie, and not enough thinkee ???...

Here’s the scoop, and how I pulled this project back from the brink of ruin… As it was, the shotgun my son dutifully retrieved for me happened to be his grandfathers, and it is an oldie…. It runs about ten feet long, and it was my father’s first shotgun, passed down to me when I became of age, and it has been passed down another generation since my grubby paws caressed it lovingly, and will bog down my grandson (if I ever get one !) for when he graduates to his first 12 gauge, thus this crappy, no-finish, club is the longest gun in my collection by almost four inches !..This thing has so much family mileage, that I actually felt relieved when my son outgrew its usefulness to him, and I “stole” it back for family safekeeping until needed next !.. It may be valueless to anyone other than a male family member, and certainly laughable to any would-be-thief, but I couldn’t ever live with myself if I didn’t keep it as safe as possible & amongst friends, so I just couldn’t bring myself to excluding it from the mix, even if it is waaaaaay too long (and ugly)…..

Change of plans time…… (dad, are you sure you just don’t want me to keep this old thing at my house ???)…. NO !

Here’s my first (and hopefully last) serious design change, and it really isn’t too bad. You might not even have to employ this to your project, due to machine size, or your own gun collection length, and I certainly apologize for not thinking this project through with more intelligence….Sorry !

Out comes the galvanized sheet metal floor, and out comes the 2+ inch thick hard foam underlying insulation. These changes to plan adds about 2 ½ inches to the available interior height, and plenty to now be able to nestle “ol ironsides” in with the others…..Calculating finished interior sizes including carpet, fireboard, and plywood, this pig should have about a half inch to an inch to spare….Pretty close, I know, I hate to lose the sub-floor insulation, but my options are somewhat limited, thus I have little choice but to cheerfully digest these compromises…. Thankfully, I own no other gun close to this one’s length, and I guess I could have broken her down, and taken the barrel off for storage, and then there would have been no problem, but I am kinda pi$$ed off at myself for not calculating better, and I like all of them standing upright, and proper attention, ready to serve at a moments notice, so these are my changes, reluctantly (but dutifully) submitted with an embarrassed chagrin.

There will be no photos submitted with this post, although my son did take a few of “dad” boiling over into a frothing, seething rage, while he mocked and openly laughed at my inability to properly plan out such a simple and uncomplicated endeavor, such as our little Coke gun locker….

Next installment, we return to proper form with..

“Can I actually recover money by selling used interior parts ??”

Arebelson · 04-14-2004, 08:52 PM

Solver think you might come up with a nice "cover" with / for something like the item displayed on this link ?

http://www.gun-racks.com/

Just thinking........

SOLVER · 04-14-2004, 10:20 PM

These rotary racks are very nice indeed, and the upcoming installment titled "Interior design concepts" covers the weaknesses and strengths of them in detail, although the subject content is limited to how a rotary rack applies to our project.. Please jump in and post your opinions and evaluation after you get yours for all of us to share, as this info will be helpfull to anyone following the project...I can blather on and on about my specific gun locker, and I sometimes worry that I handicap this project but not offering a better organized train of thought, and more helpfull ideas, links, solutions, but in order to properly cover the subject comprehensively, anyone/everyone should add their 2 cents worth as we all can benefit from additional thoughts, ideas, suggestions, etc. so please chime in as much as possible and thanks for the helpfull link.

SOLVER · 04-16-2004, 10:55 PM

Project: Guncoke

“Can I actually recover money by selling used interior parts ??”

The brief answer to this question is “YES”!!.... Again, the restoration forums are an excellent place to sell off, or even offer any of the crap you stripped out during gutting. You may even want to offer the stuff on e-bay, flea markets, e.t.c., although I am not up to date on sales & shipping rules regarding this site….Protect yourself if selling, always describe the item honestly, and if you are unsure if it works or not, say so in your item description and always make sure to offer a competitive price, unless you want to sit on a bunch of crap forever, instead of building your project ! Some items are in high demand, and some items are in high demand simply because they are old, hard-to-find, or are known “maintenance nightmare” items. Also, Im not sure about the regulations of shipping refrigeration components, especially complete systems due to possible toxicity of the Freon contained within. I see all the time how people post “want ads” on various soda pop collectable vending machine message boards, wanting this or that…. Good place to post your sale stuff….FOR FREE !!! (see links in installment #1, part one).

The highest demand item seems to be the bill validators and coin changers, sorter mechanisms, e.t.c. I recovered a few dollars worth of change out of my machine’s coin sorter, and I suppose this is a testimonial to the utter stupidity of certain lambs that plague our planet like some type of unholy locust……I cant help but to wonder exactly why the previous owner of my machine didn’t harvest this loose change, as the door was open, beckoning to the filthy, greedy masses to “come and reap bounty”, but perhaps the thought never occurred to him or the thousands of school kids that walked right past this machine on a daily basis to their school not half a block away…. Who knows, maybe your machine will be an old one, and the change that YOU harvest will be of some numismatic collector value…Old bottle caps ??? Old soda cans or bottles ??...are these valuable to collectors ???

As described earlier, the complete refrigeration subsystem removed from my machine as a completely contained unit, and if you know that your machine cools and does not “short cycle”, then your reefer may just be sellable. If your electrics are in good shape and operational, you may even be able to part out whatever you don’t plan to keep. Of course, the very oldest machines are in high demand, and since my machine was built in 1979, it doesn’t qualify for the antique super-collectable category, however, I did throw a few posts here and there, just sniffing the winds, and I had a few folks jump right back wanting my stuff, so you never know !!!

My machine originally was slated for it to be a glass bottle dispensing unit, and has the bottle cap opener built into the front, but had the can conversion vending rack installed. As I previously discussed, this sob was beefy and from perusing the vending forums, certain can conversion racks are of great interest, even more so to the guy who wants a pop machine in his rec room, and the machine he buys is the variety that dispenses bottles (no longer available here in Ohio), so maybe you sell off the rack for a few bucks……

As far as real time selling is involved, I am currently in negotiations with three interested parties regarding my coin changer that was in my machine. It is a COINCO model 9200 and is very much in demand and quite sellable as it is in good, useable condition. I did end up trashing my reefer assembly which was stupid as it functioned fine, but I was in a hurry to get started on rebuild….

Next installment: Inside design concepts”

SOLVER · 04-17-2004, 07:57 PM

Auxilary post # 3

(I shall try to keep these aux posts brief and without pictures)

Here is a quickie auxiliary post, and the idea was recently submitted to me by e-mail. I encounter some folks who are reluctant to post thoughts or suggestions fearing that the idea in question may be considered “stupid” or “unusable”, or fear thread “hijacking”, and I understand these concerns, however, every idea and comment IS VERY RELEVANT to the overall scheme of this project, so please don’t be afraid to chime in. If still reluctant after reading these most comforting words of encouragement, then by all means, continue to e-mail me, but I fear that you may lose the community pride happy feelings that result from tossing in your 2 cents. This isn’t just my project, it’s OUR project available to all, for all, and by all. I have stated many times that I fear that I am a poor author and that you folks may find my words regarding this project to be less than entertaining, however, I do try to at least get the gist of the concept related to you with the most information, the least amount of useless babbling, and hopefully have answered most questions with my own demented observations. I also try to assign credit where credit is due, and listed below is a recently submitted suggestion.

For a quick hidden extra ammunition storage area, especially if space is at a premium, take innocuous looking case boxes of canned soda, and stack them on top of the machine…. This does a few things…. It adds an air of authenticity to the below glowing “Coke” machine, as any pop vending unit certainly must require periodic refills, and it also gives a good place to warehouse less valuable gun related items, such as ammo, slings, parts, e.t.c. It also gives more central weight to the machine, helpful in keeping it authentic feeling and less likely to be accidentally bumped, then the subsequent discovery by Mr. thief that this coke machine isnt a coke dispensing machine after all.

If you use the flat style canned case box, which is available for free anywhere, and is the type that consists of a bottom and half sides of cardboard (with Coke, Pepsi, 7-up, e.t.c. logo lettering) and create a shell out of empty cans along the three consecutive sides, which leaves a center hidden zone that offers ample storage space. These fake cases of Coke can be stacked on top of each other, on top of the machine, thus presenting the illusion of extra canned soda waiting to be employed inside during your next pop machine restocking !! (VERY CONVINCING) True, these hidden regions aren’t really secure, but no thief would mess around and try to steal warm cases of canned beverage, especially if these cases were of an unpopular variety, especially more so if unpleasant in taste.

Apply beads of dark caulking or silicone between each of these dummy “frontal view” cans on the back sides to eliminate light peering through, thus alerting all to the fact that these cases of pop are simply “dummies”. Also, this sealing shall assist in keeping the cans in place, preventing shifting. Where I have my machine placed, (yes, its done and currently being used !) I have room for eight cases (2 stacks of 4 side-by-side) of these dummies on top of my machine under the ceiling, and a cool disguise is to make the fronts of these cases dusty, dirty, and old-ish. These four cases conceal various bulk ammo, most of which is sealed in rubberized battle packs (.308cal Port)

Next installment we get back on track with…

“Inside design concepts”…..

SOLVER · 04-18-2004, 10:37 PM

Project: Guncoke

“Inside design concepts”…..

Its your choice exactly how you want the inside of your machine to be designed….Be smart !!!...look at other “real” gun safes and their design…..steal ideas !!!...measure and make notes of what you like & don’t like about these other safes you inspect….Do you want pistol storage ???....Ammo storage ???....gear storage ?? Optics storage ?? Magazines storage ???...if so, how much ????.... Make an inventory of all your gear, and divide it into categories based on value, amount of use, accessibility, and then use this inventory to determine exactly what MUST fit inside, then what you would like to add in, then finally crap that can stay outside. The only true constraints is the available real estate inside your donor machine, so let your creative juices flow. Always remember that practicality is the name of our game, and many, many, many hours of thought (& lotsa suds) went into this first design. I came up with all sorts of crazy concepts, and wild crap that I wanted to include, but in the end, practicality won out. By the term practicality, I directly refer to an easy to build, fully functional clean design, with the ability to modify interior design concepts at the drop of a hat. I ended up choosing to have a large, wide & deep drawer storage in the bottom section of my machine (where the compressor motor used to reside), long guns in the vending can rack area, and pistol and boxed ammo storage on the door between the outer & inner door panels. The large bottom drawer does not seal up like the upper long gun & door storage areas with their rubber vacuum “refrigerator-style” weather stripping/door seal, so be careful about what you keep here due to the possibility of less rusting prevention than the upper areas provide. This giant drawer is roomy enough for virtually anything, and one could even add inner dividers, a false bottom, a lift out gun cleaning kit that sits on top of the bottom section inside, kind of like having multiple drawer layers inside of the drawer itself, ammo, magazine, optics storage, e.t.c. Pending on how you choose to line your walls of the long gun storage area, is also a factor regarding ease of mounting additional gun dividing racks… if you use plywood wall liner, you may easily move, adjust & fasten anything anywhere, at any time…. If you use fire liner, you will have to pre-drill through it and more thought should go into the initial design. I decided on using both fire lining and plywood, thus sandwiching the fire liner between the factory original hard foam insulation and my inner exterior plywood. I shall cover my exposed inner plywood with a carpet of some type to assist in a non-marring interior, but I haven’t decided exactly which type of carpet I will be using (indoor-outdoor, shag, low nap, e.t.c). Dividing racks can now be installed, moved, adjusted to fit, removed, e.t.c. at will with this setup. I really wish that I hadn’t tore up the factory galvanized liner, but I did, so get over it, do you hear me ??? Pi$$ing & moaning about the liner aint gonna bring the @#$%ing thing back so stop being a crybaby and permit me to move along….. ARE WE GOING TO HAVE TO HEAR ABOUT THAT LINER IN EVERY POST ???

Rotary racks

There are a variety of various vertical rotary long gun storage racks available in both pre-assembled, and in kit form. Plans for the do-it-yourselfer are also available, and these racks are sometimes advertised as “for gun safes” and “no gun ever in back”….Virtually all of these racks are built on varying types of swivels, thus a clear advantage to utilizing one is that you can revolve the assembly in order to bring the gun of choice out front. Other distinct plusses are that these are well made, strong, look good, and can be moved from safe to safe, should you be of the type to upgrade your safe selection from time to time. These things have other nice features such as padded recesses, gun retaining straps, various formats & layouts , and some are designed so that they can hold both regular height (tall , not overall length) shotgun type, and a taller scoped rifle type (needs fatter depth), all in the same rack due to staggering and/or angled gun slots!!

I would be remiss if I did not point out a few flaws, and although minor, they do merit mentioning. On the bottoms, these racks are round in shape…. Most safes are square in shape… Do the math, and superimpose a circle inside of a square…. What do you end up with ??? You end up with wasted real estate in the corners that could be better put to use storing firearms. Another problem is the expenditure of funds required for these, as opposed to a free interior storage system (keep your budget in mind), so even though I wish I could employ one or two of these wonderful rotary racks in my econo-locker, I am going to have to pass this time. Lastly, I have a problem with the overall design, and that is, for the space used, these racks actually yield marginal amounts of gun storage. For example, in my Coke machine, the biggest rotary rack that I could fit inside, would only hold fifteen guns. Without the rack, my machine now stores thirty eight. True, it’s a pain in the a$$ having to sometimes dig out a gun from in back, like is found on so many other mass-produced “real” gun safes, but with careful layout of the dividers, I can retrieve any gun from any slot, all without having to move any guns out of the way to achieve proper access, and I can easily do this with room to spare and not clank & bang guns against each other digging one out. I think I shall employ anti-rusting gun socks to all residents, and of course, I will keep the most popular up front, or at least change the lineup as seasons dictate.

http://www.gunstands.com/rifle.htm

http://www.gun-racks.com/

The design I really wanted to go with, involved two double sided pull out vertical rifle racks (22 inches wide), on heavy duty glides, the design similar to an inside gun room rifle rack I built last year. Unfortunately, My machine wasn’t wide enough to be able to employ this design, but I am on the lookout for just such a machine for “econo-gunlocker #2”, which due to the involved physics, would have to be securely lagged to the floor as hundreds of pounds of long guns being drawered outside of the unit on full-extension drawer slides will make the thing face-heavy and prone to tipping over and dumping itself, and its contents, out in your lap. Anyway, this design is the most expedient in terms of gun storage, but if you only have a few guns to store, then a rotary rack might be something to consider. He77, I like the rotary design, even if not used inside a safe, but left free standing on the floor (in a securely locked room).

I ended up employing four racks that run from the front to the rear. Two are fastened to each side, and the two center racks are supported by upright posts. All racks are constructed out of 2 x 2’s (1 ½ x 1 ½ ). All racks have various heights, and are designed this way to accommodate the different firearms in my collection. A good thing to remember is the actual staggering of the individual gun slot dividers. I used 2 1/4 inch wide spaces for shotguns, and 2 inches for rifles, and 1 7/8 for rimfire 22’s. The technique I used to create these “half circle” gun barell holder/dividers is quite simple…

I took a 2 x 2 and drilled a series of 7/8 inch diameter holes in the center, then cut the thing in half, which left two useable dividers. I used a spade bit chucked into an electric drill, and put a scrap piece of lumber underneath to avoid the usual “blowout” associated with spade bits when they are forced through to the backside of your work piece when drilling. Of course, it goes without saying, that you must lay out your circles according to your actual gun dividing/spacing, so that they correspond. These upright racks have the capacity to roomily store 38 long guns in their present configuration.

A neat thing I also built in was two spare barrel holders. These are built using the “half circle” method, and screw directly to the wall plywood, or center posts. I put one on an outside wall about seventeen inches off the floor, and the other one was built under the left center rack, coupled with a scrap piece of plywood 10 inches tall, helps keep the barrels from falling through to the other side. On this plywood “backing” piece, I screwed off another “half circle” barrel divider along its bottom edge, thus this setup keeps spare shotgun barrels in line, out of harms way, and perfectly in place, ready to grab at a moments notice. This barrel holder was fastened about thirty inches off the floor measured at the top, it is about 10 inches tall, and will accommodate all barrels from shorties, to the longer ones as well (working range is 28 down to 18 inches useable barrel space). This height can easily be raised or lowered as needed, pending your personal spare barrel lengths. These barrel holders reside directly behind associated upright long gun storage, thus putting some wasted space to work !.. I also built in pegs for choke tube storage or even pistol storage on the back wall in between the racks, and I could envision utilizing peg board at some places to add a dimension of adjustability, although I wasn’t clever enough to think about it during the design and/or building portion on my machine.

My interior long gun storage dividers are constructed so that they are easily removed and exchanged with ones having a different sizing, layout, design, e.t.c. and can be swapped out in a moments time. I researched the web, retail stores, friends safes, catalogs, and a host of other places to get a comprehensive overview of all available concepts, and one thing that I do not understand is that how some people lock up twenty dollars worth of crap inside a two thousand dollar safe, thus I try to limit my primarily secured items to those being of value, and secondary storage relegated to actual gun parts stuff (extra barrels, optional optics & mounts, e.t.c.). I have a friend that has stuffed his safe to the bursting point with ear protection, shooting glasses, gun cleaning supplies, old targets, e.t.c. and has little useable room for actual gun storage. This is no good. This project is for a gun locker, not a all-inclusive catch all for anything gun related. I am fortunate to have a dedicated gun room in my house, and this is where I warehouse all my gun related paraphernalia, and my Coke machine shall bear the burden of actual firearm storage.

Door storage is another matter…. My machine has a door with a generous 4 ¼ inch thick cavity between the outer and inner door panels, thus there will be a lot of room here for pistol and boxed ammo storage. I removed all of the coin storage components, lights, and other goodies here to give me maximum real estate for all of my junk. The factory inner door also locks fast against the outer door, thus adding even more security to this storage area. Several of my inner door storage compartments also feature individual doors, but these are mainly for keeping things in the box, and not falling out, thus they do not lock at this present time, although locks everywhere are a good idea, as long as you can keep track of all the keys, should your various locks be incompatible for keying alike.

Unfortunately, this can be a poor security area after removing all these components as the only protection from theft from outside in front is the original factory “COKE” plexi-glass advertising panel, so we MUST beef this area up considerably… You can screw off plywood to the front of the advertising area, right behind the plexi-glass panel, or better yet, find home heating & ventilating flat rectangular ductwork and use this (flattened out) along with the plywood to create a reinforcement barrier…. Examine the entire front inside area of the door and beef up the reinforcement behind all suspect areas such as the actual push button selectors, can dispensing chute, coin return, e.t.c. With all of this done, you can now design shelves, dividers, and regions to separate the door cavity to better organize your storage options. If using fire liner on the inside of your gun storage area, don’t forget to, of course, line the door cavity areas as well.

My door storage compartments are an eclectic mixing of fit & function. Some have doors, others do not, and the clever designer always, always thinks ahead in terms of playing hide-n-go-seek. I also cleverly employed a few hidden regions, artfully crafted to be disguised behind, beneath, below, e.t.c. existing areas for “special” storage, and these hidden regions should be kept secret from all. It doesn’t take too much imagination to come up with the means to conceal but yet conveniently access these hidden areas, and Im sorry I cant disclose my actual personal techniques, other than to say that you don’t have to go overboard making these hidey-places, as we must remember that the unit as a whole is the storage vessel, and putting hiding places behind hiding places inside of locked compartments, inside of a locked locker may not be the most prudent of ideas, however, you can never have too much security, thus I shall share that I only have three of these specialty hide-outs, two for smaller items, such as pistols, and one that is capable of concealing four long guns away from the crowd. However you chose to do these hiding places, it is of paramount concern that they be PERFECTLY indistinguishable from the normal look of the project, and a clever fellow can easily construct a false back, shallower door storage boxes, sub-floors, e.t.c. to achieve desired effects.

Another design concept to keep in mind is final interior humidity levels and the possibility of subsequent rusting…Guns attract rust, and it would be bad to finish off your project, bloat it full of your gun collection, then go away with a warm, happy feeling in your belly about the security of your stash, only to return in a week and discover that everything has acquired a coating of rust, so give this design area a lot of thought. Naturally, this rusting / moisture / humidity can be circumvented by using silica packs, a small light, or even a small fan, heating element, or all of the above. Most machines are designed with a drain hole in the bottom of the upper refrigerated area, and this drain hole usually has a drain tube/hose attached.. Clever folks (like us!) can manipulate this feature to our benefit regarding controlling moisture, humidity, and the introduction / prevention of outside air entering & leaving our gun safe areas.

Next installment: “Prepping the interior for rebuild”

RASTA GUN MON · 04-18-2004, 10:55 PM

WOW!!!!!

Arebelson · 04-19-2004, 04:25 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by RASTA GUN MON
WOW!!!!!

And I agree, WOW !!!!!!!!!!!
I thank the poster !

04-03-2004, 06:09 PM	#5
remy1492 Registered User Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Corpus Trashy TX Posts: 4,554	I think this is a neat thread. Kinda like the MonsterGarage auto conversions on Discovery Channel. __________________ Never, ever, leave your wingman!

04-03-2004, 07:04 PM	#6
Zoff12 Swift... yet unhurried! -- Team AK-47.NET ™ 10/09 Join Date: Oct 1999 Location: Hurt Virginia Posts: 4,329	Yeah...I would be very interested in this. __________________ Clear, Paul كافر Lo there do I see my father, Lo there do I see my mother and my sisters and my brothers, Lo there do I see the line of my people, back to the beginning, Lo they do call to me, they bid me take my place among them, in the Halls of the Valhalla, where the brave may live…… forever. "The difference between cover and concealment is a sucking chest wound!" "A slow hit is better than a fast miss" "Move as fast as you can, but as slow as you have too." "Na bean don chat gun lamhainn"

04-04-2004, 04:58 PM	#9
The Champ Registered User Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Saskatchewan, Canada Posts: 1,334	Browsed through some of the stuff you posted already. Very interesting. I was thinking, an extra messure of security would be to have the machine look as much like the original as possible. That way, a would be thief could very well pass it off as a coke machine, not even know there were guns in the house. __________________ RIP OwP. Gone but not forgotten. "The best way to kill a man is to pay him to do nothing"

04-05-2004, 11:10 PM	#13
ProngsAK-47 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Hudson Valley, New York Posts: 1,043	By the way, nice thread and keep up the good contributions to the site! __________________ "Hard times build character, or so I'm told. They teach you lessons worth your weight in gold, and I've been shown things happen for a reason." ~ETC RIP Mom July 4th, 1999

04-09-2004, 10:37 AM	#16
Gr8Scott Registered User Join Date: Jan 2000 Location: Mayberry, USA Posts: 3,643	One question... Why debrand the machine? Why not leave the coke on the outside of the machine so that potential thieves really think it's an old coke machine that you've turned into your own personal drink machine. That makes more sense to me than painting it and giving thieves a clue that you might have modified this machine. To me, the more original this thing looks on the outside, the more secure it is on the inside. __________________ Do you get value out of this site? Contributions to gunsnet start at $5 with benefits kicking in at $20. Check here to see those benefits: <a href="http://www.ak-47.net/store/memupgde.htm?">MEMBERSHIP UPGRADE CENTER</a>

04-03-2004, 08:37 AM	#1
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Coke machine econo gun locker Yes, I know.... everyone has already done this... This time, its different... affordably cheap, roomy, clean & surprisingly secure..... And I documented exactly how anyone can do this, step-by-step, w/pics, for under $ 200.00 with fire rated interior in a series of nine or ten posts for the average joe to do. Dont want to be a bandwidth pig, so if interested, post a reply and I will begin my series....Cool project !

04-03-2004, 11:39 AM	#2
The Champ Registered User Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Saskatchewan, Canada Posts: 1,334	Let me ask you this, where do you get a coke machine, and how much did it set ya back? Also, would be cool if you could make it dispense boxes of ammo instead of pop __________________ RIP OwP. Gone but not forgotten. "The best way to kill a man is to pay him to do nothing"

04-03-2004, 05:45 PM	#3
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Yeah ! put in some change, & out comes ammo !! great idea... As far as your question, "where did you get a coke machine & how much "??... these questions are answered in the first installment (#1), which shall be posted this coming week, after my introduction post that shall be available tonight. I have already prepared six installments (out of nine), all complete with pics. However, since you did ask, I paid $20.00 for my coke machine, and passed up several free ones !!! (all of this is covered in inst. #1....I will explain how to acquire these things either free, or very cheaply....

04-03-2004, 06:02 PM	#4
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	[ MODERATOR, PLEASE DELETE THIS POST AND ALL SUBSEQUENT RELATED IF INAPPROPRIATE OR OF NO USE TO MEMBERS] Project: Guncoke This project is to turn a soda vending machine into a gun storage locker that is quite secure and this is my first installment of an ongoing conversion project that I am currently doing right now for myself. It took me a while to decide exactly which forum to share this project with. I decided on this one because this build is based solely on an economic standpoint, specifically designed for the cost-conscious family man who has little choice but to stretch his firearms budget to achieve maximum value for the dollar. Is this project the cheapest, safest, most secure idea on the planet ???? No it isn’t, and any type of storage product has flaws and weaknesses, and if you don’t care for this concept, do not trouble yourself with reading any of my follow-up posts. Am I the foremost leading expert on home-brewed gun-stashes like this one ???? .. No !... I welcome any & all comments, suggestions, concerns, ideas regarding the progress & affordability of doing this. This project is NOT designed to replace a big dollar, super secure, high fire rated gun safe, but rather offer a budget minded approach to securing your guns in the interim, UNTILL you are able to afford a decent gun safe. There are actually those of us, with small, medium & large gun collections of various values (sentimental & $$$) that simply are unable to afford any type of professional gun safe at the present time, even a used one. This being said, please do not hound me with “you’ll be sorry” stories about how irreplaceable a real gun safe is, because I know this to be a true fact, and so does anyone that collects guns…. Matter of fact, I suffered a devastating house fire two days before Christmas this year, and it gave me thought and experience on how to economically offer a degree of safety & protection for both theft and fire. My background is that I am a family man, married for fifteen years, two kids…. Money is tight, he77, money always seems to be tight, so I wanted a little more to protect my guns than a flimsy cabinet, or clever hiding places for them, but right now, a large sized fire rated safe that would hold my collection, isn’t in my immediate future, however, I can afford a hundred, or two hundred dollars for this project to reach fruition. We all have seen this concept on many other boards & forums, I do not claim to be the originator nor inventor of the idea, or the ideas involved in this projects construction, but, I haven’t ever seen exactly how the average family man can do it from start to finish, with all steps & stages wrote out (w/pics) plain to see. I will try not to get ridiculous on spending, or on elaborate tools and building concepts…Hopefully, anyone who will try this project will own, or have access (able to borrow?) simple basic tools and simple skills. The nice thing is that what little money shall be needed, can be applied over time sparingly, so the overall final cost is pleasantly digestible. Many of my material acquisition techniques have been refined over the years from me being a cheap-a$$, and I shall endeavor to explain them as needed completely when necessary. Also, since we are all not professional wood & metal workers, some mistakes are to be expected, and perhaps you can learn from my many mistakes !.. Of course, finished external appearance must be quite convincing, and any flaws or imperfections will be hidden inside. I try to use construction techniques that may at first appear puzzling, but in the end, each step shall have provisions for “hiding” / “concealing” previous step’s mistakes (hopefully). O.K., now that I have bored you with my initial explanations and disclaimers, I shall start off the project beginning with the next installment. I am not an expert at posting, I am not an expert at writing, and installments may be added or subtracted as time goes by. Some installments will be short & sweet, others, long & wordy. I am hoping to keep the timeline from start to finish in around one month, working on it evenings after work, and perhaps weekends. I don’t want this thing to be an enormous time-killer, so I wont try to be fancy or elaborate. Bear with me as I am an average “ Joe”… This is my first time doing anything like this, or posting large amounts of info at one time. Also, please alert me if this crazy scheme is boring , useless, or simply eats up too much valuable bandwidth. UPCOMING INSTALLMENTS: How to cheaply acquire a donor machine. Tools & techniques needed for project How to strip the interior & remove door Can I recover money by selling used interior parts? Inside design concepts Prepping the interior for rebuild Rebuild Completion *************************************** Next installment: "How to cheaply acquire a donor machine"...

04-04-2004, 11:44 AM	#7
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Project: Guncoke Installment # 1, (part one) “How to cheaply acquire a donor machine” Acquire a donor soda vending machine. Size IS important on this project. I wanted something large enough to contain around thirty guns, and maybe some storage area too. Problem is that this project’s mainstay is affordability, so pending whatever size you can afford and whatever donor machine you end up locating shall ultimately be the deciding factor. I was firm on wanting a larger sized donor machine, so I passed up a couple of soda machines (free) that were just too small. I liked the price of the free machines, and I tried to reason and justify that I could build several smaller storage lockers, and thus the idea of using several smaller ones has merit on the concept of being able to maneuver them into tight hallways, around close corners, e.t.c., but where I planned to put my machine, overall size wasn’t an issue. Moving a large machine into its final resting place is no small concern either. Large machines are heavy, unbelievably heavy !!!!... (this is good thing). It was of no small concern to me that perhaps it may not be such a hot idea to use smaller machines as any potential thief could easily just load the thing up (full of my guns) and drive away, so a large & heavy donor machine will be perfect to satisfy all my requirements. Of course, additional mounting lags into walls & floors is needed, regardless of its size, so maybe you might find using smaller has an acceptable risk quotient. It goes without saying that whatever machine you ultimately end up using, it must at least be tall enough to hold the longest of your firearms, so explore the inside of any/all “donor” machines before acquiring them & bringing them home, keeping a careful eye on available inside dimensions. Obviously, the overall plan is to strip the guts out of the shell, then manufacture an interior designed to fit your exact needs. I have stripped the interior out of my Coke machine already, and discovered several problems that could have been avoided, were information such as this available. As I stated earlier, a large sized machine is very heavy, and this brings to mind a beginning problem area….transport of the machine to your home. I found that hundreds and hundreds of pounds can be shaved off by stripping the larger heavy internal components on site, before you attempt to bring your “baby” home. I do not have access to a large truck, with needed liftgate, e.t.c. This way, a regular pick-up truck can do the transporting, perhaps in as little as two trips, one of which is to dump the stripped guts, and another trip to actually haul her home. A very good lesson is that the door to my machine is extremely heavy, so by removing the door prior to transport, the actual shell wasn’t too bad to load up with some help. But how can I CHEAPLY acquire a donor machine ??? I found my donor machine by keeping my eyes open. It took about three weeks and I was ever-vigilant and on the look out at every availability. Good places to find donor machines are small towns, that are on the verge of dying. Out-of-the-way places are good to scope out as well. Remember, its easy to find soda machines in all sizes, shapes and costs, but what we are after, is either free, or at minimal cost, and in acceptable condition. As I explained earlier, I actually came across a few free machines before discovering my large Coke, but they were kinda small, and I would have had to build two or three of them to house all my guns. Where in the he77 can you get free machines, you ask ???? Look around. Find em unplugged , which indicates that they are broken, needing repairs, or simply wore out. Look for a machine that needs expensive repairs to the coin mechanism or refrigeration unit, and maybe has the beginnings of small surface rust, minor dents, and that the present owner is tired of looking at it, because of the painful reminder that his machine could be earning him money, but its just not cost efficient to repair it. The owner of my machine had it sitting at the side of his business, unplugged, and due to the extreme weight of it, he didn’t know how or when he could ever get rid of such an eyesore…. I stepped in and offered to help him out. He was sick of mowing around it, and when I offered him $20.00 for it and that I would immediately haul it away, he jumped at such a wonderful opportunity ! Also, don’t dismiss “no name” or “off-brand” machines either….Because these types aren’t COKE or PEPSI, they might be acquired easier than something more socially acceptable. New age retro wannabees have the idea that a soda vending machine in their rec room, basement billiards room, or outdoors at poolside is a great idea, until they have to deal with maintnencing it or stocking it… These disillusioned folks are often quick to rid themselves of a good idea gone bad…. Another place to look is on E-bay, or any of the dozens of forums dedicated to restoring “valuable” antique vending machines. I found dozens of machines free or for little cost in these areas just this month, but remember to keep an eye on their location as you will have to drive there to get it…..A free machine five states away isn’t a bargain. The restoration sites are good sources as there is always someone who has a machine that is broke, but is really just too new (1970-1980ish) to fool around restoring… Right before writing this post, I discovered three donors within an hours drive of my home that would make excellent projects, so look around. There were millions of various soda vending machines made over the years in a variety of flavors, sizes, and configurations, so keep your eyes open, and be ready to jump. Never be afraid of rejection….offer an owner a few dollars, and if he declines, come back in a few months and offer it to him again. If he again refuses, he is an idiot and let the dumb s.o.b. trip over the dead machine for the rest of his sorry bitter life with his walker when a few more years pass, and then while he rots in a nursing home with no visitors, having a stroke or suffering from broken hip pain, he can remember his worthless vending machine….maybe it will come to visit, as no one else will !!! (yes, I am bitter from three or four past rejections !) Important links listed below.... http://www.colamachines.com/cgi-loca...ec7f81a83e5249 http://soda-machines.com/cgi-local/d.../ikonboard.cgi http://collectibles.listings.ebay.co...istingItemList http://66.70.130.84/T_lock_assembly.htm

04-04-2004, 11:53 AM	#8
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Installment # 1, (part two) Another good place to keep an eye on is behind small older strip centers with less than successful businesses within. Old style laundromats, bowling alleys, thrift stores, e.t.c. anywhere an old coot would have kept a vending machine inside, stubbornly clinging to his nickel, dime & quarter profits, resisting the advances of modern day vending services that might only offer him a portion of the cut. When these places finally go out of business, upgrade, or their machine dies, that’s your chance !....This is what is funny…When I started out on this endeavor, the first places that I called were my local soda pop distributors and bottling agents.. Absolutely no help at all as they are too greedy to let anything go, and whatever they encounter that is old or broke was promptly shipped off to auction. And another good source is various want-ads, classifieds, local newspapers, word-of-mouth, garage sales, flea markets (especially dirty, cheesy-type flea markets!), or anywhere !!! Tell everyone you know to start scouring for these machines… Networking is always a good idea and many eyes do quick work….but be ready to jump when the time is right !!!..Have the cash ready & available to display, but don’t be a chicken and never be afraid to offer a low price, even if you are sure your offer will be refused. When making such low offers, deciding factors are waving the cash in front of the seller”s nose, so he sees that you are serious, telling the seller that you will do the transaction today, and right now. These factors easily sway people and by putting them on the spot, the rush decisions they make are usually favorable to your wallet !!. Also, if you make an offer and are declined, immediately walk away and act like you are firm on your offer and are ready to buy elsewhere. Most times, you will be called back as everyone hates to see money walking away, and even if you happen to not be immediately called back, you could always leave your phone number and tell him that….”if you change your mind in the next day or two, call me”. And naturally, if you simply cant live without it, you can always return later and pay his price, but usually, these techniques have proven themselves successful for me over the years ...Decide in advance if you are firm on must having a free machine, or if you are comfortable spending a few dollars to buy one…. The nice thing about this project is that our donor can be dead, thus big savings !!! Once you investigate deeper, you will discover that you can actually buy fully functional older used machines for about fifty dollars on up, so my budget ceiling was $20.00 which was perfect for me… How much rust is too much rust ????....Good question, as rust is a bad thing, especially around guns !!... However, most of the time, exterior rust is just that, exterior rust. If the machine has been closed, and has the usual galvanized interior lining, interior rust usually is not present. Also, too much exterior rust will make your finished product look like a p.o.s., so tread carefully when selecting your donor, looking for the best example of overall condition with an inexpensive price tag to go with it. With my machine, the interior galvanized metal liner was kinda chalky, but in pretty good condition (even though I tore it up removing the vending rack like an idiot !). Although I plan to line the interior surfaces with plywood and/or fire rated panel, the original metal liner serves as a vapor barrier and as an additional security defense perimeter so usually a good scrubbing/buffing will make the liner shine in the event that you choose to not equip the interior of your machine with wood or fire stuff. Exterior damage is of no small concern either. A machine that is swelled & bloated badly is no good for our project, and severe external damage can be a no-no, especially if the door operation is affected, or the damage would compromise the overall security of your gun collection. Small dents, scrapes, faded paint, missing parts, e.t.c. shouldn’t be too bad, and any of the above items usually translates into an initially cheaper acquisition. Always keep in mind exactly what you want your gun stash to accomplish at the end of our project and always remember this…. “RUN YOUR PROJECT, DON’T EVER LET THE PROJECT RUN YOU !”. In closing this installment, I want to thank the many people who sent me e-mails. It is amazing how many people are really interested in doing this, but are reluctant to admit it, or simply want to keep their own project secret, thus adding to the eventual security of it. I try to be as thorough and comprehensive as possible, but I am not an expert at writing “how to” manuals, thus I may miss something, or perhaps you have a problem area, or simply don’t understand a specific area or technique. I will try to answer every e-mail with better descriptions and/or additional pics that will (hopefully) be of better help. Next installment: “Materials, tools and techniques needed”

04-05-2004, 05:41 PM	#10
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	I agree. This is well covered in upcoming installments, and keeping the frontal light functional, and plugged in would deter would-be theives. Fully functional coin slot, the can chute, buttons that push in, e.t.c. will add an air of authenticity (and security) to the project and these things are easy to accomplish. Thanks for your input and please keep these, any other good ideas coming in, as this project is very customizeable for each person, and is very helpfull. I will at the end, offer (for free) a CD_rom of the entire series, complete with all the photos that I couldnt post due to space hogging fears, to anyone who may want one, along with incorporating everyones thoughts and ideas into the mix for multiple options if and when anyone does do this type of project.... Its funny, I thought quite a bit before I even began this thing, and I thought I had it all figured out, but the original series of eight installments have now grown by a few more, as I really want to offer as much information as possible to the do-it-yourselfer (like me), and with good input from everyone interested, I shall add on all usefull ideas & information.

04-05-2004, 09:25 PM	#11
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Project: Guncoke “Materials, tools and techniques needed”: Basic simple hand & power tools are the name of our game, baby, and everyone seems to either have them, or knows somebody who does. This project is designed for the do-it-yourselfer home family handyman, so we must always keep in mind that this project revolves around affordability, and the concept of any average “Joe” being able to involve themselves successfully. A drill, a saw, a wrench or two, maybe a screwdriver, really not too much is involved tool wise. Those with a large selection of tools and with lots of experience using them will find this project goes quicker than someone who does not, but anyone should be able to pull this off nicely. Partial tool listing: Screwdrivers (good quality) Wrenches, Sockets, socket extension, & socket ratchet Wire cutters Electric power saw or jigsaw Drill or screw gun Measuring tape Utility knife Dremel tool (if needed to cut off stubborn fasteners when stripping the interior) :::::::::::Materials listing:::::::::::::::::::::::::: Plywood (thickness dependant upon what you are either able to scrounge, or what you can afford….I ended up using free ½ inch thick used crating plywood free from a furniture store…Other free supplies are warehouses, motorcycle dealers. Automobile glass suppliers, riding lawn mower sellers, or anywhere else they would use plywood for crates. Wood shops might also be willing to supply scraps large enough for the project…..ask em !!! My free plywood had some nails in it, and some screw holes, but go out and price brand new plywood….Its not cheap, thus the attraction of free…(any money you save now on materials can be applied later to other stuff that you cant seem to scrounge, or would prefer better quality than originally budgeted for)..Since I plan to cover this plywood on the inside with carpet, I wasn’t too concerned with a few holes & imperfections here and there. If you plan to stain & finish your interior, be more choosy about the quality. I decided to single layer this plywood, but if you want thicker, but can only obtain thin (for free) double or triple layer it up to achieve the sturdiness you seek. Fire lining material (if used)..I plan to use 1/4 inch thick fireboard, and I guess I will have to purchase this as I don’t know of any “free” supplies of this stuff. For me, fire protection is important, even if it isn’t the greatest, highest rated deal, as far as fire protection is concerned, use as much as possible, and always hope that it is never ever needed. I like ¼ inch thick, due to the fact that this stuff is somewhat challenging to fabricate with, and I can more easily double layer it thicker for ease of milling. My fire lining came in manageable sheets, and is the type used underneath fireplace hearths & other hi-temp areas… Ended up using construction adhesive to secure it into position as I wanted to keep any screw mounting holes through it from breaching its fire resistant protective capabilities. How efficient is this stuff ?,,,I don’t know, and I guess if you want to go overboard, you could always slap some asbestos into the mix, as long as you don’t mind getting excruciatingly painful lung cancer & the subsequent death involved, but I had to watch my budget….He77, if I wanted to spend a thousand dollars building this thing, I would have trotted my buns out and bought a pretty looking appropriate gun safe, so some degree of compromise must be reached, and respected. Hardware: Various screws, bolts, hinges, locks, & other misc. fasteners …Keep all fasteners from gutting process as they might come in handy later (free)… Even getting a good game plan before beginning building didn’t cut it with me and my project, thus I had several trips to the econo-hardware store to pick up more or better suited fasteners as time went on. One thing to keep in mind here is balancing your project’s initial budget with ending up with a finished product that is EXACTLY what satisfies your expectations. If you plan use any additional locks anywhere (I have several extra interior locking compartments) try to keep all the locks keyed alike to avoid the hassle of fumbling around with a big keychain wasting time trying to locate the appropriate key for whatever lock you want to open. Paint (for interior if needed) You may have some already, in half full cans laying around at your house, family’s houses, or friends houses (free!)…Found some, but not enough of any one particular flavor ????....Heres a tip….Mix them all together and end up with a useable quantity…(Im serious !)…remember…FREE is good.. The exterior of my donor machine wasn’t too bad and I decided not to do alter the exterior appearance for sake of fooling would-be gun thieves. I did paint certain interior areas as a measure of rust prevention, like the bottom compressor area below the long gun storage, which I plan to utilize for bulk ammo storage (in ammo cans). Metal: Scrap thin sheet metal pieces (available free from dumpsters behind home heating & cooling shops or in construction dumpsters on new home sites, e.t.c.) Use this to block off security breach areas, such as the coin slots, can dispensing chute, e.t.c. Carpet: scraps, available everywhere (free), for covering the interior if desired…Stay away from pet pi$$ soaked free carpet that people are throwing away, as it is YOUR guns that will be mingling with the sweet, delicious stench of animal feces and urine. You may even want to use carpet padding in essential locations under the carpet to add “softness”. Its not too hard to find brand new scraps & pieces from anywhere that new carpeting is being installed. He77, I was even able to locate enough suppliers to pick & choose quality and color !!! Hardwood: for making shelves, dividers, gun racks, e.t.c. and available everywhere….look for good condition free pallets or skids. Watch out for rough milled skid lumber as you will have to plane & sand extra to obtain “usability”. :::::::::::Techniques used::::::::::: Sawing: Whenever sawing anything, strike a penciled line to keep as straight of an edge as possible on your saw cuts. If you have access to a table saw with a fence, all the better. A table saw used for cutting, leaves a perfectly straight saw-cut line as opposed to a somewhat rough & wavy jig sawed cut line, however, if a jigsaw is the only choice available, you can get by with keeping the factory straight lines out in the front viewing area, and leave the rougher quality cuts to the rear or in places where you can overlap these poor quality appearance cuts with the factory milled perfectly straight edges. If you are going to paint, you can always caulk any rough corner seams, then, paint over this. For carpeted interiors, the carpet can hide a multitude of “sins”, so this wont be as big of an issue. If you want the plain plywood look for your final finish, cut your wood materials first then assemble inside the box in this order…. First, the top & bottom, then the sides, then the back. If you do it this way, you can slightly oversize the lengths of your cuts on the sides & back by about 1/8 inch and then “drive” (hammer) these into final position with the extra lengths sealing up & firming the corner areas. You will be able to get away with this as the foam insulation behind the galvanized sheet metal liner has some “give”. A good tip is that if you are using a jigsaw, cut your material upside down (flip it over on your sawhorses) and cut what will be the back area, as the bottom portion of the material cut is usually chip-free or even chip-less. If cutting metal, use the appropriate blade. For thick metal cuts, especially when gutting the interior, a saw-zall or Dremel with a metal cutting wheel is a good idea. If using a circular saw to cut plywood for your interior, the trick about jig saws and cutting upside down applies here also, but you can employ a “straight edge” (make sure its straight !) and clamp this straight edge down to the material you are cutting and then run your saw fence plate against the clamped on straight edge to facilitate more perfectly straight saw cut lines. Drilling & screwing: Drilling is closely dependant on exactly what and where you are drilling. If screwing off anything its sometimes best to pre-drill your holes with the proper sized bit. When needed, countersink your screw heads flush with any exposed surface. Professional countersinks ARE available, but a poor man’s counter sink is to pre-drill your hole (slightly smaller than the shank of the screw) then use a larger sized drill bit and drill a depression to permit flush-ness of the screw head. Use appropriate fasteners for long-term durability. Don’t use a wood screw if anchoring into metal, check your fasteners length so it doesnt “poke” through / out, use glues, silicones, e.t.c. when confident that you want the piece to stay… Better to infuse too much construction quality while building, than later discover that you didn’t use enough. Make your project last for a lifetime, even if only planning to use her for a few years….You can always sell the pig later when you buy an expensive professional gun safe. Measuring: Old rule here, and well known…”MEASURE TWICE, CUT ONCE !” If ever in doubt, cut it long, then slim it down for an exact fit after trying the piece in its intended position. Cant read a tape measure ??? ..This is a good way to learn ! Making it look nice inside: Not too much too say about the usual painting, caulking, sealing, carpeting, e.t.c. Do the best that you can, and you could also involve friends and family to do jobs you are unskilled at…Involve the wife & kids on a sunny weekend !! Let em paint, or scrub, he77, let the wife apply wallpaper, or fabric, or carpet…..Women are usually very patient & good at these activities due to the fact that they are skilled at folding & tucking. Every kid loves to take anything apart, and you can let them help gut the pig….besides, spending quality time with the wife & kids is an excellent bonding adventure, and when using friends, make it a party, & always drink lotsa suds to remain hydrated…. It is nice, however, to keep some chores all to yourself for some much needed “daddy’s private time”…. Good to go out and work on your machine to clear your head. You might want to be very, very selective about exactly who all will know about this project as “loose lips sink ships”….nuff said about that !. Electrics: Be very careful if using any of the factory electrics to help fool would-be-thieves, such as retaining the front display lights, circulation (anti-rust) fan, e.t.c. I wanted most of these space-hogging areas non-functional so that I could better apply them to more & more storage, so its up to you. I did end up using a smaller front light instead of the large factory unit thus all of my electrics are fresh & safe. Just don’t burn down your house (and find out how fire-proof it is) by having faulty electrics involved…Remember, one reason you got a free (or cheap) machine is that it was probably broken, somehow, somewhere. If wanted, the brand name front plexi-glass advertising panel could be retained and when lit, this simple decoy can prove to be most convincing to anyone not in the know. The actual light fixture in my machine was a simple fluorescent 2 bulb unit that runs on 110v, and could most easily be wired directly to a wall plug, thus giving the illusion that this gun locker is just an ordinary pop machine, and certainly not an armory. Fully investigate the integrity of the factory electrics BEFORE you plug anything in. Safety and Tool safety: For God’s sake, don’t hurt, maim, or kill yourself, or anyone else by doing ANYTHING unsafe (or stupid)…If in doubt, STOP!...When manipulating your machine’s position, use help when needed, don’t let it tip over on you and smash your brains out of your face in a bloody, gelatinous puddling ooze. Matter of fact, I suffered a plethora of deep cuts while working on stripping the liner out of my machine, a task I hated to do, but due to the initial damage caused by my blundering attempts at removing the can vending racks, and my subsequent discovery of a lot of hidden rust behind the liner , I ended up just trashing all the interior galvanized metal liner. As I have access (brother-in-law) to thin aluminum coil, used by roofers, vinyl siders, window installers, e.t.c. and his brake (used for shaping & bending it), I plan to install all new metal to act as the original galvanized metal liner did. This is probably a good thing, as I discovered that my factory liner had significant rusting on its back side, against the hard foam insulation, and I don’t want any rust anywhere, so I tore it out (resulting in tissue damage & volcanic eruptions of my own plasma !)… Problems: You will encounter problems…Hopefully, if I have done my job, you wont have too many, and when you hit a trouble spot, stop, step back, take a break. Most times, a fresh approach the next day reveals options previously undiscovered. If your problem is tool related, ask the pros. If it’s a fit / finish problem, don’t get mad and try to beat it into position or submission. You will just have to fix the damage YOU caused later !.. If it’s a design problem, get more info from the internet, go to a gun store and casually “browse” their safes, or try out your different options, even going as far as making cheap cardboard “templates” of whatever component you are wrestling with….Sometimes these mock-ups will solve your original problem and give you a different feel or look regarding your design and work out other potentially upcoming problems.….Cardboard is free, you can always pick up used boxes behind shopping centers, stores, e.t.c., and it’s a darn good idea to make a template of the overall size of your finished product and use this to make sure it will fit where you plan to put it, through doorways, around corners, up & down steps, e.t.c. I ended up using a lot of cardboard boxes….A lot of them ! Next installment: “How to strip the interior & remove the door”…..This is where the fun begins and we get busy actually working on your machine, instead of reading thousands and thousands of my blathering non-sensical words. Playtime is over, gentlemen…….

04-06-2004, 07:45 PM	#14
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Prongs....good point about the paint mixing....shows what an idiot I am regarding paint !...Sometimes, trying to stretch dollars too much is a bad idea...I shall include your contribution to the final cd rom if you dont mind, and I look forward to any/all suggestions, tips, ideas regarding anything to do with this project that you and everyone else can offer to make this post usefull.......

04-08-2004, 03:58 PM	#15
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Auxillary post #1 From time to time, I shall endeavor to add supplimentary information in what I title "auxillary posts".. This info can range anywhere from odd stuff that doesnt seem to fit in any paticular installments to cost tallies, to just a post to add a few more pictures into the mix... Todays info is a cost tally plus my new lock pics... I will cover the entire subject of locks & locking your machine in my usual blathering, lengthy, sleep-causing diatribe in an upcoming installment already penned, however, the ease of refitting my machine with a fresh, new, high security "T" handle suprised me and this quick projectwas perfect for todays unexpected sunny warm Ohio weather and resulted in no personal bodily injury (rare)! Costs sustained thus far... $20.00 for machine $29.96 for complete factory front locking assembly Total $ 49.96 A few pics of this new lock assembly below.... One last thought.... Due to the ever-increasing additions of more & more pics, loading times for this thread may increase exponentially, but rest assured that I resize all pics down, to assist in more expedient loading....Please be patient...

04-09-2004, 11:00 AM	#17
charger0122 SUMBITCH!! Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: georgia Posts: 1,458	just be careful about moving the machine mine about broke my back when it fell on me.the gun dispenser is a good idea i keep my homemade wine in mine it gets a little colder than my fridge and i can lock it up

04-09-2004, 11:47 AM	#18
Richard Simmons Registered User Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: VA Posts: 20,084	The paint if for the interior of the machine. I believe he is leaving the exterior, except for replacing the large light with a smaller one as is. __________________ With a brain you are prepared for LIFE. With a brain and a gun you are prepared to LIVE.

04-09-2004, 05:41 PM	#19
John Lapin Registered User Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Northern New Mexico, on the border of Colorado Posts: 242	Great Idea. Thanks for the suggestion. Never would have thought of that in 100 years. Opened up a world of possibilities. Thinking outside the box. You'r hired!!!! __________________ "Freedom, I like the sound of that", John Wayne from his movie "The Alamo" 1959 "Poor New Mexico, so far from Heaven, so close to Texas", Governor Manuel Armijo, circa 1841 "All calculations based on our experiences elsewhere fail in New Mexico". Territorial Governor Lew Wallace, circa 1881, author of "Ben-Hur, A Story of Christ"/ Accused So-Called "Left Liberal"

04-09-2004, 05:42 PM	#20
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Project: Guncoke “How to strip the interior & remove the door”. [PART ONE] Before beginning this installment, several of you have e-mailed me or posted threads with a few additional suggestions that are helpful to our project, such as where you might also be able to procure a donor machine, and these are listed in no particular order… Run-down crappy used car lots that have failed, or are in the process of doing so….Behind small time pizza shops, old gas stations, auto body shops that are less than successful, also, check local salvation army & goodwill thrift stores. As a new thing, I will post all suggestions received regarding previous installments at the beginning of the next segment, this way, we can more easily stay well informed & current about all options….. o.k., then, lets move on, shall we ??..(RS, you are correct) O.K., Its time to lighten your pig up for transport & rebuild…. Thoroughly look her over, inside & out. All machines are kind of the same….They all seem to be built as an exterior box with door, then they have interior vending components, coin mechanisms, and a refrigeration unit with its sub assemblies. While looking her over, you are looking for how these interior parts are fastened to the shell. Also, while looking her over, inventory its condition, weaknesses, what it will need, repairs, e.t.c. However these interior parts are fastened, they will have to be un-fastened.. There usually isn’t any way to “bully” these out without removing the fasteners…..believe me, I tried, and almost ruined my machine. One thing I found was that virtually all fasteners used on my machine were one of three different sizes/types…. #1 = Phillips head sheet metal screws, #2 = 3/8/ inch head lags…#3 = 5/8 inch head bolts holding the compressor into position. Everything inside & out was either #1 or #2….most convenient ! Remove the door. All doors are removable (hopefully!) so examine the hinge areas both top & bottom. My machine has the top hinge fastened to the shell with five bolts. Three of these are lags that screw down into the box from up top, and are easily removable. The other two are security carriage bolts, with no actual top head to hold (so thieves cant rob the machine simply by removing the door easily) and a square type recessed head into the square-ish plate hole. One on my machine tried to be real funny and began to strip and turn..This is because the underneath nut had rusted to the bolt, so I used medium sized vice-grips to grab hold of the upper rounded head and was then able to proceed. This setup is common and is, of course, designed so that anyone interested in breeching the security measures of the machine by simply removing the door, would have to be able to access the interior to do so. A small metal plate covered the access hole inside for me to be able to gain access to the two nuts inside on the security carriage bolts up top. This thin plate was held into position by a small Phillips sheet metal screw. The bottom hinge was simply lagged down into the bottom with two 3/8 inch lags, easily removed with the door open. All of this info is wonderful, as long as you have access to the inside of your machine, such as it being unlocked or you have a key… If not, then sooner or later you are going to have to either call a locksmith, or break into it. I read a thorough and comprehensive internet post somewhere on how to do this without causing severe damage, but at the time, I wasn’t planning on recording this entire how-to saga, thus I didn’t save it, and now I regret it as it was quite complete, but I did do some sniffing around and got some info on this subject… I will try to locate more and include it in the “Completion” installment but for now, heres a few tidbits on the subject (authors unknown)… QUOTE... Posted: April 04 2004,11:56 "I don't remember seeing an earlier thread on this but have done the procedure and it's pretty simple. I have a 1976 Cavalier C6 machine with the same lock you are describing...Take a look at the lock assembly. Looking dead-on into the ring-slot (where the key would fit) with a good light source (like a snake light, etc.) you should see the ends of 7 brass pins. They are equally spaced around the ring-slot. Use a drill with a small drill bit (small enough to fit into the ring-slot) and drill out each pin. Being brass they'll drill pretty easily. Once all seven are drilled the rectangular face piece of the lock should pop out. Sometimes it may require a small amount of assistance by a flat screwdriver or other prying device but shouldn't take hardly any effort to pop it out. If it doesn't easily pop then one or more of the pins are still in place. Re-drill each until you get the lock to pop. It took me about 20 minutes the first time I did it but I was going slow and being careful not to damage anything other than the pins. Once you pop the lock, replace the "innards" (good southern word) with a new lock assembly purchased from any lock-smith. Usually around $15.00 and comes with two keys. Let me know if you need more help." END QUOTE.... ********************************** QUOTE "Lock and Key assembly....$8.95 - If you need to remove the old lock from your machines and know the key Number, we can match the number. If not, you will either have to drill the lock out, have a locksmith open it, or break the colored (maroon, green) body and unscrew the center rod to separate the machine." END QUOTE... This one is from a nefarious anti-social website, but may be helpful… QUOTE... "There are basically only two ways to get into vending machines without a key. Through the lock, or directly. LOCKS You can always try and pick the lock, using the standard method. The only problem with that is that there are usually at least eight settings, so you have to pick it three or four times to get the cylinder to travel enough to open the lock. That can be entirely too time consuming and generally not worth it. So, here are some better methods for opening a lock without picking it. It can be very easy to get into tubular locks or very hard, depending on how cheap the lock is. Gematic-type: cheap as hell locks. Their main weakness is that the cam (small piece of metal on the back of the lock designed to hold the cylinder in place) is held on by a single, small, weak-threaded screw. Most of the time the cam is also only an aluminum alloy. To defeat this type of lock, you can use a tubular key. File it down so that only the pin that sticks up from the cylinder is left and when inserted into a lock it rotates freely, but you can't pull it out. Attach a chain to the key, then wrap the chain around a bar of some sort. Yank hard. Voila! Cam either comes completely off or is bent to hell, open sesame. Ace-type: somewhat more expensive, better secure. The cam is held on by a nut over a larger bolt-type end. This makes it mainly pull-proof. However, the lock is only coated in carbon steel. Beneath that millimeter thin layer of hard metal there is only a nickel alloy. Insert a small drill bit into the cross section where the key slot meets the circular opening and go at it. After you get past the hard metal, the rest will give like soft cheese. Keep drilling until either the cylinder falls out, or you drill right through the lock and through the bolt in the end of the lock. It only takes me about five minutes to do this with a hammer drill. American-type: you can tell these locks from the others by the fact that the face is completely flush. Instead of a tubular cylinder, these locks rely on a set of pins on the key, mounted at irregular depths. The face is drill-proof. These things are the Fort Knox of locks, if you see one you're pretty much XXX trying to open it without a key. So, on to the next method! DIRECT Let's not kid ourselves here. We're not trying to get into these things for the aesthetic value of the job. We want the stuff inside. C'mon, you want to try to dump salt water into these things, thinking it will completely ruin the machine and only work part of the time? I'm guessing we're not all that concerned with the well-being of the machine in question. Face it, this is a grab-and-go job. So xxxxth lock, let's just get in. Almost every single vending machine has the T-bar locking system. This means there's a steel bar traveling the length of the machine, securing the door at the top, bottom and side directly next to the lock, opposite the hinge. This is a pretty good system. It doesn't work against someone determined to get in. Why? Because the point where the locking bar intersects with the machine's walls may be steel, but it's only about a quarter inch thick. Bring a prybar and a hammer. Unplug the machine. Climb on top of it. Track where the locking bar intersects with the roof by going in a line straight up from the lock. Insert the prybar (you might have to hammer it down in) about an inch to the side of that position, toward the hinge. Pry the sucker open. Once you've got the top open, you can see where the locking bar goes into the side, pry that open too. From there you can yank the door open and grab anything you want. A successful break-in to a vending machine should take less than three minutes. Doing it this way also doesn't damage the machine enough to make it unusable. In fact, it takes less than five minutes of welding to fix, thus the vending company loses very little... some product and a couple hundred dollars is chump change compared to the $7000 it costs for the machine. If you don't trash the machine, there's less of a chance the company will follow up on busting you for breaking into it." END QUOTE... Im going to stop pasting these tips about now as after doing various inquiries to most internet search engines, the info about breaking into these machines appears to be bad mojo….There are a lot of sites dedicated to illegal activities, but I think that including some of this stuff may be helpful as long as it is used for good….never evil !!!!!! (Please go to “How to strip the interior & remove the door”. [PART TWO]

04-09-2004, 06:02 PM	#21
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Project: Guncoke “How to strip the interior & remove the door”. [PART TWO] This brings us to an important point… What if there is a lock, but the door is open ??... What if the is a big gaping void where someone vandalized the machine in order to steal its riches (2 or 3 dollars in change) ???.... Vending machines are pretty well designed to protect against theft, but they do have some weaknesses. Remember, these things do sit alone, all the time, in all areas without guards, so they must be theft deterring in order to remain productive.. There are also ways to considerably beef up the factory locks with a few add-ons, which we will cover in teeth-grittingly boring detail later upon the completion segments…. Additionally, the internet has thousands of vending lock sites that offer virtually everything you could ever want vending machine lock-wise, but since my machine was already open and missing the lock, I ended up using my local locksmith for my replacement parts need..(see auxillary post #1) These guys do this stuff for a living, and they should be able to outfit you with new locks or lock assemblies even if you drilled out your existing lock to gain entry… Use extra caution if you do have to break in so that you can easily return the locking system to its factory state, even if planning on adding some of the well made auxiliary vending locks that are available on the market..These offer factory looks and blend right in, and are easily installed as they are flush mounts and seem to be idiot proof (we’ll see !)…The ones I am looking at mount at the opening side and coupled with the original front mount lock, should beef up our locking duties nicely. I definitely want to stay away from anything suspicious looking like the typical padlock & hasp that might make a would be thief give this ol coke machine a good looking over….Keep it as demure looking as possible, because Mr. Thief can just keep on trucking right on by my gun collection without a second thought. Remove the refrigeration components…. The compressor was bolted down to the floor in the very bottom area of my machine with two 5/8 inch bolts, with the nuts welded to the floor plate, and after removing these bolts, the compressor unit slid out from the front on a type of tray. The evaporator (radiator?) was screwed to the walls inside the upper opening, directly below the can vending racks. Remove all cooling system mounting hardware and be careful not to puncture any of the lines as inhaling Freon is a big no-no !! The way my machine was set up was that the entire cooling system could be removed together, without having to dis-assemble any of the lines. As far as the factory electrics are concerned, you will have to do something to the electrical subsystem in order to separate the door from the body, and my machine Had large bundles of wires and fat “looms” that contained them.. I simply just cut through them as I had no need for any of the electrical sub assemblies. You may want to retain the factory product light for theft-deterrent reasons (throw thieves off the trail) or you may not…Its your choice. I was, at first, going to set it up so that I could plug in the factory light fixture to light up the front Coke plexi-glass bezels, but then I decided that this light area could be better used for pistol and ammo storage as it is a generous sized region, and we will cover how to make this area more secure in future installments if so desired... I ended up using a smaller "slimline" fixture here...Same illumination as the factory, and runs cooler which is good for this area being used for pistol & ammo storage, and is significantly smaller, thus more storage space yeild with the original functionality of the big ol "COKE" that draws thirsty patrons from miles away to the machine, much like an unholy beacon which beckons to soda-addicts like the sirens of yore. Also, if you can sell off any of the electrical or cooling components, use better caution than I did in order to keep the value / sell-ability of these items… I knew I wasn’t going to sell off anything, so that gave me license to speed things up considerably and I could hack & tear out at will….. Im glad that I decided to use a more smaller, thinner lighting fixture behind the advertising bezels, that way, I enjoy a delicious compromise between keeping up machine functional-ness looks and having my much needed door storage areas. When you see how much storage is available between the front of the inner door and the auxiliary middle door, one can become space greedy, and I plan to add extra locks to secure this middle door to the actual front door for an extra measure of security. This middle door is somewhat thin, but could be beefed up to accommodate racks mounted on either (or both) sides to hold pistols, ammo, e.t.c….Something to consider when we sail into the “interior design” installment… One thing to keep in mind is to carefully examine all the crap that you strip out of your machine for material that you can use later…. For example, there was a galvanized metal “box” that protected the evaporator (radiator?) inside the main area below the can vending racks, and this box was open on both ends…..It was held into position by a couple of Phillips head sheet metal screws and after removing this, you may want to keep it instead of trashing it because it can be used in a few different areas later, such as cutting it in half width-wise and using one of the pieces to screw off in front of the can drop door to prevent unauthorized intrusions into the inner door sanctum… additional cut down pieces can also be utilized for closing off the coin change return chute, bottle opener hole, behind the push buttons, e.t.c. The soda can vending rack on my machine was a bear to remove, and unfortunately, I missed two essential fasteners that were semi-hidden, thus I almost completely ruined my inner metal liner. This vending rack is EXTREMELY HEAVY !!. Removing it lightened up my donor machine by about three or four hundred pounds and was cleverly secured through its back using two lags that went through the rear liner and into a steel reinforcing plate hidden behind the liner….I looked and looked and looked, but I could never see these fasteners until I had manhandled the rack out a little, (bending the he77 out of my liner) and that’s when I discovered them. From initial inspection, there was no visible lags anywhere, but after attempting to tear out this rack, I found that near the center, rear of the rack, you could easily remove the thin backing strips of the soda can holding bins at the rear of the vending rack, thus enabling you to see the two lags and remove them…. After discovering them and their subsequent ease of removal, I felt like an a$$, and almost screwed up my project before it really began. My vending can rack was also positioned into the cavity of the shell, raised about ten inches off the floor by four flat metal legs.. These legs were only attached to the walls of the shell, and not to the vending can rack itself, thus they were simply propping the vending can rack up tight against the ceiling. These flat legs were somewhat tough to remove. They were fastened through the walls of the liner into backing plates, much like the back of the vending can rack, and there is no way to chisel, pry or force them off, or use any crowbars behind without ruining your liner. Take your time, you need to carefully remove these legs. Mine were held on with the usual combo of 3/8 inch head lags and phillips head sheet metal screws. The two rear ones were especially difficult to remove as there wasn’t much clearance to turn tools in the corner area. A lot of patience is in order here, and I found helpful was a PROPER sized screwdriver with a vice-grips clamped onto the screwdriver handle, thus giving me more leverage to POP them loose in this tight area…..DO NOT STRIP THE HEADS OF ANY OF THESE FASTENERS !....Once you are able to “POP” them loose to begin with, then they turn most agreeably thereafter. You may want to break out the dremel for a wee bit o grinding on any of these fasteners that you have difficulty with...Much faster than stripping your fingers & knuckles raw to the alarming sight of fresh bloody meaty bone......Its good to remove the door first, then remove the can vending rack as the thick door wont be in the way of sliding the rack out of the opening… One other good piece of advice is to think carefully about which position you want the machine to be in when removing these components (upright, on its back, on its side, e.t.c.)….I left the machine sitting upright to remove the door and the cooling components, then laid my machine on its side to remove the can vending rack. Next installment: “Can I actually recover money by selling used interior parts ??”

04-10-2004, 10:25 PM	#22
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Auxillary post # 2 Here’s some pics of the factory lighting set up….top pic is of the outside looking in at the lighting & coin changer sub-component area doors (closed). Although these doors are thin, they do possess rigidity thus they shall survive the strip-out nicely. Once relieved of their back-breaking thankless burdens, a variety of possibilities now become known, and initial interior designing concepts are beginning to swim uncontrollably in my head, much like the talking dog who advised Mr. Davy Berkowitz to perform his monstrously savage acts of destruction, but we shall endeavor to focus our energies on gentle acts of creation…… As you can see, this pic reveals the actual factory lighting fixture door in the open position… One can most readily imagine how the simple substitution of a smaller slim-line lighting fixture shall yield generously ample storage space, cooler operating temperatures, and less interior fire risk. Above, we see another view of the same… It is written that one should employ either a heating element, or a light in a gun safe as this assists in retarding the interior humidity that can cause rusting…It is also advised that you should employ these devices near the bottom of a gun safe, as the rising hot air shall circulate around your guns (see outdoor life / J.Carmicheal column this month)..This may be a good idea, but another excellent idea is to be able to see the interior of your gun locker, all the more made brighter by some type of light, to aid tired old eyes (like mine) in the selection of that days gun choice, and fumbling around in the dark may have worked for Helen Keller, et. al., but it doesn’t cut it with me. I need to see !! Testing shall prove whether my slimline front COKE light will provide enough spare illumination to brighten up all interior areas for ease of viewing. If not, we shall have to incorporate addition means of luminosity. And finally (thank god?) is a close-up of the original factory twin bulb fluorescent lighting fixture which resides directly behind the front plexiglass “COKE” advertising display panel… This fixture is typical of the time period, with clunky ballasts, and fluorescent starters, and is time proven to be somewhat reliable. Although the starters & ballasts are subject to maintenance, especially given that these machines usually were plugged into non-surge protection type electrical outlets, and I imagine that there has been an old soda machine or two that when struck by lightening, fried itself completely, yet the design that incorporates subsystems, should have been an easy rebuild, with minimum tools. Why was it so necessary to extrapolate this info in mind-numbing detail ??? …..Because I wanted to share these pics to better help you understand upcoming installments regarding the pistol & ammo inner door storage areas, and how much real estate the factory light pigs up, and also, the factory subcomponent access doors that I hope to retain as an additional measure of security (which shall require the installation of locks) and these doors will assist in keeping door stored items in their respective positions. Heres a Saturday night “teaser” pic (below)…. As you all know, I am several installments ahead (in terms of my project’s construction status) of what is currently being posted, and I do this for various reasons… The main one being that any feedback, suggestions, ideas, e.t.c., that you all contribute, can be applied, & tested before you read about that particular area (when possible) and this is just such an event… For example, it has been suggested recently that the incorporation of “rope” lighting may solve a few dilemmas I am having, so I have been keeping an eye out for rope “donor” lighting cable. This cable will solve a few problems, especially in regards to lighting up the Coke plexiglass advertising panel, but I don’t want to lose inner door storage space. By trimming down the depth of the pistol & ammo storage component directly behind the COKE panel by 3/4 inch, I am now able to route lengths of this “rope” lighting between the wood back of this door storage box and the plexiglass ad panel. Long term testing has shown that this rope lighting runs nice & cool, thus my machine wont erupt in a fiery he77-sparked inferno of pistol & ammunition fueled flames making me cry like a doting mother of a pre-teen , upon discovering a birthday party invitation in her son’s underwear drawer to the Never-land ranch. How much for the rope lighting, J.T., you may ask….???...After all, we have a final budget to keep in mind, and we cant just fly off and buy any trinket who’s shiny appearance catches our eye (and our fancy), now can we ?... As luck would have it, today was a very windy day here, and I spent most of it working on my machine, and trying to keep my nosy neighbor from crashing the party….. This guy is a bit of a snob, and when he saw me off-loading the Coke machine into my garage a few weeks ago, he directed some cleverly snide remarks my way about how I am an entertaining “junkman” who never fails to amuse & delight him with my schemes…. Junkman, I may be, especially in the heat of a battle, such as this project, but I refuse to entertain this a$$hole, so myself & my supporting cast, dedicated the day to replenishing our nearly exhausted hydration levels, via another type of adult canned beverage, and our boisterously loud behavior drove Mr. Snooty inside to be amongst his equals ( inbred halfwit wife & kids), but a little later, when my happy group discovered that our supply of suds had dwindled to an alarmingly low level, we trotted on down to the nearest drive-thru and purchased hydration aids, and while there, I spied the owner removing a couple of thick cardboard beer advertising displays that the wind wreaked havoc with today…. These two displays had ¾ inch diameter rope lighting around the perimeter, and around the product logos, thus giving these cheap advertising aids a “neon-ish” appearance, and each was about 2 foot by 4 foot in size. I inquired about what he planned to do with them and he informed me that they were headed to the dumpster.. So I ended up with two twenty foot long sections of high-brightness ¾ inch diameter rope lighting for free !!!...Self contained, brilliantly bright, and best of all, very affordable… As for Mr. Next-door-neighbor clown, this guy is so snobbish, and carries his nose pointed so far into the air, that he should have flashing red lights installed on it so airplanes don’t slam into his face.. Oh, and for the “teaser” tag used two paragraphs above, it merely describes an out-of-sequence photo posted ahead of its respected installment, thus hopefully stimulating obviously dwindling levels of audience enthusiasm levels for this project.

04-14-2004, 08:20 PM	#23
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Project: Guncoke Major setback #2 “What the he77 do you mean, the gun dont fit ?” This is a new department, and it shall subsequently titled “Major setback”… You all know about my first setback, and that was when I caused significant interior damage to the galvanized sheet metal liner by going berserk, trying to thrash the can vending rack out, not knowing about the two “hidden” retention bolts that held said rack in. I bypassed this setback by justifying the removal of the liner due to b.s. rust worries, and I moved right along….This really wasn’t a “true” major setback, something along the lines of derailing the entire forward momentum of the whole project, per se, and so I was able to salvage the galvanized sheet metal floor (with the drain) and just tore out the two side walls, the back, and the ceiling, leaving exposed hard foam insulation. I was going to use this to our advantage by employing the same principles of a vacum bottle (thermos) to the interior by sandwiching insulation and fire retardant board in between an outer metal shell, and the interior plywood, thus perhaps giving some measurable degree of fire proofing. At least that was the idea, and it sounded real good, especially after ripping the flesh off my hands in a bloody, drunken carnage….. Soon, everything was back on schedule, and progress being made, sutures finally removed, and my wounds healed (flesh, but not my mental wounds!)… Decided it would be a fine idea to play with some interior design concepts the other day, as I only had an hour or so to kill, not enough time to really accomplish much of anything, and I was experiencing mental-block when it came to picturing final upright gun position placement, so I decided to employ the aid of some props (guns) to help get a “feel” for what I wanted to end up with. My oldest son was stupid enough to be in my vicinity at the time, so I barked off an order to fetch me a gun, so I could prop it up inside, and maybe do some experimental tracing… The buffoon came back with what is probably the most obnoxious gun in my collection, an old AR with about twenty five pounds of #$%& hanging off it (various lights, lasers, vert grips, scopes, radios, washing machine, e.t.c.) and due to its bulky size and shape, I grew agitated with the boy for bringing me the least likely universally shaped long gun, that would be useable for tracing, and besides, the thing is too short to be used in comparison to the overall average length of the rest of my guns, so I politely requested (by bellowing rude obscenities) that he come back with just a shotgun, a regular old shotgun, any old shotgun, JUST BRING ME A #$%&ING REGULAR SHOTGUN !.... Well, he finally did bring me back a shotgun, and as I had now moved to working on the rear of the machine, I told him to prop it up inside and see how it looks… That’s when I heard his timid, quivering, shaky, scared voice (he is 23 yrs. old) meekly inform me that.. “dad, the gun don’t fit !” “WHAT THE HE77 DO YOU MEAN, THE GUN DON’T FIT???” I scrambled around to the front, and sure enough, the gun is too long, and it certainly wont fit between the floor and the ceiling, seems to be about a half inch too long……. O.K. Time for a cold bottle of life-sustaining “happy juice” (beer) as I try to figure out exactly how in the world I broke my own cardinal rule, one of the first suggestions offered to you all, at the beginning of our installments, namely, “carefully size out potential donor machines”….. What went wrong ???..Too much drinkie, and not enough thinkee ???... Here’s the scoop, and how I pulled this project back from the brink of ruin… As it was, the shotgun my son dutifully retrieved for me happened to be his grandfathers, and it is an oldie…. It runs about ten feet long, and it was my father’s first shotgun, passed down to me when I became of age, and it has been passed down another generation since my grubby paws caressed it lovingly, and will bog down my grandson (if I ever get one !) for when he graduates to his first 12 gauge, thus this crappy, no-finish, club is the longest gun in my collection by almost four inches !..This thing has so much family mileage, that I actually felt relieved when my son outgrew its usefulness to him, and I “stole” it back for family safekeeping until needed next !.. It may be valueless to anyone other than a male family member, and certainly laughable to any would-be-thief, but I couldn’t ever live with myself if I didn’t keep it as safe as possible & amongst friends, so I just couldn’t bring myself to excluding it from the mix, even if it is waaaaaay too long (and ugly)….. Change of plans time…… (dad, are you sure you just don’t want me to keep this old thing at my house ???)…. NO ! Here’s my first (and hopefully last) serious design change, and it really isn’t too bad. You might not even have to employ this to your project, due to machine size, or your own gun collection length, and I certainly apologize for not thinking this project through with more intelligence….Sorry ! Out comes the galvanized sheet metal floor, and out comes the 2+ inch thick hard foam underlying insulation. These changes to plan adds about 2 ½ inches to the available interior height, and plenty to now be able to nestle “ol ironsides” in with the others…..Calculating finished interior sizes including carpet, fireboard, and plywood, this pig should have about a half inch to an inch to spare….Pretty close, I know, I hate to lose the sub-floor insulation, but my options are somewhat limited, thus I have little choice but to cheerfully digest these compromises…. Thankfully, I own no other gun close to this one’s length, and I guess I could have broken her down, and taken the barrel off for storage, and then there would have been no problem, but I am kinda pi$$ed off at myself for not calculating better, and I like all of them standing upright, and proper attention, ready to serve at a moments notice, so these are my changes, reluctantly (but dutifully) submitted with an embarrassed chagrin. There will be no photos submitted with this post, although my son did take a few of “dad” boiling over into a frothing, seething rage, while he mocked and openly laughed at my inability to properly plan out such a simple and uncomplicated endeavor, such as our little Coke gun locker…. Next installment, we return to proper form with.. “Can I actually recover money by selling used interior parts ??”

04-14-2004, 08:52 PM	#24
Arebelson Registered User Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: Southern US- Dixie-Georgia Posts: 160	Solver think you might come up with a nice "cover" with / for something like the item displayed on this link ? http://www.gun-racks.com/ Just thinking........

04-14-2004, 10:20 PM	#25
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	These rotary racks are very nice indeed, and the upcoming installment titled "Interior design concepts" covers the weaknesses and strengths of them in detail, although the subject content is limited to how a rotary rack applies to our project.. Please jump in and post your opinions and evaluation after you get yours for all of us to share, as this info will be helpfull to anyone following the project...I can blather on and on about my specific gun locker, and I sometimes worry that I handicap this project but not offering a better organized train of thought, and more helpfull ideas, links, solutions, but in order to properly cover the subject comprehensively, anyone/everyone should add their 2 cents worth as we all can benefit from additional thoughts, ideas, suggestions, etc. so please chime in as much as possible and thanks for the helpfull link.

04-16-2004, 10:55 PM	#26
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Project: Guncoke “Can I actually recover money by selling used interior parts ??” The brief answer to this question is “YES”!!.... Again, the restoration forums are an excellent place to sell off, or even offer any of the crap you stripped out during gutting. You may even want to offer the stuff on e-bay, flea markets, e.t.c., although I am not up to date on sales & shipping rules regarding this site….Protect yourself if selling, always describe the item honestly, and if you are unsure if it works or not, say so in your item description and always make sure to offer a competitive price, unless you want to sit on a bunch of crap forever, instead of building your project ! Some items are in high demand, and some items are in high demand simply because they are old, hard-to-find, or are known “maintenance nightmare” items. Also, Im not sure about the regulations of shipping refrigeration components, especially complete systems due to possible toxicity of the Freon contained within. I see all the time how people post “want ads” on various soda pop collectable vending machine message boards, wanting this or that…. Good place to post your sale stuff….FOR FREE !!! (see links in installment #1, part one). The highest demand item seems to be the bill validators and coin changers, sorter mechanisms, e.t.c. I recovered a few dollars worth of change out of my machine’s coin sorter, and I suppose this is a testimonial to the utter stupidity of certain lambs that plague our planet like some type of unholy locust……I cant help but to wonder exactly why the previous owner of my machine didn’t harvest this loose change, as the door was open, beckoning to the filthy, greedy masses to “come and reap bounty”, but perhaps the thought never occurred to him or the thousands of school kids that walked right past this machine on a daily basis to their school not half a block away…. Who knows, maybe your machine will be an old one, and the change that YOU harvest will be of some numismatic collector value…Old bottle caps ??? Old soda cans or bottles ??...are these valuable to collectors ??? As described earlier, the complete refrigeration subsystem removed from my machine as a completely contained unit, and if you know that your machine cools and does not “short cycle”, then your reefer may just be sellable. If your electrics are in good shape and operational, you may even be able to part out whatever you don’t plan to keep. Of course, the very oldest machines are in high demand, and since my machine was built in 1979, it doesn’t qualify for the antique super-collectable category, however, I did throw a few posts here and there, just sniffing the winds, and I had a few folks jump right back wanting my stuff, so you never know !!! My machine originally was slated for it to be a glass bottle dispensing unit, and has the bottle cap opener built into the front, but had the can conversion vending rack installed. As I previously discussed, this sob was beefy and from perusing the vending forums, certain can conversion racks are of great interest, even more so to the guy who wants a pop machine in his rec room, and the machine he buys is the variety that dispenses bottles (no longer available here in Ohio), so maybe you sell off the rack for a few bucks…… As far as real time selling is involved, I am currently in negotiations with three interested parties regarding my coin changer that was in my machine. It is a COINCO model 9200 and is very much in demand and quite sellable as it is in good, useable condition. I did end up trashing my reefer assembly which was stupid as it functioned fine, but I was in a hurry to get started on rebuild…. Next installment: Inside design concepts”

04-17-2004, 07:57 PM	#27
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Auxilary post # 3 (I shall try to keep these aux posts brief and without pictures) Here is a quickie auxiliary post, and the idea was recently submitted to me by e-mail. I encounter some folks who are reluctant to post thoughts or suggestions fearing that the idea in question may be considered “stupid” or “unusable”, or fear thread “hijacking”, and I understand these concerns, however, every idea and comment IS VERY RELEVANT to the overall scheme of this project, so please don’t be afraid to chime in. If still reluctant after reading these most comforting words of encouragement, then by all means, continue to e-mail me, but I fear that you may lose the community pride happy feelings that result from tossing in your 2 cents. This isn’t just my project, it’s OUR project available to all, for all, and by all. I have stated many times that I fear that I am a poor author and that you folks may find my words regarding this project to be less than entertaining, however, I do try to at least get the gist of the concept related to you with the most information, the least amount of useless babbling, and hopefully have answered most questions with my own demented observations. I also try to assign credit where credit is due, and listed below is a recently submitted suggestion. For a quick hidden extra ammunition storage area, especially if space is at a premium, take innocuous looking case boxes of canned soda, and stack them on top of the machine…. This does a few things…. It adds an air of authenticity to the below glowing “Coke” machine, as any pop vending unit certainly must require periodic refills, and it also gives a good place to warehouse less valuable gun related items, such as ammo, slings, parts, e.t.c. It also gives more central weight to the machine, helpful in keeping it authentic feeling and less likely to be accidentally bumped, then the subsequent discovery by Mr. thief that this coke machine isnt a coke dispensing machine after all. If you use the flat style canned case box, which is available for free anywhere, and is the type that consists of a bottom and half sides of cardboard (with Coke, Pepsi, 7-up, e.t.c. logo lettering) and create a shell out of empty cans along the three consecutive sides, which leaves a center hidden zone that offers ample storage space. These fake cases of Coke can be stacked on top of each other, on top of the machine, thus presenting the illusion of extra canned soda waiting to be employed inside during your next pop machine restocking !! (VERY CONVINCING) True, these hidden regions aren’t really secure, but no thief would mess around and try to steal warm cases of canned beverage, especially if these cases were of an unpopular variety, especially more so if unpleasant in taste. Apply beads of dark caulking or silicone between each of these dummy “frontal view” cans on the back sides to eliminate light peering through, thus alerting all to the fact that these cases of pop are simply “dummies”. Also, this sealing shall assist in keeping the cans in place, preventing shifting. Where I have my machine placed, (yes, its done and currently being used !) I have room for eight cases (2 stacks of 4 side-by-side) of these dummies on top of my machine under the ceiling, and a cool disguise is to make the fronts of these cases dusty, dirty, and old-ish. These four cases conceal various bulk ammo, most of which is sealed in rubberized battle packs (.308cal Port) Next installment we get back on track with… “Inside design concepts”…..

04-18-2004, 10:37 PM	#28
SOLVER Registered User Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 77	Project: Guncoke “Inside design concepts”….. Its your choice exactly how you want the inside of your machine to be designed….Be smart !!!...look at other “real” gun safes and their design…..steal ideas !!!...measure and make notes of what you like & don’t like about these other safes you inspect….Do you want pistol storage ???....Ammo storage ???....gear storage ?? Optics storage ?? Magazines storage ???...if so, how much ????.... Make an inventory of all your gear, and divide it into categories based on value, amount of use, accessibility, and then use this inventory to determine exactly what MUST fit inside, then what you would like to add in, then finally crap that can stay outside. The only true constraints is the available real estate inside your donor machine, so let your creative juices flow. Always remember that practicality is the name of our game, and many, many, many hours of thought (& lotsa suds) went into this first design. I came up with all sorts of crazy concepts, and wild crap that I wanted to include, but in the end, practicality won out. By the term practicality, I directly refer to an easy to build, fully functional clean design, with the ability to modify interior design concepts at the drop of a hat. I ended up choosing to have a large, wide & deep drawer storage in the bottom section of my machine (where the compressor motor used to reside), long guns in the vending can rack area, and pistol and boxed ammo storage on the door between the outer & inner door panels. The large bottom drawer does not seal up like the upper long gun & door storage areas with their rubber vacuum “refrigerator-style” weather stripping/door seal, so be careful about what you keep here due to the possibility of less rusting prevention than the upper areas provide. This giant drawer is roomy enough for virtually anything, and one could even add inner dividers, a false bottom, a lift out gun cleaning kit that sits on top of the bottom section inside, kind of like having multiple drawer layers inside of the drawer itself, ammo, magazine, optics storage, e.t.c. Pending on how you choose to line your walls of the long gun storage area, is also a factor regarding ease of mounting additional gun dividing racks… if you use plywood wall liner, you may easily move, adjust & fasten anything anywhere, at any time…. If you use fire liner, you will have to pre-drill through it and more thought should go into the initial design. I decided on using both fire lining and plywood, thus sandwiching the fire liner between the factory original hard foam insulation and my inner exterior plywood. I shall cover my exposed inner plywood with a carpet of some type to assist in a non-marring interior, but I haven’t decided exactly which type of carpet I will be using (indoor-outdoor, shag, low nap, e.t.c). Dividing racks can now be installed, moved, adjusted to fit, removed, e.t.c. at will with this setup. I really wish that I hadn’t tore up the factory galvanized liner, but I did, so get over it, do you hear me ??? Pi$$ing & moaning about the liner aint gonna bring the @#$%ing thing back so stop being a crybaby and permit me to move along….. ARE WE GOING TO HAVE TO HEAR ABOUT THAT LINER IN EVERY POST ??? Rotary racks There are a variety of various vertical rotary long gun storage racks available in both pre-assembled, and in kit form. Plans for the do-it-yourselfer are also available, and these racks are sometimes advertised as “for gun safes” and “no gun ever in back”….Virtually all of these racks are built on varying types of swivels, thus a clear advantage to utilizing one is that you can revolve the assembly in order to bring the gun of choice out front. Other distinct plusses are that these are well made, strong, look good, and can be moved from safe to safe, should you be of the type to upgrade your safe selection from time to time. These things have other nice features such as padded recesses, gun retaining straps, various formats & layouts , and some are designed so that they can hold both regular height (tall , not overall length) shotgun type, and a taller scoped rifle type (needs fatter depth), all in the same rack due to staggering and/or angled gun slots!! I would be remiss if I did not point out a few flaws, and although minor, they do merit mentioning. On the bottoms, these racks are round in shape…. Most safes are square in shape… Do the math, and superimpose a circle inside of a square…. What do you end up with ??? You end up with wasted real estate in the corners that could be better put to use storing firearms. Another problem is the expenditure of funds required for these, as opposed to a free interior storage system (keep your budget in mind), so even though I wish I could employ one or two of these wonderful rotary racks in my econo-locker, I am going to have to pass this time. Lastly, I have a problem with the overall design, and that is, for the space used, these racks actually yield marginal amounts of gun storage. For example, in my Coke machine, the biggest rotary rack that I could fit inside, would only hold fifteen guns. Without the rack, my machine now stores thirty eight. True, it’s a pain in the a$$ having to sometimes dig out a gun from in back, like is found on so many other mass-produced “real” gun safes, but with careful layout of the dividers, I can retrieve any gun from any slot, all without having to move any guns out of the way to achieve proper access, and I can easily do this with room to spare and not clank & bang guns against each other digging one out. I think I shall employ anti-rusting gun socks to all residents, and of course, I will keep the most popular up front, or at least change the lineup as seasons dictate. http://www.gunstands.com/rifle.htm http://www.gun-racks.com/ The design I really wanted to go with, involved two double sided pull out vertical rifle racks (22 inches wide), on heavy duty glides, the design similar to an inside gun room rifle rack I built last year. Unfortunately, My machine wasn’t wide enough to be able to employ this design, but I am on the lookout for just such a machine for “econo-gunlocker #2”, which due to the involved physics, would have to be securely lagged to the floor as hundreds of pounds of long guns being drawered outside of the unit on full-extension drawer slides will make the thing face-heavy and prone to tipping over and dumping itself, and its contents, out in your lap. Anyway, this design is the most expedient in terms of gun storage, but if you only have a few guns to store, then a rotary rack might be something to consider. He77, I like the rotary design, even if not used inside a safe, but left free standing on the floor (in a securely locked room). I ended up employing four racks that run from the front to the rear. Two are fastened to each side, and the two center racks are supported by upright posts. All racks are constructed out of 2 x 2’s (1 ½ x 1 ½ ). All racks have various heights, and are designed this way to accommodate the different firearms in my collection. A good thing to remember is the actual staggering of the individual gun slot dividers. I used 2 1/4 inch wide spaces for shotguns, and 2 inches for rifles, and 1 7/8 for rimfire 22’s. The technique I used to create these “half circle” gun barell holder/dividers is quite simple… I took a 2 x 2 and drilled a series of 7/8 inch diameter holes in the center, then cut the thing in half, which left two useable dividers. I used a spade bit chucked into an electric drill, and put a scrap piece of lumber underneath to avoid the usual “blowout” associated with spade bits when they are forced through to the backside of your work piece when drilling. Of course, it goes without saying, that you must lay out your circles according to your actual gun dividing/spacing, so that they correspond. These upright racks have the capacity to roomily store 38 long guns in their present configuration. A neat thing I also built in was two spare barrel holders. These are built using the “half circle” method, and screw directly to the wall plywood, or center posts. I put one on an outside wall about seventeen inches off the floor, and the other one was built under the left center rack, coupled with a scrap piece of plywood 10 inches tall, helps keep the barrels from falling through to the other side. On this plywood “backing” piece, I screwed off another “half circle” barrel divider along its bottom edge, thus this setup keeps spare shotgun barrels in line, out of harms way, and perfectly in place, ready to grab at a moments notice. This barrel holder was fastened about thirty inches off the floor measured at the top, it is about 10 inches tall, and will accommodate all barrels from shorties, to the longer ones as well (working range is 28 down to 18 inches useable barrel space). This height can easily be raised or lowered as needed, pending your personal spare barrel lengths. These barrel holders reside directly behind associated upright long gun storage, thus putting some wasted space to work !.. I also built in pegs for choke tube storage or even pistol storage on the back wall in between the racks, and I could envision utilizing peg board at some places to add a dimension of adjustability, although I wasn’t clever enough to think about it during the design and/or building portion on my machine. My interior long gun storage dividers are constructed so that they are easily removed and exchanged with ones having a different sizing, layout, design, e.t.c. and can be swapped out in a moments time. I researched the web, retail stores, friends safes, catalogs, and a host of other places to get a comprehensive overview of all available concepts, and one thing that I do not understand is that how some people lock up twenty dollars worth of crap inside a two thousand dollar safe, thus I try to limit my primarily secured items to those being of value, and secondary storage relegated to actual gun parts stuff (extra barrels, optional optics & mounts, e.t.c.). I have a friend that has stuffed his safe to the bursting point with ear protection, shooting glasses, gun cleaning supplies, old targets, e.t.c. and has little useable room for actual gun storage. This is no good. This project is for a gun locker, not a all-inclusive catch all for anything gun related. I am fortunate to have a dedicated gun room in my house, and this is where I warehouse all my gun related paraphernalia, and my Coke machine shall bear the burden of actual firearm storage. Door storage is another matter…. My machine has a door with a generous 4 ¼ inch thick cavity between the outer and inner door panels, thus there will be a lot of room here for pistol and boxed ammo storage. I removed all of the coin storage components, lights, and other goodies here to give me maximum real estate for all of my junk. The factory inner door also locks fast against the outer door, thus adding even more security to this storage area. Several of my inner door storage compartments also feature individual doors, but these are mainly for keeping things in the box, and not falling out, thus they do not lock at this present time, although locks everywhere are a good idea, as long as you can keep track of all the keys, should your various locks be incompatible for keying alike. Unfortunately, this can be a poor security area after removing all these components as the only protection from theft from outside in front is the original factory “COKE” plexi-glass advertising panel, so we MUST beef this area up considerably… You can screw off plywood to the front of the advertising area, right behind the plexi-glass panel, or better yet, find home heating & ventilating flat rectangular ductwork and use this (flattened out) along with the plywood to create a reinforcement barrier…. Examine the entire front inside area of the door and beef up the reinforcement behind all suspect areas such as the actual push button selectors, can dispensing chute, coin return, e.t.c. With all of this done, you can now design shelves, dividers, and regions to separate the door cavity to better organize your storage options. If using fire liner on the inside of your gun storage area, don’t forget to, of course, line the door cavity areas as well. My door storage compartments are an eclectic mixing of fit & function. Some have doors, others do not, and the clever designer always, always thinks ahead in terms of playing hide-n-go-seek. I also cleverly employed a few hidden regions, artfully crafted to be disguised behind, beneath, below, e.t.c. existing areas for “special” storage, and these hidden regions should be kept secret from all. It doesn’t take too much imagination to come up with the means to conceal but yet conveniently access these hidden areas, and Im sorry I cant disclose my actual personal techniques, other than to say that you don’t have to go overboard making these hidey-places, as we must remember that the unit as a whole is the storage vessel, and putting hiding places behind hiding places inside of locked compartments, inside of a locked locker may not be the most prudent of ideas, however, you can never have too much security, thus I shall share that I only have three of these specialty hide-outs, two for smaller items, such as pistols, and one that is capable of concealing four long guns away from the crowd. However you chose to do these hiding places, it is of paramount concern that they be PERFECTLY indistinguishable from the normal look of the project, and a clever fellow can easily construct a false back, shallower door storage boxes, sub-floors, e.t.c. to achieve desired effects. Another design concept to keep in mind is final interior humidity levels and the possibility of subsequent rusting…Guns attract rust, and it would be bad to finish off your project, bloat it full of your gun collection, then go away with a warm, happy feeling in your belly about the security of your stash, only to return in a week and discover that everything has acquired a coating of rust, so give this design area a lot of thought. Naturally, this rusting / moisture / humidity can be circumvented by using silica packs, a small light, or even a small fan, heating element, or all of the above. Most machines are designed with a drain hole in the bottom of the upper refrigerated area, and this drain hole usually has a drain tube/hose attached.. Clever folks (like us!) can manipulate this feature to our benefit regarding controlling moisture, humidity, and the introduction / prevention of outside air entering & leaving our gun safe areas. Next installment: “Prepping the interior for rebuild”

04-18-2004, 10:55 PM	#29
RASTA GUN MON Registered User Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Chandler, Arizona Posts: 675	WOW!!!!! __________________ Give Thanks and Praises To The Most High. Jah Rastafari.

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