The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

Hi All,

I have just bought a 7 Gun cabinet so that I can apply for FAC, I was planning on fitting this weekend - I had planned on installing in a cupboard on the landing, I thought it would be an ideal place, no Windows, tucked into a cupboard and it's a brick (as I thought) external wall. I was happy that I had everything I needed until last night a Builder friend who has Shotguns told me I couldn't put it there as it's really an Internal Wall, it's a Terraced house so it's internal to my neighbours.

To be honest I never gave it any thought - I can't really see my neighbour tunnelling through the wall to get to the cabinet, but how would the FEO see it? Friend told me Northumbria police insist on an outside external wall, anybody any knowledge on the subject - I'm potentially running out of walls I can use!

As always any advice greatly appreciated

Always best to get the view of your local Firearms Certification Department, at the end of the day it their call, the views on here are only relevant to each of our own experience.

I am in Northumberland and long ago when I had cabinets they had no problem with them being bolted onto our neighbours shared brick wall, semi detached house.

That was then though, so ring them up and take their advice, the horses mouth is always the best.

Thanks Dromia - excellent advice

Is it a load bearing wall (ie, made of brick, concrete or similar) as opposed to a partition wall (made of plasterboard and wooden or metal studs?)

Generally, you need to bolt it to something made of ceramic (brick, concrete), which means your house will fall down if you remove the wall.

Whether its shared with the neighbours should be immaterial as long as the wall is holding the roof up. They won't (and shouldn't) know its there.

Best idea ring your FEO and ask.

(also ideally mount it into a corner so you can't get a crowbar into the door)

Yes it's a load bearing wall -old terraced house from the early 1900's

I will do as suggested and give FEO a ring before I fix it to the wall.

Cheers

Nothing in the Home Office guidance about not securing to internal walls. It will be fine. Brick walls are best, but the fixing method is far more important than what it is attached to. Use suitable fixings.

I’ve seen cabinets attached to brick walls that could be pulled off because of inadequate fixings, and cabinets attached to stud walls that you could swing off all day and it wouldn’t budge.

Furiouspilgrim wrote:Nothing in the Home Office guidance about not securing to internal walls. It will be fine. Brick walls are best, but the fixing method is far more important than what it is attached to. Use suitable fixings.

I’ve seen cabinets attached to brick walls that could be pulled off because of inadequate fixings, and cabinets attached to stud walls that you could swing off all day and it wouldn’t budge.

M12 Anchor bolts purchased!

I don't think there is any requirement to have them on internal walls, the only requirement is you take reasonable safe storage precautions to stop unauthorised access and part of that could be keeping the cabinets out of sight. All this can be discussed with your local FEO and maybe crime prevention officer.

I have 6 long cabinets and a couple of pistol/ammo cabinets in the house (there are a lot of shooters in this household). Of these 4 of the big and one small cabinet are bolted to outside walls. As our house is a barn conversion most (all but one) external walls are wooden, many of the internal are stud-work as well. I don't think I would have space to fit them all on an internal wall and out of sight of casual visitors especially as it's a single storey building.

Take a look at new build houses, the vast majority are stud and board construction internally and I am sure some of them must have firearms.

Ovenpaa wrote:Take a look at new build houses, the vast majority are stud and board construction internally and I am sure some of them must have firearms.

Yep, my son had this problem when he went to install his cabinet. I'd advised him to fit it on an outside wall and that he'd probably have an inch or so of plaster/plasterboard, then he would be into the internal block wall, so to make sure he had long enough anchor bolts.
When he went to fit it he found he had a 1/2 inch of plasterboard then a 4-6 inch cavity before hitting brick...!!
On further research it turns out his new estate are all timber framed houses with a brick skin.

He managed to get multiple fixings into a wall stud and floor, so its rigid enough...