There are a few ways in which fire safes are manufactured to protect stored items from heat and fire.
Most fire resisting safes create moisture when heated in order to help stop the paper from reaching combustion point. Even the older safes such as the Milners ranges from the 1900's offered this type of protection. However, this very method of protection can weaken the safe over time by rusting the safe away from the inside. If the papers you are trying to protect are important to you, then make sure that the safe you have is up to job.
Another difference between the fire safes and cash protection safes is the thickness of the metal body covering the safe. Large thick plates of steel may offer protection from fire for a short while, but prolonged heat from a fire will soon be transfered through the metal to the inside of the safe. Also, a thick metal body will stay hot long after the fire has stopped - try switching off an electric iron and seeing if it is still hot a few minutes later! As a consequence, fire protection safes are made with very thin metal bodies in order to allow as little tranference of heat from the outside to the inside. Cash protection safe bodies are filled with concrete, steel mesh etc - fire safes are filled wth a material which will hold in the moisture we mentioned earlier - a bit like plaster - but is very very soft. This makes a fire safe of little or no use as protection against burglary and the cash protection safe little use against a prolonged fire.
As mentioned elsewhere in these pages, paper is damaged at 150 degrees c whereas computer media is damaged at 55 degrees c. It will be obvious then that a different type of safe will be needed for protection of these 2 types of media.
In the tab headed 'Fire Protection' we mentioned that fire safes create a steam to keep the contents damp therby altering the combustion point. However, this is exactly the opposite of what you need for data protection - hard drives, floppy discs and tapes don't like moisture.
Modern data safes usually have an additional cabinet fitted inside with an airtight door to keep out the moisture. This obviously helps do the job but it also reduces the size available inside for storage. Most data cabinet manufacturers will be able to offer information regarding how many discs, tapes, cd's etc cas be stored in these 'data boxes'. Some manufacturers supply combi safes which are paper protection safes with a small data box inside allowing room for paper files etc but also allowing you to store a small amount of electronic data media.
