Security

[PhantomD]

We are currently in the ridiculous situation where most of our sound and lights gear is kept miles away from our venue due to a perceived lack of security in the booth.

Our upstairs booth has metal bars to provide security while being able to see/hear what happens outside - although people can come up to a ledge and stick their hands through the bars = touch or steal our equipment.

How can we secure devices such as CD players, desks etc to things like furniture, and what secure methods could you recommend to store equipment in the booth (along the back wall away from the bars).

I was thinking of a pair of properly locking file cabinets with the key only given to one person - apparently this isn't really secure enough, even with the door locked and the bars up.

Ideas?

[soundlight]

For the equipment that will be within reach, you can get rope locks. Big long piece of security cable, just like you would use to secure your laptop, but three times as thick and three times as long. You get attachments that you stick to the outside of the equipment (they will NOT come off unless you cut them off, the adhesive is really, really strong.)

A safe that you can bolt to the floor might work for your other storage.

[CowboyDan]

You could also try adding bars to what is already there. This way people could not get their heads through the bars.

[cutlunch]

You could make some wooden shutters that slide into frames on the inside of the bars. This way people can't see or reach in. Also add a deadlock to the booth door.

[avkid]

This looks like good stuff.
http://www.tufnut.com/

[Van]

You could dig a moat around the booth and fill it with sharks with frikin' lasers.

[ricc0luke]

lets try electrifying those bars...

[Footer]

Originally Posted by Van

You could dig a moat around the booth and fill it with sharks with frikin' lasers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pozlp_wnkRk

....do you actually have a history of theft in a theatre where bars were warranted?... or is this a club situation?

[bdesmond]

I don't have a brandname offhand, but, there's a certain type of eye hook that mounts on equipment and you run some aviation cable through that is usually used in public computer labs and such to secure the equipment. I've never seen one of the **** things come off either. Make sure someone can't get a pair of bolt cutters through or size the steel cable appropriately.

Anyone determined is going to break your file cabinet lock pretty easily...

[Chris15]

Question 1: Are the CD players and what not in a rack? If not, would putting them into a rack be an option? Provided that the rack has sides etc, then it is going to be hard to extract things from with only a hand through the bars...

Someone raised the point of putting a deadlock on the booth. In my opinion, big no no. Bad for fire codes, expect in certain circumstances. I've got a copy of the section of the BCA (Building Code of Australia) that deals with requirements for egress compliant door locks. Contact me offline for a copy. Besides, unless your school is rather lax (public or private by the way?), chances are they'll be wanting that door on their master key system and so you only half achieve security anyway...

Now filing cabinets... (This is about to get downunder specific, apologies to antipodeans) Assuming that you are talking about "standard" filing cabinets for us, please don't make me laugh by calling them secure. IM me and we'll discuss why I say that but as Brian said, in most cases, locking a filing cabinet is only going to achieve a "we'd prefer you didn't open this" sort of attitude. It ain't going to stop anyone. Did I mention that if you ask nicely I'll post you up a master filing cabinet key?

Now an option that might work would be if you fitted roller shutters over the openings. Show ends, drop the shutter.


You know how to get me offline, so give us a yell and we can discuss this in more depth. (In case you hadn't worked it out yet, security happens to be another little hobby of mine...)