Top Concerns About Home Container Addressed: Security, Resistance, and Safety

Nowadays, shipping containers are utilized for more than merely storing and moving freight. It is becoming commonplace to build temporary homes, offices, libraries, art galleries, and other structures out of shipping containers, often known as "cargotecture."

People naturally want to know that these structures are safe and secure and will continue to be safe from fire, water, storms, and earthquakes as shipping container conversions continue to diversify. The easiest method to make sure your house is safe is to buy containers from a reliable supplier. We at FSE are able to provide knowledgeable guidance regarding container quality, ensuring that alterations are expertly carried out, utilizing safe floor and wall treatments, and installing suitable ventilation, heating, and cooling systems.

How Reliable Are Weatherproof Containers?

Durable boxes called shipping containers are used to transport precious cargo across oceans. Manufacturers use the solid rectangular shapes and the long-lasting Corten steel exteriors to produce adapted structures that can withstand severe weather.

The basic building block of a customized shipping container is a steel box that is made to endure heavy travel while safeguarding its contents. The superior Corten steel used in shipping containers makes them resistant to wind and water. Even bigger units or those piled above one another continue to be weatherproof as they are put to new applications.

All structures made of shipping containers must first act as barriers against the elements. As freight boxes go across oceans, weather-resistant containers show that they can withstand storms and strong winds in addition to changing temperatures. Shipping containers may still withstand harsh winds and weather even after manufacturers change them.

Reputable shipping container modification firms craft units for wind and water protection with care. Adjusted shipping containers can be modified to defend against minor weather problems like temperature and humidity variations in addition to major weather occurrences. This frequently entails adding insulation as well as air conditioning equipment.

Do Shipping Container Homes Rust? How Long Do They Last?

Due to its steel construction, rust is a typical issue. Corten steel, which is sturdy and corrosion-resistant, is used to make a lot of containers. This substance inhibits corrosion and rust, although it doesn't totally prevent it. Container homes tend to last the longest in dry regions and in areas that have alternating wet and dry weather. They tend to rust faster in areas with significant rainfall, severe humidity, persistent fog, or salt-laden air and may not be a good alternative.

Rust prevention must be considered when creating a shipping container home. Your container home can survive a lot longer if you limit exposure to the elements. If rust does appear, it must be removed right away to stop it from worsening and spreading.

A shipping container home's longevity mostly depends on the environment in which it is situated. However, a home constructed from pre-owned shipping containers should survive for roughly 15 years without any substantial upkeep, whereas a home constructed from brand-new containers should last for roughly 25 years. You can increase the lifespan of your home by several decades by adopting an efficient type of external cladding. Your home's lifespan can be increased by performing routine maintenance and eliminating rust as soon as you see it.

Are Home Containers Secure?

The same level of security as traditional residences is possible for container homes. The buildings are made to be impenetrable by both possible intruders and the elements. You can convert shipping containers into homes by adding doors and windows, and with the correct locks and security systems, container homes can be just as safe as any other sort of housing.

Additional security upgrades can shield container construction from outside influences, including potential invaders. For instance, a shipping container's contents can be kept safe and secure using a variety of locks, burglar bars on the windows, and latch guards.

Are These Homes Safe? Are they Processed for Safe Living?

If you've done your research on the safety of containers, you may find that using shipping containers as homes could pose some health risks, such as:

• The allegedly toxic chemicals used to treat many shipping containers' wooden floors
• The dangerous chemicals, such as chromate and phosphorus, contained in the paints used on shipping containers
• Contamination from chemical spillage of toxic substances handled or stored in the container previously.

The inhabitants of polluted containers may be at health risk from these dangerous compounds. Many containers that are converted to residential shelters either utilize new containers that are not treated or coated with hazardous paints or old containers with well-known histories that were not used to handle poisonous substances in order to remove these dangers.

To guard against dangerous chemicals splashed on the wooden floor, covers are used in containers with a non-breathable flooring underlayment. Next, put tiles for your new flooring on top of the underlayment. An alternative is to completely remove the old wood flooring and install marine plywood in its place.

To protect them from saltwater, many shipping containers have coatings made of hazardous paint. However, the issue arises when you come into contact with the paint. When transforming the container into a residential shelter, the paint coating might be taken off in such circumstances. To protect the safety of the occupants, the container can also be coated with non-toxic paint or insulated with spray foam.

Are Home Containers Waterproof?

Containers, as we all know, spend the majority of their time on the backs of enormous cargo ships, where they frequently suffer damage from intense rain and a lot of sea spray. Shipping containers are especially made to not let any water in at all, keeping the cargo inside completely dry. This is done to ensure that the goods inside the cargo are safeguarded. The container is now watertight rather than waterproof, nevertheless. Although these two words are frequently mistaken for synonyms, this is not the case.

Waterproof refers to an object that cannot be harmed by water, whereas "watertight" refers to an object that is tightly sealed to prevent water from entering within.

Despite the fact that some containers can be made to be waterproof, the majority rust over time when exposed to significant volumes of water. Therefore, we cannot state that containers are entirely waterproof, technically speaking. Despite this, they can be used for shipping for up to 12 years, so a little rust shouldn't be a big deal.

Compared to conventional stick-built houses, these watertight shipping containers require less structural upkeep. However, if you have discovered that water is entering your container from the outside, you might need to perform some additional maintenance to seal it. The seal running the length of the container's roof would be the first place to look. If this is damaged, you should caulk and seal the roof again, and then check it again after your container has experienced a significant amount of rain. Next, examine any windows, doors, and locations where wires or tubes might protrude from the container. You can use expanding foam and silicone to plug any gaps in these places.

Are Home Containers Fireproof?

Steel, a fire-resistant material, is used to make containers. As a result, only the most extreme circumstances—such as when the container was already loaded down with a lot of flammable materials—would cause a container to catch fire. If a fire were to start inside a container for any reason, the container would be able to stop the fire from spreading. Since containers are airtight, a fire would go out on its own once it had consumed all of the oxygen inside. Despite the fact that the container's interior would be harmed, the fire would have been contained.

As we all know, containers may be used for a variety of other things outside transportation, such as pop-up stores and temporary workplaces. It's interesting to note that containers are frequently utilized to simulate real-world scenarios for firefighters' training. Despite already having fire resistance, containers are typically further customized with heat-resistant paint, exhaust systems, and controls that can keep track of the rate of fire growth, the fire's temperature, and put out the fire when necessary.

There are still more benefits. Shipping containers are watertight in addition to being fireproof.

How Powerful of a Hurricane can a Container Home Withstand?

A Category 3 storm, which poses a significant risk to typical residential homes, may pass through a shipping container home. The maximum wind speed of a category 3 storm is 129 mph.

There are no statistics on a shipping container's wind resistance. However, steel structures and container homes have a lot in common.

Shipping containers are built with hefty panels and thick steel frames, which are then used to create container homes. A steel building and a well-built container dwelling are likely to have equivalent strength.

Up to 170 mph winds have been recorded passing through steel buildings without them collapsing. Modern building regulations allow for the construction of conventional residential dwellings that can withstand winds of up to 150 mph.

How Can a Container Home Be Hurricane-Proof?

Here are a few strategies for protecting your shipping container house:

• Install hurricane-resistant windows, hurricane shutters, and wind-resistant metal roofing.
• Cut down any big trees close to your property.

In comparison to the frame, the windows and outside components are more susceptible to damage during a hurricane. Install hurricane-resistant windows to enhance hurricane protection. The DP rating assesses a window or door's structural load, water resistance, and air resistance.

A window can resist more pressure from wind and water if its DP value is higher. A DP 50 window or door can resist winds of 200 mph, or 75 pounds of pressure per square foot.

Add storm shutters as well as sturdy windows. Hurricane shutter installation provides protection from wind, rain, and flying objects. Most of the year, you can leave the shutters open. When there is a chance of severe weather, you can close them.

Additionally, the roofing material you select has to be rated to resist hurricane-force winds. The most hurricane-resistant roofing material is normally metal, but some of the most recent asphalt shingles are also certified to withstand gusts of 150 mph or more.

Large trees should be cut down, and equipment and cars should be parked far from the container house. Trees can be uprooted and cars can be flipped by even a small hurricane. The container's frame should be able to withstand the force of any flying debris, although it could still receive significant damage.

Are Container Homes Earthquake Proof?

Simply put, absolutely! Solid steel blocks make up container dwellings, which are incredibly durable. They can resist gusts of up to 175 mph when simply anchored with pylons, whether configured in single units or multiple units together. This indicates that they are very sturdy during hurricanes or tornadoes.

The container won't break because it is a solid object and will not move or shake. Although the contents could be disturbed, they won't collapse or fall apart like a typical structure would. The building might roll a little in a direct impact, but it won't fall down. In an earthquake, it would be the very best safety cocoon. It would be at least a hundred times more durable and secure than a typical home. We would far rather stay inside a Container King home than a typical home or workplace during any earthquake.

Are Shipping Container Homes Safe From Lightning?

It's important to remember that height and material do affect where lightning will strike, but they usually don't make this risk much worse.

This is due to how strong the lightning is. A comparatively small steel building's pulling force, if any at all, won't have much of an impact on a lightning bolt traveling at 10,000 feet with a billion-volt force.

A conductive object will only draw lightning if it is already about to strike nearby, according to research. In actuality, only at a distance that is equal to or less than the object's height. So a lightning bolt that is up to 10 feet away may be drawn to a container that is 10 feet tall.

In other words, compared to a timber house or a concrete building of comparable height, your shipping container home is almost as protected against lightning strikes. Simply because it is so negligible in comparison to the power of a lightning bolt.

Your container home has the same chance of getting struck by lightning as a regular house. Although there is nothing we can do to stop it, the grounding systems make sure that neither you nor your property suffer any long-term harm as a result of the strike. As a result, do not let this influence your decision to buy a shipping container home.

Are Shipping Containers Bulletproof?

There are several types of bullets. A.50 caliber round will strike a container very differently than a tiny.22 caliber round. The quickest response to this query is that sometimes containers are bulletproof. Naturally, we were unable to try this out for ourselves, but Civil Advantage, a shooting-focused YouTube channel, did, and the findings are really intriguing.

They evaluated eight distinct bullet types of various strengths using two layers of a container wall. They counted how many layers, if any, each bullet could penetrate to determine how durable the container wall was.

Out of the eight bullets, three failed to enter either of the two steel layers, three did so and made a dent in the second, and two succeeded in doing so.

The container was bulletproof against the lesser-tested bullets but not against the full metal jacket or rounds capable of penetrating armor. As a result, there isn't really a predetermined response to the query because it entirely depends on the kind of bullet employed. Even though we would like to think that you would never require a bulletproof container, it is still a fascinating issue to look at.

Are Home Containers Vandal Proof?

To put it another way, breaking into a container would require some skill on the part of the thief. Since containers can endure earthquakes, tornadoes, and hurricanes, attempting to steal something from one of these steel fortresses would likely be difficult.

Containers are frequently locked with powerful padlocks that are maintained in lock boxes for increased security. Heavy-duty locks are composed of tough steel, and the lock box keeps the padlock totally out of sight for potential thieves, whereas a burglar can cut through a standard padlock in under 20 seconds. Attempting to harm a container would also be difficult because they are constructed of one of the world's toughest metals.

Are Home Containers Pest-Resistant?

Prefab container homes are extremely pest- and insect-resistant due to their steel design. Even if you decide to install exterior wall coverings or timber floors, the interior steel frame of your building will remain impenetrable to pests and built of steel. While termites can eat through external siding or interior finishes, they are unable to penetrate steel, protecting the structural integrity of your property.

Are Home Containers Resistant to Heat and Cold?

Many people worry that containers act as dead heat traps, which might make living there uncomfortable.

Your prefabricated container home should be more comfortable and energy-efficient than a traditional home, nevertheless, with proper and well-installed insulation and ventilation.

Foam and fiberglass insulation are used in most containers. You can read the home container blogs on the FSE Automation website if you have any queries. To answer all of your questions, we have a post on home container FAQs.

Summary

Recently, it has become more and more common to construct homes out of shipping containers, and for good reason. The containers are readily accessible, affordable, and may be used to build anything from little houses to big apartment buildings that can house hundreds of people. Shipping containers can be the best option if you want to create a house in an original and environmentally friendly manner.

The durability of a modified shipping container makes it a popular choice for homes and businesses. In the event of a natural disaster like an earthquake, they will offer a safe haven for you and your property, protecting you from extreme weather like tornadoes.

You are secure since the container is resistant to intruders and vermin. However, you should make sure the used container is free of any structural flaws or harmful building elements that could endanger your health. Container strength is well understood and well recorded. Even if it's a little stronger than you actually need, it should be durable and give you peace of mind.

So that health risks for residential shelters are kept to a minimum, it's important to work with reputable companies that make changes to shipping containers and make sure they follow all best practices when choosing containers and making them. Future Sky Equipment is one of these reputable companies that provides different kinds of converted containers.