A Simple Deputy's Rack (Vertical Weapon Rack)

At times, I've had to travel for work and my wife wanted a bit of security while I was away.  After discussing options and testing fits, we decided on a home defense shotgun; however, we also quickly realized we had no place to safely store it away that would also be accessible in an emergency.

I reviewed some of the floor standing and wall mount commercial options available and finally decided to just design and build what I really wanted.  

I took inspiration from the old Westerns... queue the scene where someone enters the Sherriff's office.  As the camera pans across the prisoner's cell, just before we see the Sherriff (who typically has his feet up on the desk for some reason... or maybe that's just Andy Griffith) there is usually a vertical weapon rack with various long guns, ammo, gun belts, etc.

After playing with designs for a bit, I finally settled on a small vertical rack for two weapons (you never know) and also had shelves and space to hold all of the associated equipment.  We don't have children in the home, so we didn't have to incorporate any child safety features which allowed for a much simpler design.

We also decided on a location, so that determined the overall width of the rack and also presented a challenge... the location had had quarter round molding so the rack had to sit flush against the wall without having to cut out a section of the molding.  To accommodate the molding, I simply offset the rack foot for the depth required.

For the materials, I decided to go with 1" x 10" pine boards for the sides and the shelves, and 1" x 3" for the horizontal brace as well as the top shelf front and butt stock frames.

I used a router to create the dado joints for the shelves and was fairly happy with how they turned out for a first attempt at dados.  For the horizontal weapon brace, I used the router to cut out half oval openings and then used black felt to protect the weapon's finish.  On my first test fit, the shotgun seemed a bit looser in the horizonal brace than I liked so I added a magnet; however, after the fact I think a very thick felt might have worked better (similar to what is used to hold the top end of a pool cue in a pool hall).

Once it was all finished, the rack fit in the planned space perfectly and the offset foot allowed the rack to sit flush against the wall.