The Ultimate Faraday Cage

Today’s Guest Post Article “The Ultimate Faraday Cage” is from Vey who is the founder of Prepperlytics.com

U.S. Military Engine Shipping Containers

These all steel shipping containers may just be the ultimate faraday cage to protect your electronics from an EMP.

What is it?

The US Military ships a LOT of equipment around the world, including diesel engines. To do this, they use a waterproof, air-tight steel container simply called a “Military Engine Shipping Container”.

While useful to the military for shipping engines, they’re pretty useless to civilians… unless you’re a prepper! In that case, they make near-perfect Faraday Cages.

What Makes a good Faraday Cage?

The most important feature a good faraday cage is strong EMP shielding. In other words, the harmful particles released by an EMP should travel around the container, and not through it, which might damage the electronics stored in the cage.

Most Faraday cages are made of metal, which is a conductor of electricity.

As long as the container is fully enclosed, and nothing is touching the edges, the components inside will be properly shielded.

The other thing that makes a good Faraday Cage is size. The cage needs to be large enough to store any sensitive electronics you want to survive an EMP blast such as a generator, solar power equipment, radios, alarms, clocks, replacement car parts, night vision, etc.

Military Engine Shipping Container Specs

Size: 68″x47″53″ (dimensions can vary)
Price: $200 off Craigslist
Color: Olive drab
600+lbs
Air-tight
Water-tight
EMP-shielded

Modifications

The shipping container comes with a steel bar across the center to support the heavy engine. It’s bolted in, but can easily be removed with a wrench and socket.

It’s best to remove the bar to ensure that no electricity is passed through the center of your Faraday Cage, and it also makes organizing the contents much easier.

Line with cardboard

As the particles from the EMP hit the faraday cage they will travel along the steel container’s parameter, eventually entering into the ground.

You want to make sure that the items you’re storing inside the container are not directly touching the steel, which is conducting the current.

You can do this by lining the inside of the container with a non-conductive material, such as cardboard or wood.

In our example here, we’ve lined the floor with a layer of cardboard, then we’ve placed the solar power inverter and charge controllers back in their original packaging.

Build a Shelf

With the cross bar removed, we have 3 steel pillars on each side. We can use these to mount a wooden shelf.

Place 3 planks of wood across the pillars, then screw 4 places of wood going the opposite direction to hold items. Screw the top boards to the bottom 3.

For better coverage, screw plywood to the top of the shelf.

Since the shelf is just resting on the pillars it can easily be removed to access the contents below.

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Special Considerations

Weight: This is a container is made out of steel and is designed to carry and protect a heavy engine. That means it will protect your valuables like a safe, but it also weighs as much as a safe.

The best way to move this thing is with a tractor that has forks on the frontend. It can be done with 4+ men, but it can seriously injure you if you’re not careful.

Access: The unit has a clamshell style opening which means the top half is bolted to the bottom half. This ensures an air-tight, water-tight seal.

To get into the cage you’ll need to unscrew 30 bolts. If you’ve got some air tools it should only take a few minutes, but post-SHTF it’ll take 20-30 minutes to unbolt by hand. On the plus side, it’s going to take a fair amount of work for someone to try and break into this thing without you hearing them.

More Considerations

Availability: You won’t be able to pick one of these up at your local big box store.

I got mine off of Craigslist locally for $200. No tax or shipping costs. You can look for them on government auction sites, estate sales, Facebook Marketplace, local army surplus stores and local classifieds.

Space: This container is not something you’re going to want taking up room in your basement, nor will you be able to easily get it down there.

It’s waterproof, so you might as well store it outside. Just make sure it’s out of sight in a barn or behind a shed. It’s obviously going to beg questions of neighbors, so make sure you’ve got a good story. I would just tell them you found a good deal on a waterproof storage unit for storing stuff outside. Nevermind the 30 bolts it takes to get in and out of it.

Is this the ultimate faraday cage?

I believe it is.

It’s large enough to hold all the electronics for a sizeable group. Nobody is going to steal the thing from under your nose. They’re fairly easy to come by if you’re looking for them, and nobody but the military and preppers really have a good use for them.

Is this going to be your only Faraday cage? No.

You’re going to want to have smaller ammo box or safe size cages that you can easily get in and out of. But for the bigger stuff line generators and inverters, this is a perfect solution.

The article above was kindly contributed by Vey from Prepperlytics, and the original title, “The Ultimate Faraday Cage” can be found on the Prepperlytics.com blog.

Prepperlytics is an online website that helps preppers calculate the number of calories that would be needed in a SHTF scenario. Vey’s site also has a number of other really useful tools that help preppers prepare. You can check out our Prepperlytics Review Here

The Ultimate Faraday Cage