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A little story to keep my 'this could only happen to me' reputation intact...
The bed I inherited in my furnished apartment here in Italy is something between a single and a double size which has this minimalistic designed sprung base consisting of traversal hardwood laths about 3 1/2" wide by 3/8" thick sprung into very slightly oversize plastic lined slots in the sides of a supported metal frame which the bed mattress sits on. The idea is that the hardwood laths have just enough free play in the slots to allow them to spring slightly up and down without actually dropping out thus giving the bed mattress a bit of bounce and at the same providing ventilation via the spaces between the laths. A good design in principal, that is until it's subjected to my 220 lbs of dead weight when I collapse on the mattress after a hard day of work - ok, well maybe not so hard a day!
Several times over the past few weeks I've rolled over in bed during the night and had my fantasy dreams abruptly awoken by sounds like a quick burst of fire from an AK-47 as my weight has bent several of the laths a little too far causing them to pop out of their slots at the speed of light and fall to the floor, quickly followed by the mattress, the sheets and of course yours truly, cocooned somewhere in between.
I can say with total conviction that this is definitely not the recommended way to have your dreams interrupted!
Springing those laths back into their slots in the early hours when you are half asleep, not to mention half naked, is a very dangerous and delicate operation which requires a fair amount of controlled force and concentration alongside sufficient agility to quickly jump out of the way to avoid being accidentally whacked in a very sensitive part of your anatomy by the reciprocal springing of a lath which doesn't want to go back into it's slot. Sorry, no photograph of my re-springing technique since it would probably be classed as some sort of bondage pornography.
Totally brassed off with these early morning rude awakenings I recently set about sorting this problem out. Now any normal fellow would probably have cut a sheet of plywood to fit on top of the metal frame to completely cover the laths and fix the problem the easy way but of course, being a carpenter of sorts, and not any normal guy, my approach needed a little more reasoning and applied logic which went like this ....
Why try to solve the problem from above when the real problem * was occurring below? Stop the laths from bending down too far and they'll stay in their slots.
* Some might say that the real solution would have been for me to lose weight but I'd already dismissed that as an idea plucked from the realms of fantasy and totally improbable unless I were to have an accident which lopped off at least two of my legs!
Following a Saturday morning trip to work, I raided the sheets of plywood scraps in the factory and much to the amusement of a bunch of weekend maintenance onlookers set about making up a long A frame to place lengthwise under the laths at just the right height to stop them flexing so far down that they pop their slots. My solution won't win any Italian design awards but at last I now have a stable bed, ventilation between the laths for the mattress and can get a decent night's sleep 15" above the floor without my dreams being interrupted.
Now if only my darling wife were out here with me I could give my fix a really energetic acid test to see how it holds up - 'it' being my fix! - or maybe this is just me still dreaming!
Do any folks out there have any similar furniture mishap stories? If so please share. I surely can't be the only one to have things like this happen to me - can I?
The bed I inherited in my furnished apartment here in Italy is something between a single and a double size which has this minimalistic designed sprung base consisting of traversal hardwood laths about 3 1/2" wide by 3/8" thick sprung into very slightly oversize plastic lined slots in the sides of a supported metal frame which the bed mattress sits on. The idea is that the hardwood laths have just enough free play in the slots to allow them to spring slightly up and down without actually dropping out thus giving the bed mattress a bit of bounce and at the same providing ventilation via the spaces between the laths. A good design in principal, that is until it's subjected to my 220 lbs of dead weight when I collapse on the mattress after a hard day of work - ok, well maybe not so hard a day!
Several times over the past few weeks I've rolled over in bed during the night and had my fantasy dreams abruptly awoken by sounds like a quick burst of fire from an AK-47 as my weight has bent several of the laths a little too far causing them to pop out of their slots at the speed of light and fall to the floor, quickly followed by the mattress, the sheets and of course yours truly, cocooned somewhere in between.
I can say with total conviction that this is definitely not the recommended way to have your dreams interrupted!
Springing those laths back into their slots in the early hours when you are half asleep, not to mention half naked, is a very dangerous and delicate operation which requires a fair amount of controlled force and concentration alongside sufficient agility to quickly jump out of the way to avoid being accidentally whacked in a very sensitive part of your anatomy by the reciprocal springing of a lath which doesn't want to go back into it's slot. Sorry, no photograph of my re-springing technique since it would probably be classed as some sort of bondage pornography.
Totally brassed off with these early morning rude awakenings I recently set about sorting this problem out. Now any normal fellow would probably have cut a sheet of plywood to fit on top of the metal frame to completely cover the laths and fix the problem the easy way but of course, being a carpenter of sorts, and not any normal guy, my approach needed a little more reasoning and applied logic which went like this ....
Why try to solve the problem from above when the real problem * was occurring below? Stop the laths from bending down too far and they'll stay in their slots.
* Some might say that the real solution would have been for me to lose weight but I'd already dismissed that as an idea plucked from the realms of fantasy and totally improbable unless I were to have an accident which lopped off at least two of my legs!
Following a Saturday morning trip to work, I raided the sheets of plywood scraps in the factory and much to the amusement of a bunch of weekend maintenance onlookers set about making up a long A frame to place lengthwise under the laths at just the right height to stop them flexing so far down that they pop their slots. My solution won't win any Italian design awards but at last I now have a stable bed, ventilation between the laths for the mattress and can get a decent night's sleep 15" above the floor without my dreams being interrupted.
Now if only my darling wife were out here with me I could give my fix a really energetic acid test to see how it holds up - 'it' being my fix! - or maybe this is just me still dreaming!
Do any folks out there have any similar furniture mishap stories? If so please share. I surely can't be the only one to have things like this happen to me - can I?
I do like your fix though. Great job!
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