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Old 04-13-2012, 12:42 PM   #1
Wayne and Carolyn Mathews
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Mattress too heavy

We just went from a king to a queen bed in our Monty, and surprise--the queen mattress is probably twice as heavy as the king mattress we removed. It now takes two people to lift the bed to access the storage underneath. The struts now won't hold up the mattress, either, so when I need to get something under the bed, Wayne has to hold the lifted mattress on his shoulder so that I can reach in and grab things. (We have only the mattress, not the box springs.)

Has anyone else encountered this situation, and if so, what did you do about it? I won't go into the details of the "discussion" we had about going from the king bed to a queen, but since I won, I feel like I need to find a solution to the problem. Obviously, getting another, lighter queen mattress will take care of things, and that's what we will probably have to do. I'm sure that will be a popular decision, too . . .

Are RV-specific mattress lighter than regular mattresses? I wish I knew how much the queen mattress we have weighs so that I had something to go by when looking for another mattress.

Ideas?

Carolyn
 
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Old 04-13-2012, 12:59 PM   #2
mhs4771
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How about one of the Air type mattresses? We replaced our King with a Sleep Number King and love it, plus it's lighter than the OEM. We thought the mattress in the Monty was quite an improvement over our TT mattress, but after sleeping on it for 3 months straight we thought differently and upgraded to the Sleep Number.
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Old 04-13-2012, 01:10 PM   #3
Clemson1881
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I would value my comfort over giving up the storage underneath the bed. RV mattresses do not make for good sleeping.
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Old 04-13-2012, 02:03 PM   #4
DQDick
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X2. You have arrived at the solution we use. I hold the bed up and Joyce gets stuff out. Sleep number is a good option, but we like a regular, comfortable, bed and are willing to put up with the minor, in our opinion, issues with having it.
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Old 04-13-2012, 02:55 PM   #5
8.1al
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Maybe you can replace the gas struts under the bed with stronger ones
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Old 04-13-2012, 03:07 PM   #6
DHenry
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Cut a round dowel long enough to hold up the bed while you get your things out of the storage area.
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Old 04-13-2012, 04:14 PM   #7
seahunter
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Quote:
quote:Originally posted by Wayne and Carolyn Mathews


Are RV-specific mattress lighter than regular mattresses?
Ideas?

Carolyn
Yes, the RV mattresses are not normally very high quality and would be lighter. Regular residential mattresses are usually much thicker and would have a much higher coil count and therefore be heavier but much more comfortable. I agree that comfort for me would outweigh the inconvenience of having to hold up the mattress. The dowel/rod idea is a good one, as is larger struts.

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Old 04-13-2012, 04:50 PM   #8
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Good idea. Might I also suggest that you devise some kind of catch mechanism that would prevent the dowel from slipping out and sending the mattress down on your neck.

Quote:
quote:Originally posted by DHenry

Cut a round dowel long enough to hold up the bed while you get your things out of the storage area.
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Old 04-13-2012, 05:24 PM   #9
helmick
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Our queen mattress is over 16 inchs thick, Rose has no problem getting things out from under it by her self. The original struts always hold it up.
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Old 04-13-2012, 05:39 PM   #10
firetrucker
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By any chance does it have a foam topper on it? Those things are heavy!!

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Old 04-13-2012, 05:55 PM   #11
Chasnracin
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You say you changed out your king for a queen? What all did you have to change out to do that? DW prefers a queen so she doesn't have to trek a football field to find me at night.
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Old 04-13-2012, 07:08 PM   #12
bob n pam
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We had that problem in our 2955 when we added a good mattress. We just changed the gas struts out for stronger ones and that solved the problem. It also made lifting the bed easier.
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Old 04-13-2012, 08:01 PM   #13
Wayne and Carolyn Mathews
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Chasnracin, our carpenter friend trimmed each side of the bed platform so that the bed base would fit the size of our queen mattress. The queen measured 60" wide; we had the board cut to a width of 58" so that we didn't bang our knees on the bed base when we were around it. It took less than 3 minutes for our friend to cut both sides for us. The queen mattress has the regular corners on it, not the rounded corners like our OEM did, and is still a perfect fit/size for the bedroom. Boy, do I like the extra space around the bed, too!

By the way, the bed base widens under the windows on either side of the bed. Our friend didn't cut that area--just the part of the base that extends over the platform area. Not cutting that area left us a bit of room to stash a book or box of tissue, etc., in an easily accessible place right by the bed.

Carolyn
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Old 04-14-2012, 04:17 AM   #14
steelpony5555
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We have a residential queen with a 3 inch topper and the struts hold it up. Yeah it is thick and we have to get a running start to jump up on it but man do we sleep good lol lol.
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Old 04-14-2012, 07:29 AM   #15
DonandJudy_12
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Heavier duty struts will solve your problem- That is how we solved the problem when we went from rv king to "short" queen- We sure sleep better and the extra space is also very welcome- JMHO- Don
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Old 04-14-2012, 07:50 AM   #16
CamillaMichael
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Quote:
quote:Originally posted by 8.1al

Maybe you can replace the gas struts under the bed with stronger ones
When we contacted Keystone about upgradding our mattress, the rep suggested upgrading the struts if there was a problem lifting the mattress...to date, no problems (we too went from the stock king to memory foam queen).
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Old 04-14-2012, 08:37 AM   #17
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We have the ComfortAire and a pillow topper as well - both are quite heavy. We bought 130 pound gas springs from McMaster-Carr for about 12 bucks a piece plus $5 for overnight shipping.
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Old 04-15-2012, 03:42 AM   #18
Wayne and Carolyn Mathews
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snfexpress, thanks so much for the source for better struts. Did they fit the original holes (for the factory-installed ones), or did you have to start over with new holes or a new placement for the struts?

We love sleeping on the new queen mattress, which came from the queen bed in our home after we sold it. We do have a foam topper on the mattress, so that's the source of some added weight. I couldn't believe, however, that it takes two of us to lift that bed now. On a positie note, we don't regret the changeout of mattresses or going from a king to a queen. It's so nice to be able to actually move around in the bedroom.

Carolyn
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Old 04-16-2012, 05:46 AM   #19
snfexpress
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I did add a bracket to spread the force over a bigger area because of the increase in weight on the bed but the struts do just change out - you use the old hardware with the new strut.

The struts I ordered were these:



Seems the price went up a couple of bucks in last couple of years...
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Old 04-17-2012, 03:10 AM   #20
Wayne and Carolyn Mathews
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Thanks, Michael and Kat, for the info. After struggling with the bed again last night, Wayne is just about to admit that we definitely need stronger struts. I don't think our mattress is as heavy as some of the fancy air-filled ones, but still, it's a pain to lift when I need into that storage area.

Carolyn
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