I am posting this now because someone asked a question on Facebook.
So I have this basic pervasive, recurrent problem in life: I am significantly larger than the average or median human being, in at least two dimensions, which often leads to difficulty fitting in commercially designed spaces. this is not something that people who are of average size tent to think much about, but it’s a big problem if you’re over 6 feet tall and or over 200 pounds. Vehicles, homes, bedding all create issues. I cannot drive most sports cars, and a majority of compact pickups and SUVs such as even the popular Toyota Tacoma and 4runner are off limits. I outgrew my regular twin bed by ninth grade and as an adult I struggled with queen beds before eventually realizing only king and “twin XL” would work. When I buy a camping vehicle it’s an issue as well: my class B required that I sleep diagonally, and most smaller trailers have no viable beds for me. When I bought my SUV I needed a three-row to have enough rear space to camp properly.
But, before getting the trailer, I had already tried a custom mattress for my Volvo. I found a vendor, Mattress Insider, that sells fully custom mattresses at fair prices – in fact their regular prices work out about the same as the “sale” prices on a higher end “regular” mattress. My custom 30 by 80 pocket coil mattress, the “Park Meadow” model, was about $400 shipped with a generous return period – which I utilized to correct an initial measurement error. The mattress essentially cost the same “per square foot” as my Sealy Posturepedic at home, a king bought at an “all sizes for the price of twin” sale.
So the mattress in my case actually preceded the RV.
Anyway, I settled on the Winnebago Hike 100 1316SB for my camper when I decided car camping would not work for my big midlife crisis trip. The camper came with three beds, none of which fit me: an overhead loft “short queen” which is 60 by 68 inches, and two “bunk” benches that are even smaller at only 66” long. But, I already had the longer mattress, so literally at the dealership I just placed the custom mattress on top of one of the benches.
This was not ideal, because it left over a foot of mattress flapping in the breeze, plus the bench had a lot of extra material in the way with a backrest that was not easily removed. Well, it came off with four bolts, so easily enough.
Then the bottom… just two bolts hold it to the hinge:
… and those bolts come out easily.
Once the frame is out, the mattress comes off easily with a zipper:
It’s then straightforward to replace the frame without the mattress.
Now you have a rather simple platform bed. But, it’s still only 66” long. So it won’t support a full length mattress.
So I needed support for it.
Lowe’s will happily cut a sheet of plywood down to any size you want. I measured and planned out a size for the board and had them cut it. It was great fun and the dog loved it, everyone loved the dog, it was great. I chose water-fragile fiberboard and of course it started raining while I was there! But I got the trailer close enough to the door and made it out dry. Thank architects for awnings!
The Lowe’s clerk was happy to cut all of the planned pieces I needed, including the side supports.
Measure twice! And I did,.. and still made it too big.
The issue was the overhang. I measured and cut on the premise of having the mattress and at the hinge by the rear door like the original bench. But this didn’t work at all because it left a huge gap that my pillow and all sorts of other stuff fell into. And the support/wall could not be added to the wall side of the bed because it would block the hinge.
Instead, I reduced the whole thing in size and slammed the mattress against the back and side.
Time for more cutting – but I was far from home and had no such tools. Harbor freight for cheap clamps, Facebook Marketplace to get a nice Bosch saw for $15. This isn’t the ideal saw for ripping plywood, but it was good for other aspects. Namely the notch for the hinge:
… which lined up fine.
Now the side supports.
Just simple 1 by 4 beams. I bought one ten foot section and had various extra pieces left.
Oh yeah, put those legs back on… you may need to cut a small notch in your platform for part of the leg to fit.
Kind of the last part: attaching the side supports/walls
Just a handful of drywall screws. This was a mistake too, I would have to flip this piece later to make the hinge work again.
But ultimately that is the bed project. I took that leftover 1 by 4 piece and used it to secure gear in storage in the loft bed above.
By the way, here’s the right size storage bin to use the loft bed for storage:
Finished project looks great and sleeps a big guy comfortably:
