| I am finding that the materials for a beckley and other handmades are not very expensive, and I would like to construct my own bed using wool batting, latex and a cuddle bed to top it. I need to find a high support pocket coil system in a box and some natural form of fire retardant. I know that several of you have done mattress surgery. Hoping you have some suggestions, as I do not trust the coil systems in the commercial mattresses and cannot get info on them in any case. wondering if leggett and platt would sell it to me retail. any ideas? thanks |
| Cotton felt and cotton batting are not the same thing. cotton felt is used in upholstery. looks to be about 1/2 inch thick. In the cutaway I saw for the Shifmans, they used 8 to ten inches thick of cotton felt. a whole lot. the comfort layer - dacron, wool, latex combination - was on top of that. Cotton felt is sold in rolls. I saw it on ebay but you could buy it from anyplace that sells upholstery materials or from a shop that does it. as for the coils, you remember correctly. I read the same threads. I just looked at a 5 year old simmons. coils were worthless.had been "firm" but felt like mush. I also looked at a 10 year old handmade shifman. coils in both the mattress and box were shot. had originally been an extra firm and now bounced like a trampoline. coils in the box seemed to have just died. so I doubt that the simmons pocket coils have much of a lifespan. I do think that the lower gauge is what I need . and open offset. so that is what I am now looking for. did find a stearns and foster with 12 3/4 coils. I have not seen it yet, so don't know how good they are. I will let you know. the one advantage to buying vs. making is getting a two sided mattress. I don't think I have the stamina or the budget to do this whole thing twice. |
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I may visit an upholstery shop sometime soon. I went to Joanne's and the cotton batting for quilts was really bad, it has cotton pieces that are not cleaned and rough. Isn't felting was the wool puddle pad is? That is dense then according to Budgy, and it looks like it is now that I look at the picture again. I want fluffy. |
| you may want fluffy on top, but this is not topper material, it is the muscle of the mattress. there are wool toppers that will give you that . just discovered holland maid offset coils - gold bond uses them in some models. and aireloom and shifman. so now I understand why those beds felt so great to me. it was that coil system. that is what I will be looking for. |
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okay. here ya go. you can buy all materials from hickory springs, maker of the holland maid coil units. http://www.hickorysprings.com/2008/Locations.html I am going to call them today, so I will report back what I find out. |
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Are you positive that Shifman uses cotton felt? All of the cotton felt layers I have seen in a mattress basically look like this:
The stuff is just recycled junk cotton materials....it does NOT hold its shape very well at all. It is suitable to use one or two layers of this directly over the springs to prevent coils from damaging other upholstery materials (coconut coir is better for this job), however I would not use any more than this. Cotton batting can also be purchased in rolls: This is also usually made of new non-recycled materials. It will be more comfortable than cotton felt, it will still ultimately compress which is why if you are going to make a DIY mattress it is important to be able to know how to 'tuft' the fillings into place. This is the problem with going for either of these materials for a DIY build...its simply challenging work. |
Hey Budgy, thanks much for your input on this. I was just thinking, "Hmmm, I'm going to ask Budgy about this", and then there you were in the next response!  Now that you've gotten yourself into this: I really have been wanting to try a layer of cotton and/or wool and I think I have the patience to make it work. But I have no idea of what it is I need to do! Can you explain to me what you mean when you say that you have to "tuft the fillings into place"? I wonder if there's any explanation of this process to be found on the net or anywhere? Or if it is something that only an "old time" mattress maker would know how to do? And surely anyone working for a mattress co. isn't going to show me... (unless I could infiltrate... get a job at a local custom mattress manufacturer, perhaps...!) As I think I mentioned earlier, I have a futon full of what looks like cotton batting. It surely can't be that time consuming to do if cheap futons use it, right? And actually the futon seems pretty comfy for most people who've slept on it. We've had no complaints even when pushing guests for criticism of it, offering them other options, etc. Olenska, do you have a link to show us where you got your info re Shiffman's mattresses using cotton felt or batting etc.? (I'll do a search but if you have one handy...) budgy wrote: Are you positive that Shifman uses cotton felt? All of the cotton felt layers I have seen in a mattress basically look like this:
The stuff is just recycled junk cotton materials....it does NOT hold its shape very well at all. It is suitable to use one or two layers of this directly over the springs to prevent coils from damaging other upholstery materials (coconut coir is better for this job), however I would not use any more than this. Cotton batting can also be purchased in rolls: This is also usually made of new non-recycled materials. It will be more comfortable than cotton felt, it will still ultimately compress which is why if you are going to make a DIY mattress it is important to be able to know how to 'tuft' the fillings into place. This is the problem with going for either of these materials for a DIY build...its simply challenging work. This message was modified May 26, 2010 by jimsocal
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| Thanks for the pictures Budgy, that is helpful. Do you happen to know the width of the cotton batting rolls? I know I have seen this at the upholstery supply shop. I just wondered if I made a "quilt" type topper with the typical quilter's stitch by hand I could tolerate it. This would not be washable though would it? |
| Cotton batting is washable, however you have to take into account the shrinkage. So you have to build it oversized. It might shrink as much as 10~15% depending on how its all quilted. |
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Thanks Budgy, I will make it much larger than 60x80 than. Did you know how wide and thick the batting is? Is it always the same everywhere? I am going to go to the upholstery supply shop and take a look sometime. 1/2 hour away, so I just wanted to do the math first. It could bunch up and be a mess in the wash if it is not really quilted well wouldn't it? May be a huge project the more I think about it. Do they sell wool batting anywhere? I know the upholstery shop locally here has only cotton. The reason I would want wool over cotton is dust mites and cotton, versus wool and no dust mites (according to legend) LOL. |
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well the cotton might actually be better for this than generic wool as it is washable. most wool is not going to take to washing well. ive never actually bought cotton batting before, i would imagine whoever sells it would have to know the specs on it, width, and how thick it is or they measure it in GSM or oz per yd. |