In this instructable (My first) I will show you the basic, easy process of hanging your own bed from your ceiling. This is a great way to get that extra POW factor to your room. The reason I finally did this project is my bed spring wouldn't cut the last corner downstairs into my bedroom.
When I was making it I wasn't sure if people would go for it or think I was a freak, but it turned out to be great. The weight limit is 600 pounds if done properly, so you have about 500 people pounds after the mattress and wood weight. This is enough for almost any couple to safely sleep and with proper safety should never fail sans advanced warning.
This bed is also adjustable. I can make X's with the cable to raise it around 5.5 feet above the floor. Also, making the wire loops "longer" lowers the bed. Please buy plenty of cable so you too can adjust your bed to the right height. I am just short of 6 feet and I can crawl up just fine, but most need a stool or chair, keep this in mind along with the added risk of having a bed 4 feet off the ground.
There are a few requirements for your dwelling you need to make this happen. I would hate for you to start chopping up your place to find no trusses to hang from. Before you begin you should know you will probably only be able to do this is you live in a house (duplex, town home ect) and NOT an apartment. From my experience of building homes and living in apartments those of you will be out of luck :-(
I recently finished this instructable as it was only half completed for a long time; reason I believe for low rating (IMO)
If you like this please rate 5 stars*****
When I was making it I wasn't sure if people would go for it or think I was a freak, but it turned out to be great. The weight limit is 600 pounds if done properly, so you have about 500 people pounds after the mattress and wood weight. This is enough for almost any couple to safely sleep and with proper safety should never fail sans advanced warning.
This bed is also adjustable. I can make X's with the cable to raise it around 5.5 feet above the floor. Also, making the wire loops "longer" lowers the bed. Please buy plenty of cable so you too can adjust your bed to the right height. I am just short of 6 feet and I can crawl up just fine, but most need a stool or chair, keep this in mind along with the added risk of having a bed 4 feet off the ground.
There are a few requirements for your dwelling you need to make this happen. I would hate for you to start chopping up your place to find no trusses to hang from. Before you begin you should know you will probably only be able to do this is you live in a house (duplex, town home ect) and NOT an apartment. From my experience of building homes and living in apartments those of you will be out of luck :-(
I recently finished this instructable as it was only half completed for a long time; reason I believe for low rating (IMO)
If you like this please rate 5 stars*****
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Signing UpStep 1: First Step is Gathering Supplies
The hardest thing I had to do what make the (economical and safety) choices to ensure the best way to DIY. The trip to Home Depot should only take one try. I bought everything I needed from there and spent about $90.00
8" Wall or ceiling hooks (x 16)
3/32" Coated wire (x 60 Feet)
3/32" Wire Clamps (x 16)(-Come in 3 Packs)
Same Thread SAFETY NUTS (x 32 TO ENSURE THE CLAMPS NO NOT SLIP)
2" x 4" Board (x 4)(-84" Boards)
84" x 60" Plywood Sheet (x 1)
Drill of Choice
I wanted this project to be safe as well as fun. It puts me to sleep faster than Ambien and Scotch. It should be noted this bed moves with your natural body movement. Until I slept in this bed it wasn't something that was clear to me. When suspended you are able to moves forward backward and side to side without much resistance, and this is what can makes some folks feel motion sickness. To my understanding it is just a false sense of security many beds provide that this one does not. It moves exactly reflective of your own movement.
When I said this project was rated to 600 pounds that is the amount the weakest link can safely ensure. The weight rating on the Hooks is 75 lbs. per on a vertical load. (That drops to 35 for a horizontal load) This means that with 8 hooks the vertical safe load is 600 lbs. The cable is doubled over and rated at 320 pounds, so each loop is viable at 640 lbs. The clamps have a rating of 200 lbs. and since we are using 2 clamps per loop of cable this is overall a very safe setup.
Hook Load (8 X 75LBS = 600lbs)
Cable Load (640 X 8 = 5120 lbs)
Clamp Load (200 X 16 = 3200 lbs
8" Wall or ceiling hooks (x 16)
3/32" Coated wire (x 60 Feet)
3/32" Wire Clamps (x 16)(-Come in 3 Packs)
Same Thread SAFETY NUTS (x 32 TO ENSURE THE CLAMPS NO NOT SLIP)
2" x 4" Board (x 4)(-84" Boards)
84" x 60" Plywood Sheet (x 1)
Drill of Choice
I wanted this project to be safe as well as fun. It puts me to sleep faster than Ambien and Scotch. It should be noted this bed moves with your natural body movement. Until I slept in this bed it wasn't something that was clear to me. When suspended you are able to moves forward backward and side to side without much resistance, and this is what can makes some folks feel motion sickness. To my understanding it is just a false sense of security many beds provide that this one does not. It moves exactly reflective of your own movement.
When I said this project was rated to 600 pounds that is the amount the weakest link can safely ensure. The weight rating on the Hooks is 75 lbs. per on a vertical load. (That drops to 35 for a horizontal load) This means that with 8 hooks the vertical safe load is 600 lbs. The cable is doubled over and rated at 320 pounds, so each loop is viable at 640 lbs. The clamps have a rating of 200 lbs. and since we are using 2 clamps per loop of cable this is overall a very safe setup.
Hook Load (8 X 75LBS = 600lbs)
Cable Load (640 X 8 = 5120 lbs)
Clamp Load (200 X 16 = 3200 lbs
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Saw one of these on an HGTV show, only it was low to the ground, so if it ever broke, you would only fall 1-2 ft. Also tried one of these in a small geodesic dome cabin. It was suspended in the middle of the room, was round and maybe 2 ft. off the ground. The most comfortable bed I ever tried!
we bought a house and took possession on nov 1st. we have very little furniture (largely thanks to a house fire) and the set we bought for our daughter, while an excellent value (highboy dresser, long dresser, mirror, student desk, and hutch, all for $250) did not come with the bed (didn't survive 3 girls jumping on it, apparently.
so we've been going around and around the block about her bed - we're kinda grossed out at the thought of buying a second-hand bed anyway but when we blocked out a twin, holy hannah, she'll have no floor left at all! so we thought of a loft bed but she's afraid of sleeping up there and brand new, they're pricey (if we buy to at least coordinate with the rest of the furniture).
now, we have a solution! we can put the bed low as she wants or put it right up high to free up floor space. we can use pretty chain instead of basic cable - thread it with ribbons, use s-hooks to hang stuffies, drape fabric through the ceiling hooks to create a canopy. instead of ribbons, use vines with leaves and flowers.
the best part? because the bed is so cheap to build, we can splash out on the mattress and linens!
w00Tw00T!
Well, that just sounds awesome. If you had high ceilings you could actually build out the surrounding areas to have the bed go into a recessed area of the ceiling.
Has anyone ever seen anything like this? I'm going to be getting a new house shortly and we're having discussions about our guest room and where I will have an office. I prefer not to have air mattresses for our guests since some of them are getting older now. If I could have something out of the way in the ceiling that might be really fun and useful.
I build a tree "house" for my son that was suspended between two tree trunks using eye bolts screwed into the trees and heavy chains. Hanging the platform from the tree trunks allowed the trees to sway in the breeze without destroying the tree house. I used a set of light chains on the bottom to stabilize the whole thing so it couldn't sway more than about an inch in any direction. You could do something similar by running cables or chains to adjacent walls (or the floor) to limit the range of motion.
Why are you using hooks in the 2x4s at all when you could simply loop the cable under them? Cost would be reduced and maybe strain on the cables too.
I would slide the clamps up to the top near the hooks so you don't poke yourself or snag bedding on the sharp ends of the cables or the bolts.
Finally, I'd check the cable specs and use much beefier hooks to hang the bed. The safety issue isn't so much for the person on the bed as for the person or objects under it.
Thanks for all your support for my first instructable!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyatt_Regency_walkway_collapse - Due to a miscalculation where it looked like they could get away with two lengths of threaded rod rather than one really long length that didn't fit on a truck. A nut failed and caused the whole thing to collapse even though the engineers thought that it was at the 4x standard. Just from people standing on it.
I know this is for your own fun. Just make sure you are all the way on your bed, so you have a nice soft landing, rather than half way on or off. I would suggest a superman entry to evenly spread the load at all times. :) But land vertical so that there isn't too much swinging and denting of walls. ;)
If you're making sexy time in your bed and your doing it at its natural frequency = resonance. The thing starts swinging like mad ;)
But then again you have the same problem with a bed with long supports...
you need to take a look at how you should use the aircraft cable with an Crosbys. Also those hooks are 1) not rated for a live load AND 2) NOT RATED FOR AN OVERHEAD LOAD.
where are the moderators on this!!
The bed is functional and it works for him. I don't intend on drilling a line of holes through my ceiling to find the studs to hang my bed from but it's an interesting idea.
The discussions on the thread suggest that is might not be that safe, fair enough. As with all instructables, copy at your own risk. The sensible person will look at the instructable and then the comments and improve upon the design. Leave it up so we all learn.
Would more wires help? Surely enough wire would cope with any load (have its own weight which might cause problems with the ceiling but...)
Also if the wire at the top was cut and double over the top hook like it is around the bottom hook would would that double the load the wires can take?
One, looping the cable over the hook doesn't count as double the strength of the cable; consider the point of failure where it bends around the hook. You have only one cable there, not two, and in fact it is kinked there. The actual strength for the loop of cable is certainly less than the cable's stated strength - I would estimate 50% (160 lbs) tops. The proper way to terminate the cable ends (and approach the 320 lb rating) is with a "thimble" eye loop and a crimped ferrule.
You also fail to take the plywood and 2x4s into consideration, although honestly you're probably okay there.
Most problematic, though is that your calculations assume the load to be evenly distributed over all eight cables. Let's say a 150 lb person climbs onto the bed by the corner. The motion of climbing increases their momentary weight to maybe 200 lbs, and I'd guess that at least 50% of the force would be directed onto that one corner, and the rest by the adjacent cables, at least until the person gets settled in the bed. So at that moment both hooks on that corner are subject to ~100 lbs of force, not even counting the weight of the mattress and frame, which easily exceeds their 75 lb rating. This is what studer.steven was referring to as a "live" load.
When one cable fails in this bed, the adjacent cables are shocked with a sudden extra load, leading to a potentially cascading failure.
You should know that you are adding additional stress to the ceiling (which might be ok if you aren't overloading the floor above, but definitely not ok on the top floor of your house (the attic/roof may not have been designed strong enough for that additional load).
Pretty clever solution to the "I can't get by bed springs downstairs" problem.