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What happens when a child or adult with disabilities grows too large for a traditional special needs bed? When you find them tangled in the safety rails, or hanging over the edge? No different than with any other person - you get a bigger bed. In these pictures, provided by his parents, Joel tests his new queen size bed.
This bed has some neat features suggested by his parents... it has a bookcase for a headboard (with the lower shelf about 6 inches above the mattress so it is accessible from inside the bed), side rails on both sides, and a bookcase as a footboard. There is 18 inches clear height under the bed, so the existing trundle bed could be stored there, bringing the mattress to about 30 inches above the floor. The primary wood is solid red oak and red oak furniture grade plywood. |
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The rails are designed to stay up by themselves, or a safety pin can be inserted to "lock" the rails up (see the picture above, at the foot of the bed). To lower the rails, the upper rail is pushed towards the head, and they pivot down below the mattress level, and into the bookcase at the head. Rails are provided on both sides of the bed, and operate independently... here one set is down, and the far side is still up. |
The foot board consists of this bookcase with adjustable shelves, but the back and center divider of the bookcase are designed to take the load of the bed. The "foundation" of the bed is a high strength "torsion box" that supports the mattress directly, without a separate box spring set. As shown, in Red Oak, $1,900 plus delivery |
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This design can be adapted for any size bed, including custom sizes. In this case a queen size mattress was used, 60 inches wide and 80 inches long. The 3 inch thick foundation has sides that provide a "box" to hold the mattress, about 62 by 82 inches, giving room to tuck sheets and blankets under the edge of the mattress. (The 3 rail supports on each side take part of this space). The rail design assumes a mattress about 10 to 12 inches thick, a common thickness, but some of the new mattresses are dramatically thicker, and would require some adjustments to the design.
The bookcase at the foot is about 37 inches high and 14 inches deep - only an inch or two above the rails when up, but not so high that it blocks the view from the bed. The bookcase at the head has special slots to receive the rails as they are lowered, which requires that the bookcase be at least 15 inches deep. The height of the lower shelf can be determined by the needs of the user - taller if desired to lean against with a pillow, or shorter so the user can reach the contents of the shelf when lying flat in bed. The second shelf, in addition to the top of the head-end bookcase is optional - in this case the head unit is about 56 inches tall. The very long shelves at the head are not adjustable because of the support required.
The bed could be built very close to the floor, or with the traditional 7-8 inches clearance under the bed (which would leave the top of the mattress about 22-23 inches high since a box spring is not normally required), or so the top of the mattress could be at the normal bed height (28 to 30 inches), or even taller.
The wood can be selected to match other furniture in the home... cherry, pecan, walnut, maple, oak, or any of the other furniture wood choices.
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