Hello AT,
I saw a show recently [Small Space, Big Style], where a woman was in a small NYC apartment. She had a mechanical lift that would raise her bed to the ceiling when not in use. Any idea where to shop for this? I have searched the internet but to no avail.
It would be a great solution for my apartment. My biggest challenge is that I have to chose between a sofa and a bed...no space for both. I have tried futons (not comfortable), and have no space for a murphy bed. This mechanical lift looked like the perfect solution to hide my bed away when I have a guest over to watch TV.
I live in a 350' apartment in NYC, with 2 small dogs, AND I work from home... now that's a small space...Lisa
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I've also seen a Murphy bed which when folded up, had sort of a banquette built into it, which may give you the best of both worlds.
The disadvantage of the Murphy bed is that you don't have the exciting possibilities offered by having hardened suspension points in your ceiling...
The device is also shown off in this book...it was definitely custom made for the space...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0810991055/103-8232819-8187039?v=glance&n=283155&s=books&v=glance
The key here is that when in the "down" position the bed was supported on three corners by built in cabinets. Therefor the lift only had to be strong enough to support the unladen bed in the "up" position and one corner in the "down" position.
Provided you had sturdy beams to anchor the motors to this is not a crazy construction project. It is, however, something you would likely have to hire an engineer for if you don't have the motor knowledge.
If I'm remembering the show right, it looked like the bed descended on wide "ribbons", most likely of some sort of sail material (which can be VERY strong).
Mechanically I'm guessing you are looking at about $500 worth of motors, and perhaps another few hundred worth of anchors, proper bed supporting cabling and rollers.
Remember that when suspending a "live" weight like a person you should have a safty tolerance of at least 10 times the expected weight. So if your bed weighs 100 pounds, and you and your two very close friends weigh a combined 400-500 pounds you are looking at a rig that has to support at least 6000 pounds.
This means each corner should be able to support at least 1500 pounds when in the "down" position. I'm guessing you wouldn't be raising it up with people in it.
So for the lady in the show's situation I'm guessing she only had to worry about super solid support for that one free corner, leaving the rest of the corners supported by her shelving.
Wonderful idea stolen from the great Gene Kelly movie "An American in Paris." Growing up, my dad glued a huge wooden train track onto painted plywood. When not in use, the board was hoisted up to the ceiling of our bedroom. We loved it!
i saw the segment about this bed, it's an offbeat answer to the small space problem. i just think it's better to let a bed be a bed. that bed does make make me wonder, do the motors make noise when it's lowered? doesn't it remind you of a certain scene from the movie frankenstein?
Yes, you wouldn't want to miss out on hardened suspension points.
Jay! My grandfather made just such a thing as that for my dad and my uncle when they were kids on their back porch and they loved it! Actually, for a minute, back in 1998, there was an apartment that I looked at that had a particular nook within it that I was going to do just such a bed as this, and while I was thinking about it, I went to the Murphy bed place, and looked around, to see if they had a way to do that method -- they didn't. Anyway, I didn't end up getting that apartment, so I ended up getting a different place, and a Murphy bed worked well.
But for that moment that I was going to be in that first one, I did several drawings of ways I was going to build corner column thing that I thought would look fantastic. I threw away those drawings when I didn't get the apartment, and now I can't remember for the life of me exactly how I figured it out to work.
You should look at the Trek motor home made by Safari (I think) They have exacltly that system at it sure seems like a great use of limited space to me.