The Moldy Mattress Problem Solved... I think.

Another small example of using de Bono techniques to solve a little problem I was having:

A friend gave me a futon mattress that had been in storage too long and went to the trouble of re-building a bed stand for it so my bed is now off the floor. But the mattress was moldy, even if it wasn't apparent at the time. Going to the trouble of cleaning it, putting it out in the sun didn't seem to make any difference. With the assumption that cleaning it needed to be done a different way... (and the frustration of having spent a great deal of time on it already...)

PO: stuff it in the dryer until it catches on fire.
Observation: this makes a catchy little song to sing while I'm cleaning it to remind me that my cleaning efforts will never be done.
Observation: the dryer is hot.
Leading to: Is there a way to administer heat that would work like a clothes dryer, but not catch the futon on fire?
To use heat to kill mold by putting the mattress into a parked car and leaving it in a hot place for a number of days. (This is always possible where I live because there are so many micro-climates.)
To get/borrow a steam cleaner; put a mixture of tea tree oil, bleach & detergent in the steam cleaner or on the surface of the cover of the mattress...which area all known to kill the mold that has gone into the middle of the mattress... THEN put the mattress into the parked car to dry it out.
Black Hat: ...all the while going without a bed AND without a car. Because it will be a little stressful to drive in a car with mold in it. The mold spores will get into my car from the mattress, if the heat doesn't work to kill the mold.

Then I started thinking how sometimes I'm allergic to some sorts of clothes detergents. This shift to "allergy" rather than "cleaning" suggested a different solution... a mattress cover exists to help people deal with dust mites who are allergic - this cover could just as easily be applied to seal off mold!

But then the problem was - I don't have the money to buy this mattress cover. So...I started thinking about what else I could do to seal it up in the mean time. I realized I had save an old camping air bed which was flocked on one side that I could cut up, make a bag out of it and insert the mattress into it. I could cut it open, cut the baffles out of the inside of the camp mattress and tape it shut with good old duct tape after the futon mattress was inserted.

Wow! Instant solution with free materials! Now we'll see if it works...

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Danny Stevens on September 30, 2010 at 13:11

Great thinking work. I love the way things just took off when you found a new concept, changing from clean to allergy.

Using clean you had sterilise with heat, saturate with mould killers. Then the feasibility check and, no, wont do. A good example of thinking for reality, rather than an exercise.
Using allergy you quickly got to the idea of isolating the mould. Then a feasible solution.

I went from allergy to surgery. If your idea doesn't work, what about opening the futon up, getting at the mouldy stuffing to kill or replace, then stitch it back up?

Permalink Reply by Franis on October 2, 2010 at 12:52

Surgery - interesting provocation.
The thing about mold is that once it gets somewhere, it's difficult to isolate it. It's sort of like cancer - it keeps popping up again and again, no matter what you do.

On the previous idea, after some experimentation:
After opening up the inside of the camp mattress, I realized the end result will be really lumpy - no matter how carefully I'm cutting it. So I've decided to wait until I have the money to buy the "real" mattress cover. This is what I decided after doing a PMI comparison list on the various advantages/disadvantages of buying the mattress cover vrs. crafting a cover out of plastic/camp mattress - I decided it was worth the money.
Here are some of the positive points:
the market mattress cover:
won't slide on the surface of the mattress
isn't vinyl, so won't make you sweat
Will fit the mattress, so won't need to be taped together
won't need to have the necessary skill of snipping the baffles apart on the camp mattress without putting a hole in it accidentally
will allow me to use the camp mattress on the surface of my station wagon instead

Hey - if we teach this thinking skill stuff to people who are consumers, then having ways to evaluate products will become second nature. People won't settle for stuff that is badly designed.

OOO, just noticed that something is wrong with the chat window and I can't close it. So it looks as if I can't respond here because I can't get the chat window out of the way to hit "send." ...yet another real=life problem that I'll need to use thinking skills to solve.... That ended up being solved through patience, and copying what I'd already written here so I could post it later.

Permalink Reply by Franis on October 2, 2010 at 12:53

I still have to wait before I will have the money to buy the mattress cover. So I'm open to more thinking on this subject if people want to take a stab at it.

Permalink Reply by Franis on May 22, 2012 at 1:51

Continuing along the line of "what do I do in the meantime?"

Appraising my situation, realized that I had available two air mattresses. One was leaking and one was OK to use, but there was no reason that I could not also use the "good" air mattress as well as the leaking one to seal mold. So the other air mattress came into play, deflated, to cover the slightly moldy futon mattress more completely. So I put both of them on top of the moldy mattress, tucked them under the futon so the sheets didn't actually come in contact with the moldy futon and then put bed pads on top of them. This worked for some time, but the two air mattresses moved around over time, despite sticky yoga pad being inserted beneath them to prevent that happening.

Then I happened to be wondering around a hardware store and discovered a "storage bag" for mattresses on sale. The main problem with his solution is it isn't thick enough to exist for very long without getting a hole in it. This implies "painting" or spraying the mattress storage bag to make it more durable. I'm open to using other means to make it more durable other than spray paint - so let's see about using thinking on that idea...

Any suggestions about this?

Another point is, once the futon mattress is inside of the storage bag, it will seal in any moisture as well as seal out air.

So now my other objective is to dry out the futon as much as possible before encasing it in this thin layer of plastic.
Suddenly Danny's idea of "surgery" is starting to look feasible, as is leaving it in a hot, parked car in a dry area for a few days before putting on the plastic outer covering.