TenuredVulture wrote:Bucky wrote:TenuredVulture wrote:So, is it a bad idea to put a water bed in a second story bedroom?
"it depends"
best to ask someone who is familiar with you home's particular construction. maybe you live in an area that was built up at the same time by the same builder? generally, i'd say most residential construction could handle it, but there's plenty of cases where they've come crashing through the ceiling. never in a WFO log cabin of course
It was hypothetical, as I have no interest in acquiring a waterbed, and I live in a one story house with a slab foundation anyway. But, one time, I had a roommate in what I presumed was a pretty cheaply renovated Queen Village row house who started to fill a water bed on the 3rd floor, and I might have been imagining it, but it looked like the floor was starting to buckle. In any event, it seemed like a really, really bad idea.
Most floors are designed to handle 40-50 pounds per square foot of dead load. A California King waterbed mattress weighs about 1900 pounds which works out to around 45 lbs/sq ft. so it's definitely cutting it close. A floor inside the structure doesn't have the same risks associated with lateral loads that a porch does so it's not AS inherently dangerous but I'd still have the floor framing checked to ensure it can handle the load. Doubling up the floor joists is an easy way to deal with it, possibly packing an additional stud in the bearing walls and down into the foundation. But really, no one should have a waterbed primarily because they are sacks of filth.
