Mattress Material in the V-Berth

[Brent Swain]

I use sampson polyester with PVC saturation. No moisture can penetrate it. Far cheaper and far tougher than naugahyde, and comes in 5 ft width, which lets me cover both setee cushions with two meters. Gave up on porous covers decades ago, and would never go back to fabric covers, Have never had a mold problem. Don't like sleeping on plastic ? Put a blanket over it. No problem.

[sandy daugherty]

I sweat, and prefer a dry bed, but one that keeps me dry at nigh is going to absorb a lot of humidity during the day. What are YOUR solutions?

[Sailabel]

Latex foam. When we replaced our innerspring mattress a couple of years ago, we struggled with going with either latex foam or another innerspring. After a couple of years living aboard... no regrets the the latex... in fact it is more comfortable than our previous 'land based' bed. The foam does not support mold growth... which is great for on a boat. We place a memory foam pad (one with lots of small holes in it for a bit of ventilation) and a standard mattress cover over that.

Our mattress sits on top of a vented pad, but during a winter in San Francisco, we were plagued with condensation and wet bedding. Our solution: line the hull around the mattess with the silver insulation (rolls available from any home improvement center) and then place 'dry dek' between the hull and bedding.... therefore allowing ventilation all the way around, insulation to control condensaton, and bedding not in contact with anything except the drydek and mattress. It worked for us.

You can purchase the latex foam from several suppliers, or have a mattress made to your specs. I'm sure that there are many comfortable innerspring mattresses... but for us: latex foam.

[Brent Swain]

We all sweat. A blanket under you solves the problem, but sampson stops it and any other water from getting into the mattress in the first place. In BC, when winter cruising, once your foam gets wet, it stays wet for the season. It's very important to keep water out in the first place.

[JiffyLube]

Reading everyone's solutions with their mattresses got me thinking about what people have used for salon cushions, since sometimes extra guests have had to sleep on them.