Inflatable Air Bed 101

When most inflatable air beds spring a leak, their fate goes unnoticed for several hours. When owners finally spot signs of deflation in their bed, they become somewhat puzzled as to what they should do to find the origin of the leak. Fortunately, this process is not as complicated as it may initially seem. With the right tools and supplies, anyone can find the location of a pesky leak.

While we can dive right into utilizing some more complex methods to locate our leak, it is best to start simple. Take your deflated air bed into the quietest room in your home. It is very important that the room is far from any sources of noise – if it’s not we won’t be able to hear our leak. Unravel the air bed and inflate it as you normally would. Now, grab the nearest person in your home and ask them to apply some pressure to the top of the bed. They can apply pressure with either their hands, or by sitting down on the bed. As the person applies force to the bed, you’re job is to listen around for any leaks. If you happen to find none, flip the mattress over and repeat the process. Once you’ve located the leak (or leaks), you need to go ahead and patch it. We’ve walked you through this process in our Patching Guide [patching].

Shall you be unable to find the leak with the process described above, we have an alternative pathway you can take. First, you need to obtain a bucket in which you can store some soap water. To reduce the chances that you’ll have to constantly refill it, we recommend using a mid-sized one. Take the bucket, poor some cool water into it and drop a soap bar inside. Allow the soap to dissipate in the water for at least a minute. Once the water becomes soapy, remove the bar and swap it with a sponge. Now take your bucket and relocate alongside your inflatable air bed.

Now that our sponge has been allowed to soak, we need to squeeze it of any excess water it may have absorbed. When you’re though with squeezing, begin gliding the sponge alongside all the faces of your air bed. If your air bed’s topside is flocked (covered with a velvet-type material), you need to refrain from applying any soapy water to it. As you’re sponging your air bed, be diligent in trying to spot any bubble formations. If you notice than an area of your bed is constantly spawning new bubbles, chances are good that a leak is located somewhere in the vicinity. Once you’ve finished sponging the entire bed and locating all the leaks, you need to patch them using either the patches provided by your manufacturer, or those obtained from a home improvement store.

We hope that we’ve done an appropriate job of informing you how to uncover leaks which may exist on your inflatable air bed. We encourage you to attempt to fix these leaks as opposed to tossing your air bed altogether.

Image Courtesy: Charley Lhasa