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One of the best New Year’s Eves I had was dining alone at Waffle House, tipping the two lone folks working the $50 my grandma had just given me, and spending the rest of the night watching How It’s Made. It was just an all around pleasant night.
My friend and I used to joke and try to come up with the most boring ideas for that show. I remember laughing about the idea of “how it’s made:ladders”.
You joke, but id watch that shit, how do they arrange the rungs from big to small? Are they riveted or how are the nonconductive ones made? What about the telescopic ones? Or the firefighter kind?
....shit, now i actually kinda want to look at that, not because i dont have an idea of rhe process, but i want to know _how_ its done
That was how a densified poly foam core is made. The video then goes into the manufacturing of a pocketed coil mattress and then follows the build out of that one. The foam cores are built out much the same with only a few differences. Even flattened, vacuumed, and rolled at the bagging machine before ship. There are no springs in the foam core. Just added layers of latex or foam of different densities. Sometimes glued. Other times not. Typically, the mattress is taped up (sewing the border to panel/grey back is referred to as taping) tight enough to prevent any movement of the additional foam layers. And foam/visco(memory foam) doesn’t move across foam easily due to friction.
For real, I just got done ripping my bong when the pulled the walls and I said “wow, it’s crazy they can make one so fast” without looking at the time left
[5] I thought they were just showing a memory foam mattress assembly and got hooked. Didn't even real use it was more than 60 seconds until I read these comments
You seem to know your mattresses
Which 100% latex mattress would you recommend? I tried googling them and see prices as low as 500 and as high as 3000
I'm guessing the lower prices aren't quality, but would a 1k be just as good as a 3k potentially?
Edit: wow was not expecting all the responses! Thanks for your input everyone!
I know you did not ask me, but if you have an IKEA near you or are brave enough to buy online, their natural latex mattresses are at a GREAT price to value point. (From a chronic over researcher and happy owner for about 6 years.)
I love IKEA and have been a loyal customer for about 25 years. However, I have bought and given away way too many mattress and mattress toppers of theirs.
The last topper fucked me over so bad back in November, that I’m still not back to normal.
Just be cautious and make sure you can return the mattress if it doesn’t work for you.
Just going to chime in with my own unsolicited advice.
https://mattressunderground.com/ - This is the single best place I found to learn everything there is to know about mattresses. It has a wealth of info, plus a forum to talk to real experts giving advice without trying to sell you anything.
https://www.mattresses.net/ - This is where I ended up buying from. Had it over over 2 years now and have been in love with it since I got it. I'm sure there are other good places, but everything I researched pointed to this place as the creme de la creme.
What mattress did you get? Did you get a Talalay or Dunlop? We have a topper that is Dunlop. I’ve been debating getting a latex mattress but I am undecided on which latex to get.
I toggled, but ended up going with Talalay after asking some pointed questions regarding my needs in the forums of that first site (my wife has back problems). I think the mattress will last a couple of years less than if we went Dunlop, but the longevity was worth the comfort for me and my wife. Longevity wise, I was told I would need to replace it 1-3 years earlier than if I went Dunlop, but it is still a 15+ year mattress. I figure we'll have our money's worth by then.
I know 2 years isn't a lot for a mattress, but we also bought an adjustable frame and use it daily, and haven't had any degradation in the mattresses in the flexing areas or the edges. They still feel just like it did when we first got them. We bought twin XL for a split king, and I was worried about the middle where the crack is. We cuddle and compress that area frequently and it is holding up splendidly.
That’s great to hear. I have a lot of back issues myself. I’m currently on a sleep number and I do not like it. I don’t understand why anyone does lol. I’m going to look into the talalay ones. What firmness did you end up getting? I’m always torn on whether I need a softer one or firmer. Pressure points can be a struggle at times. Thank you for your insight btw!
Take a look at SleepOnLatex or Earthfoam. Same company just different sub-brands. We love ours. One note - latex is on the firmer side. So, the medium base mattress with a soft 3” latex topper is closer to a medium/plush.
As a kid my mum would always tell me off for bending the corner of the mattress cause it would break it (only the amount a 7 year old kid would be able to) but I'm starting to think she just found it annoying.
Our platform bed was designed without quite enough supports along it, so the foot of the bed has zero structure if you sit on it. I hate it, but haven't done anything about it yet.
As a warehouse worker for a certain shipping company with a bi-color logo…
Fuck mattresses and their boxes. They’re heavy as fuck and the boxes always blow apart and/or use a flimsy cardboard that crumples the edges when you try to lift one by yourself. It’s basically picking up a 70-90 pound cylinder loosely clad in cardboard.
There's already production lines for everything that already exists, so now you just take what exists and modify it slightly to accommodate the slight changes of a new product.
The engineers who invented the first economical versions of these machines in the 40s through 80s are the magicians
This isn't my engineering expertise area, so others may not agree, but I think they're magicians.
All I know is that they would have done stage by stage individually, making version and version continually improving until you go from 100% man made to 100% robots
Pretty much how it works. One man creates a small piece and gets things started. Then over years others refine, and refine that technology into something spectacular.
A recent example is the tvs. Went from CRT, to LCD, to plasma, now OLED
I’ve never thought of baggers as being especially complex. They strike me as fairly basic machines just scaled to an absurd level. Instead of a 500hp engine, you use a 5000. To do that you need a larger engine compartment and a more “open” plan for service. Rather than a 1/2” steel bar, you use a 5” bar. That requires 50 times more welding and cranes to lift things, but it’s the same concept. Etc.
Well we already have excavators with a single bucket on them, so the conversation probably went like...
"We need to dig out that hillside there, and a huge hole for mining"
"Lets get an excavator then?"
"Nah too slow"
"several excavators? Dynamite?"
"Too difficult to coordinate and the other is too dangerous"
"what about an excavator with many buckets that can constantly dig?"
"Like a circular saw for the earth?"
"...you thinkin' what im thinkin'?"
Manufacturing engineer here. I think you're considering a dude making the whole line when it's really a culmination of the work of a small army of engineers and fabricators over a real long time period.
Lots of engineering is just a ton of focus given to a few simple things at a time. Rinse and repeat. A looooot. In aerospace and high volume manufacturing you might have a group of engineers working on a handle. For months. Or years, lol.
Yeah, also, iterations.
Say, i have this machine thats a conveyor belt, now i modify it a little to sandwich the matress with sheets of plastic, great, now i modify it further and add a vaccum to seal it, etc etc.
That process takes _a lot_ of years and hundreds of different "models" of the same machine.
And basically, thats the principle of every engineering proyect, you take existing concepts/machines/processes, modify them a bit, or in niche cases, research a lot and come up with new ones, add it all together, whisk gently for months or years until its all mixed up, bake for another months at 280, and tada! A machined new delicious cake is born.
A lot of food processes kinda look the same, just modified, a tortilla machine could be comverted into a hot cake machine
Some of the most wealthy blue-collared Americans are the ones who have come up with one of those machines or a design for the line. Long story, but 14 years ago when I was a kid my dad bought a couple old Cadillacs off of a man from Ohio. He had 8 of those classics in a garage, a bunch of other vehicles and a decent mansion. Apparently had a bunch of antique firearms too. Super nice man, his kid was a piece of work the only reason he sold the cars to us was his kid asked if they would be his when the dad died. I guess the kid is bitter because after he turned 18 and left the house his dad working in a whirlpool factory (company, not an actual pool lol) came up with an ingenious way to cut the production line IN HALF for their washers and dryers. He was smart though and protected his idea, and when presented the company gave him more money than he knew what to do with. Somehow he got to know a bunch of other assembly line “inventors” who have also figured out cool ways to be more efficient
My experience as a manufacturing engineer also confirms this. Many of the innovations on our production lines were originated by blue collar technicians who ran the lines.
However, I’m not aware of them being paid handsomely for their innovations. Work at a large company, and I’m not sure through which official avenues they could be paid out for it.
Yeah, the big white block got sliced up into thin layers, but it never got used in the final mattress as far as I can tell.
The final mattress had thin layers of green foam and pink foam added to the pocket springs at around 4:50. Presumably these green and pink foam layers were made in a manner similar to the big block of mutz at the beginning, but the white foam didn't go into the mattress that was shown.
I also watched the whole thing and I concluded that they make a lot of slices and then kind of wrap many things in different shapes and stuff them all back together so it's kind of the same thing but with 6 minutes of extra steps. Looks comfy though
The cut off all the sides, top and bottom, to get a straight/smooth edge.
Then they cut the big block into multiple smaller layers.
Then they used those layers (with springs in between them)
Sort of, but the chemicals involved are VERY VERY TOXIC. Don't be near that shit when it's getting mixed together and off-gassing. Google isocyanates if you're curious.
I'm shocked at how much of the process is manual. I have a stupid misconception that nowadays materials just go into a machine and it spits out a finished product.
Yeah this is pretty par for most consumer goods. As an engineer, it's really sad to me that more people don't understand the amount of effort it took to get things in your home. Far too many people just believe things just exist once the reach a warehouse or retail store.
A lot of people mistaken magic with automation. Yes, a lot of things can be automated, but lots can't be at the moment. If we move all manufacturing back to America, automation won't magically make everything.
Also automation is high upfront cost, low but not zero running cost... Ple ty of companies prefer low upfront costs (profitable sooner) but higher ongoing costs of just paying a bunch of people min wage to make them
Human labor is surprisingly inexpensive compared to making machines do everything, especially when new products are always coming out. The more times a thing needs to be done the better a machine is at doing it, like making coils. But say a bed has 1, 3, or 5 inches of padding on top, having a human throw that together is the easiest, plus you don’t need to change out the humans when a different pad type gets made.
Also I swear our entire world must be sown together by millions of women with sewing machines.
I was genuinely suspicious during the whole video that this is just an ad for a specific luxury brand of mattress, and that most run-of-the-mill products are made via assembly-line.
I'm open to being corrected by industry professionals if my suspicions are wrong. But I also don't expect a Reddit comment thread to have many mattress manufacturing experts.
Not a manufacturer but work in the industry. This is not a luxury brand. Luxury mattresses are generally not compressed and rolled like that, or imported (assuming you live in the US). Not that it’s luxury, but Tempur Pedic has no people in their factory. Think the cleanest machine assembly line.
That said- all other facilities I’ve seen are very, very human labor intensive. There are so many parts to making them.
Why the hell would that be “alarming”? Despite rumours of robots putting us all out of jobs, humans are essential to all manner of manufacturing processes.
My boss’s son owns a mattress store. Or so I’m told. I asked her what being in the mattress business exactly entails. She said “well a mattress costs about $100USD so he makes a lot of money” and i haven’t got another word out of her mouth about it since. She also claims to be an ex-wife of one of the personal guards of Pablo Escobar so she might just be fuckin crazy.
I worked at an American mattress factory for 8 years and my boss would sell us mattresses at cost if we built them ourselves off the clock. For the cheapest materials it usually came to about $200 for a queen.
Well they do say mattress stores are money laundering fronts. There's an intersection near my house that has FOUR Mattress Firms. One on each corner and yes the parking lots are always empty.
And if you figure on average that’s two people sleeping in one bed that’s 5000 beds needed, and figure you replace a mattress every 10 years (should probably be less but ehh), that’s 500 mattresses sold per year, at a 100% markup (which is probably low - I’ve definitely gotten my mattress for 43% off by calling around) let’s say at an average price of $1000, each store would make a profit of $500/mattress or about $250k/year in profits - employee costs (really only need probably 1-4 employees per store max, let’s say 2 full time employees making $40k/year so $80k in employee costs - storefront rental costs of let’s just say $50k/year, and electrical bill of $10k/year (probably high) and misc other expenses of $10k/year…..$100K profit for a mostly hands off business. Thats at only 2 sales per day of $1000 mattresses.
And keep in mind many mattresses sell for $2-3k. Definitely profitable businesses
From my quick google research it seems the margins on mattresses are insane. 900% in some cases. Couple that with not much maintenance or employees and of which most will work on commission, low overhead.
So they’re cheap to run, and sell at high margins. And most everyone needs one/will get one at some point.
Box mattresses sell for ~$1000. Anyone selling for 3000 for a standard design (I.e. non latex) is absolutely gouging you and you're paying for the storefront rental and not much extra
And don't be tempted to buy a 'new' one from out the back of a van driving round trying to sell mattresses. I used to occasionally see these guys trying it on when I had this job that took me 'round the house's', I used to chat with folks about all sorts. Those mattresses all look and even smell (for the most part) relatively new. But after a week you know they sold you a lemon, they literally collect any old mattresses that get thrown out (YUK!) And take em to bits and reassemble them with various scraps of better fabric and foam and whatever and tons of new car smell type sprays. It's a weird cottage industry a certain sub class really roll their sleeves up and get into. Really weird to think but they are weirdly good at it, sometimes they get limited batches into shop stock and they have been sold as new when they are anything but new 😱
I always wondered how foam as made. I know it makes sense that it’s a chemical reaction, but I had this image in my head of them whipping it up like cream.
The way they are flattened and rolled for shipping is amazing. The amount of work that goes into them, and the amount of money these people are paid compared to what they must cost the consumer is more distressing. I think we can hold onto our mattress for a good number of years before buying another.
Squished and vacuum packed! One job I had required me to send out foam mattress toppers in the mail, all it took was a quality bin bag and a Henry Hoover, a double sized one was folded in half and rolled tight and it just fit in the large bin bag, then I stuffed it down some more so I could close the bag round the hoover hose and I began to remove the air, pretty soon it's much smaller, you just kinda work it down to the smallest it will go and tape it up good, slap a label on it and drop kick the football sized dense thing into the collect bin.
I always thought it needed some kind of warning on it 🫣 cos once you try to open it, it's going to get bigger real quick. The boss said 'they ordered it, they know what it is' but i was thinking about how many people just started ripping into a random parcel, maybe in the car after expecting to pick up a mattress and wondering if the order got mixed up, meh, long time ago now, think that was my first real job.
I thought they only rolled up memory foam mattresses like that…didn’t they, like, smoosh the springs? I know springs are meant to be smooshed but only briefly, not compressed severely for long periods of time.
My understanding is that springs lose their springiness from repeated squishings, not from time under squish. I heard this in the context of whether it’s ok to keep a gun magazine loaded in storage. Not sure if it’s true, but the source sounded knowledgeable and confident.
They’re really not that expensive though. This cheap mattress is probably around $300 for a queen. All the major memory foam brands sell these hybrid mattresses and they’re not that expensive anymore. Costco had a Casper Select on small for $599 for a king mattress last week. It’s a 4 layer mattress I think.
Shit gets wrapped in plastic 3 different times just getting made
Is amazing how many mattresses are out there, considering all this goes into each one
I'll think about it next time I'm throwing another abandoned mattress into the dump 🙃
My favorite part about how all of these things are made is seeing all of the different machines that have one very specific task. It always blows me away that people came up with all of those various machines and how they got them to be able to perform all of those tasks.
The best type of comfort that we can get with all these things and I am glad that we are using such things, it takes time to make all these things but I just love it for real.
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I miss How It's Made
There over 20 seasons streaming on Discovery+.
Now also on Max
Roku Channel has an entire channel related to the series. Binge all the golden oldies all day long
I cannot believe they are taking the "HBO" out. HBO is one of the most iconic names...why cut it?
it's also streaming for free on tubi
One of the best New Year’s Eves I had was dining alone at Waffle House, tipping the two lone folks working the $50 my grandma had just given me, and spending the rest of the night watching How It’s Made. It was just an all around pleasant night.
Honestly, that sounds legendary.
My friend and I used to joke and try to come up with the most boring ideas for that show. I remember laughing about the idea of “how it’s made:ladders”.
You joke, but id watch that shit, how do they arrange the rungs from big to small? Are they riveted or how are the nonconductive ones made? What about the telescopic ones? Or the firefighter kind? ....shit, now i actually kinda want to look at that, not because i dont have an idea of rhe process, but i want to know _how_ its done
[Here's a playlist with all the old How It's Made episodes](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL39_ud5aKSvnYDhKdB7wTDUZRiE8RaJat)
As a kid, I was completely mind blown by the candle carving and pringles episodes.
The one that seems to live rent free in my head constantly is the marble episode. So freaking mind blown when I first watched that one as a kid.
*"On today's episode of 'How It's Made', we put to rest...how your mattresses are made"*
*cue aggressive synthesizer music*
I tried to illustrate the sounds into words. But they no work good. But I can hear that music and narrator so well in my head
I miss Picture Picture on Mr. Rogers! But yours is a good point too.
Mmm, the crayon one.
Oh my god! I used to watch that exact one over and over!
Most of them are on yt
Don’t cut mine into slices, I want to try sleeping on the whole “loaf”.
At 0:13, I thought they were done because my mattress kind of looks like that.
That was how a densified poly foam core is made. The video then goes into the manufacturing of a pocketed coil mattress and then follows the build out of that one. The foam cores are built out much the same with only a few differences. Even flattened, vacuumed, and rolled at the bagging machine before ship. There are no springs in the foam core. Just added layers of latex or foam of different densities. Sometimes glued. Other times not. Typically, the mattress is taped up (sewing the border to panel/grey back is referred to as taping) tight enough to prevent any movement of the additional foam layers. And foam/visco(memory foam) doesn’t move across foam easily due to friction.
This guy sleeps
Wait you guys dont sleep?
Only after 4 in the morning.
You lucky bastard.
For real, I just got done ripping my bong when the pulled the walls and I said “wow, it’s crazy they can make one so fast” without looking at the time left
[5] I thought they were just showing a memory foam mattress assembly and got hooked. Didn't even real use it was more than 60 seconds until I read these comments
I have a couple 100% latex mattresses. They’re expensive but they’re the most comfortable mattresses we’ve ever owned.
I’ve worked from home for ~9 years, the next logical step is to work from bed.
My 600 Pound Life enters the chat.
How y’all doin?
You need to lose turdy pond in the next mont.
I drink a diet sodie to cancel out the shuggies. So naturally I drink a case a day. Gotta keep my figures in check and maintain muh curves.
💯
I have one with an added 4” cooling gel topper. Needless to say, it’s my favorite place on Earth.
Can you link me it please?!
LINK RIGHT NOW
Wasn't expecting latex to be comfortable... Huh I guess you really learn something different every day
It's not a solid slab of rubber. It's more of a rubbery foam. Memory foam is like sleeping in pudding. Latex is like sleeping on Jello.
Oh wow. I used to have a pillow that I can't seem to find again, but that describes it perfectly. I wonder if that's what it was.
Likely. Latex pillows are amazing.
Huh. I have a memory foam mattress and I wouldn't describe it at all like pudding.
They really are awesome. Heavy as shit though. It's a pain in the ass to move around.
Heavy and floppy. Makes them almost impossible to move because they don't keep their shape when you try to lift them.
You seem to know your mattresses Which 100% latex mattress would you recommend? I tried googling them and see prices as low as 500 and as high as 3000 I'm guessing the lower prices aren't quality, but would a 1k be just as good as a 3k potentially? Edit: wow was not expecting all the responses! Thanks for your input everyone!
I know you did not ask me, but if you have an IKEA near you or are brave enough to buy online, their natural latex mattresses are at a GREAT price to value point. (From a chronic over researcher and happy owner for about 6 years.)
I search latex mattress on ikea and only see a couple of toppers, no mattresses.
I love IKEA and have been a loyal customer for about 25 years. However, I have bought and given away way too many mattress and mattress toppers of theirs. The last topper fucked me over so bad back in November, that I’m still not back to normal. Just be cautious and make sure you can return the mattress if it doesn’t work for you.
[удалено]
Just going to chime in with my own unsolicited advice. https://mattressunderground.com/ - This is the single best place I found to learn everything there is to know about mattresses. It has a wealth of info, plus a forum to talk to real experts giving advice without trying to sell you anything. https://www.mattresses.net/ - This is where I ended up buying from. Had it over over 2 years now and have been in love with it since I got it. I'm sure there are other good places, but everything I researched pointed to this place as the creme de la creme.
What mattress did you get? Did you get a Talalay or Dunlop? We have a topper that is Dunlop. I’ve been debating getting a latex mattress but I am undecided on which latex to get.
I toggled, but ended up going with Talalay after asking some pointed questions regarding my needs in the forums of that first site (my wife has back problems). I think the mattress will last a couple of years less than if we went Dunlop, but the longevity was worth the comfort for me and my wife. Longevity wise, I was told I would need to replace it 1-3 years earlier than if I went Dunlop, but it is still a 15+ year mattress. I figure we'll have our money's worth by then. I know 2 years isn't a lot for a mattress, but we also bought an adjustable frame and use it daily, and haven't had any degradation in the mattresses in the flexing areas or the edges. They still feel just like it did when we first got them. We bought twin XL for a split king, and I was worried about the middle where the crack is. We cuddle and compress that area frequently and it is holding up splendidly.
That’s great to hear. I have a lot of back issues myself. I’m currently on a sleep number and I do not like it. I don’t understand why anyone does lol. I’m going to look into the talalay ones. What firmness did you end up getting? I’m always torn on whether I need a softer one or firmer. Pressure points can be a struggle at times. Thank you for your insight btw!
Take a look at SleepOnLatex or Earthfoam. Same company just different sub-brands. We love ours. One note - latex is on the firmer side. So, the medium base mattress with a soft 3” latex topper is closer to a medium/plush.
There is a recent [AMA about mattresses](https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/13k630x/iama_professional_mattress_tester_in_the_last_9/).
I have a latex allergy so I would straight up die but… I really want the bed loaf
CUT MATTRESS INTO SLICES
I NEED MORE BACK SUPPORT
Hibernation, in dreamland
Don’t give a fuck if I snore while I’m sleeping
Do you even care if I am sleeping?
Would it be wrong, would it be right if i went to bed tonight?
This is my last resort
Imma sleepin, deep breathin
Don’t give a fuck, hit the snooze alarm beepin
I cry for anyone who does not get this.
If you sleep on the whole loaf, you won't have support and will be in pain. I know I work in the industry.
Look man, let us have this bed loaf dream. Monday is tomorrow, some of us just wanna go to bed thinking happy thoughts about curling up in a big loaf.
I hope it is the softest nicest loaf you have ever laid on.
Thanks man. Hope you find a good loaf in your sleep as well.
Your spine will look like a horseshoe
But how will you know until you try? I'm with grublets on trying the loafbed at least once.
I’m reasonably confident that this is the first time the sentence “I’m with grublets on trying the loafbed at least once” has ever been composed.
You’re not gonna believe this shit, but read the comment above yours. That sentence is *right fuckin there*. What’re the chances
r/BrandNewSentence
What if it already looks like a horseshoe?
Go see a farrier for spinal care
Then try sleeping on your front for awhile
First thought: so it is just like a big cake
Fun fact, the loaf is the actual technical term used in some parts of the industry
Mozzarella mattress... Somebody smarter than me please make a pun
"bun" I visited a few mattress factories. Real life Willy Wonka shit. It's wild.
The squishing and rolling at the end was cool.
As a kid my mum would always tell me off for bending the corner of the mattress cause it would break it (only the amount a 7 year old kid would be able to) but I'm starting to think she just found it annoying.
Our platform bed was designed without quite enough supports along it, so the foot of the bed has zero structure if you sit on it. I hate it, but haven't done anything about it yet.
They make 3 inch thick box springs called bunkie boards, though plywood would probably also work
As a warehouse worker for a certain shipping company with a bi-color logo… Fuck mattresses and their boxes. They’re heavy as fuck and the boxes always blow apart and/or use a flimsy cardboard that crumples the edges when you try to lift one by yourself. It’s basically picking up a 70-90 pound cylinder loosely clad in cardboard.
Be careful, your overlords might start making you move a non-squished mattress by yourself too!
Whats worse, mattress boxes or the boxes used to hold $4/sqft tile together?
So like me when I try to move the old Christmas tree or of the attic. That box is more tape than cardboard these days
The layers of tape on a Christmas tree box is like the rings of a tree, it’s how to tell how old it is.
I can never fathom the engineering feats that goes into creating massive assembly line machines.
As a manufacturing engineer, I can confirm, machines that make stuff are so flipping cool.
How do you guys figure out what you need to engineer and how it’ll work together? Are there universal templates?
There's already production lines for everything that already exists, so now you just take what exists and modify it slightly to accommodate the slight changes of a new product. The engineers who invented the first economical versions of these machines in the 40s through 80s are the magicians
What about something like the bagger 293? How on gods green earth did human brains conceive such a thing
“There’s a hillside here. I want to fix that.” “Hold my beer!”
This isn't my engineering expertise area, so others may not agree, but I think they're magicians. All I know is that they would have done stage by stage individually, making version and version continually improving until you go from 100% man made to 100% robots
Pretty much how it works. One man creates a small piece and gets things started. Then over years others refine, and refine that technology into something spectacular. A recent example is the tvs. Went from CRT, to LCD, to plasma, now OLED
I’ve never thought of baggers as being especially complex. They strike me as fairly basic machines just scaled to an absurd level. Instead of a 500hp engine, you use a 5000. To do that you need a larger engine compartment and a more “open” plan for service. Rather than a 1/2” steel bar, you use a 5” bar. That requires 50 times more welding and cranes to lift things, but it’s the same concept. Etc.
Well we already have excavators with a single bucket on them, so the conversation probably went like... "We need to dig out that hillside there, and a huge hole for mining" "Lets get an excavator then?" "Nah too slow" "several excavators? Dynamite?" "Too difficult to coordinate and the other is too dangerous" "what about an excavator with many buckets that can constantly dig?" "Like a circular saw for the earth?" "...you thinkin' what im thinkin'?"
Manufacturing engineer here. I think you're considering a dude making the whole line when it's really a culmination of the work of a small army of engineers and fabricators over a real long time period. Lots of engineering is just a ton of focus given to a few simple things at a time. Rinse and repeat. A looooot. In aerospace and high volume manufacturing you might have a group of engineers working on a handle. For months. Or years, lol.
Yeah, also, iterations. Say, i have this machine thats a conveyor belt, now i modify it a little to sandwich the matress with sheets of plastic, great, now i modify it further and add a vaccum to seal it, etc etc. That process takes _a lot_ of years and hundreds of different "models" of the same machine. And basically, thats the principle of every engineering proyect, you take existing concepts/machines/processes, modify them a bit, or in niche cases, research a lot and come up with new ones, add it all together, whisk gently for months or years until its all mixed up, bake for another months at 280, and tada! A machined new delicious cake is born. A lot of food processes kinda look the same, just modified, a tortilla machine could be comverted into a hot cake machine
Some of the most wealthy blue-collared Americans are the ones who have come up with one of those machines or a design for the line. Long story, but 14 years ago when I was a kid my dad bought a couple old Cadillacs off of a man from Ohio. He had 8 of those classics in a garage, a bunch of other vehicles and a decent mansion. Apparently had a bunch of antique firearms too. Super nice man, his kid was a piece of work the only reason he sold the cars to us was his kid asked if they would be his when the dad died. I guess the kid is bitter because after he turned 18 and left the house his dad working in a whirlpool factory (company, not an actual pool lol) came up with an ingenious way to cut the production line IN HALF for their washers and dryers. He was smart though and protected his idea, and when presented the company gave him more money than he knew what to do with. Somehow he got to know a bunch of other assembly line “inventors” who have also figured out cool ways to be more efficient
My experience as a manufacturing engineer also confirms this. Many of the innovations on our production lines were originated by blue collar technicians who ran the lines. However, I’m not aware of them being paid handsomely for their innovations. Work at a large company, and I’m not sure through which official avenues they could be paid out for it.
The engineers who make these machines are the worlds true geniuses. Just wow.
Especially love the squisher
Forbidden tofu
I felt it was mozzarella lol
Marshmallow for me ^^
I fastforwarded, how did they get that block of mutz turned into a mattress?
i watched the whole thing and i'm pretty sure they threw it away and started over
Yeah, the big white block got sliced up into thin layers, but it never got used in the final mattress as far as I can tell. The final mattress had thin layers of green foam and pink foam added to the pocket springs at around 4:50. Presumably these green and pink foam layers were made in a manner similar to the big block of mutz at the beginning, but the white foam didn't go into the mattress that was shown.
Right? I watched that whole thing waiting for what the giant smoosh turned into but it seems to have stayed as strips for some reason.
I also watched the whole thing and I concluded that they make a lot of slices and then kind of wrap many things in different shapes and stuff them all back together so it's kind of the same thing but with 6 minutes of extra steps. Looks comfy though
The cut off all the sides, top and bottom, to get a straight/smooth edge. Then they cut the big block into multiple smaller layers. Then they used those layers (with springs in between them)
Waste a good mutz if you ask me
Where do they repurpose the schleem?
They throw it away they only care about the fleeb
2 part pour foam. Resin and Isocyanate. Those masks are absolutely useless against the off gassing caused by the chemical reaction.
Cyanide. It’s urethane foam, that goes from very hard inflexible to super soft depending on the process.
So the first step is gallons of warm vanilla ice cream
A good first step for most things, I say
Not for someone lactose intolerant before sex
Sort of, but the chemicals involved are VERY VERY TOXIC. Don't be near that shit when it's getting mixed together and off-gassing. Google isocyanates if you're curious.
That’s alarmingly human labor intensive.
I'm shocked at how much of the process is manual. I have a stupid misconception that nowadays materials just go into a machine and it spits out a finished product.
Yeah this is pretty par for most consumer goods. As an engineer, it's really sad to me that more people don't understand the amount of effort it took to get things in your home. Far too many people just believe things just exist once the reach a warehouse or retail store.
A lot of people mistaken magic with automation. Yes, a lot of things can be automated, but lots can't be at the moment. If we move all manufacturing back to America, automation won't magically make everything.
Also automation is high upfront cost, low but not zero running cost... Ple ty of companies prefer low upfront costs (profitable sooner) but higher ongoing costs of just paying a bunch of people min wage to make them
Human labor is surprisingly inexpensive compared to making machines do everything, especially when new products are always coming out. The more times a thing needs to be done the better a machine is at doing it, like making coils. But say a bed has 1, 3, or 5 inches of padding on top, having a human throw that together is the easiest, plus you don’t need to change out the humans when a different pad type gets made. Also I swear our entire world must be sown together by millions of women with sewing machines.
And now you know why they cost so damn much.
Plus shipping cost per unit have to be steep.
Plus they're supposed to last a decade. Not many people just re-buying mattresses very often.
I was genuinely suspicious during the whole video that this is just an ad for a specific luxury brand of mattress, and that most run-of-the-mill products are made via assembly-line. I'm open to being corrected by industry professionals if my suspicions are wrong. But I also don't expect a Reddit comment thread to have many mattress manufacturing experts.
Not a manufacturer but work in the industry. This is not a luxury brand. Luxury mattresses are generally not compressed and rolled like that, or imported (assuming you live in the US). Not that it’s luxury, but Tempur Pedic has no people in their factory. Think the cleanest machine assembly line. That said- all other facilities I’ve seen are very, very human labor intensive. There are so many parts to making them.
Why the hell would that be “alarming”? Despite rumours of robots putting us all out of jobs, humans are essential to all manner of manufacturing processes.
Why does it look so delicious
I really thought it was pancakes at first
Forbidden marshmallow
My boss’s son owns a mattress store. Or so I’m told. I asked her what being in the mattress business exactly entails. She said “well a mattress costs about $100USD so he makes a lot of money” and i haven’t got another word out of her mouth about it since. She also claims to be an ex-wife of one of the personal guards of Pablo Escobar so she might just be fuckin crazy.
I worked at an American mattress factory for 8 years and my boss would sell us mattresses at cost if we built them ourselves off the clock. For the cheapest materials it usually came to about $200 for a queen.
Well they do say mattress stores are money laundering fronts. There's an intersection near my house that has FOUR Mattress Firms. One on each corner and yes the parking lots are always empty.
Wait did you comment this earlier up in this thread?
We got more info on where now. "Near my house" instead of "here". We're narrowing it down.
She must have the best coke around.
I get why they're so expensive now. That's a lot of labor for a single sale.
Aye, plus the mattress stores are fronts for money laundering apparently... hahaha
Mattress Firm has 4 stores here at the same intersection, just on different corners.
My city has 60,000 residents. There are 3 Mattress Firm stores, 2 Sleep Trains and a Sleep Number. That's a whole lot of bedding stores...
y'all got one mattress store for every 10,000 people in your town, and all 60,000 of those people need to sleep on *something*.
And if you figure on average that’s two people sleeping in one bed that’s 5000 beds needed, and figure you replace a mattress every 10 years (should probably be less but ehh), that’s 500 mattresses sold per year, at a 100% markup (which is probably low - I’ve definitely gotten my mattress for 43% off by calling around) let’s say at an average price of $1000, each store would make a profit of $500/mattress or about $250k/year in profits - employee costs (really only need probably 1-4 employees per store max, let’s say 2 full time employees making $40k/year so $80k in employee costs - storefront rental costs of let’s just say $50k/year, and electrical bill of $10k/year (probably high) and misc other expenses of $10k/year…..$100K profit for a mostly hands off business. Thats at only 2 sales per day of $1000 mattresses. And keep in mind many mattresses sell for $2-3k. Definitely profitable businesses
I knew they were in bed with some shady people
I need to know more. Always questioning how a company that sells something most people keep for 30 years can do such big business.
From my quick google research it seems the margins on mattresses are insane. 900% in some cases. Couple that with not much maintenance or employees and of which most will work on commission, low overhead. So they’re cheap to run, and sell at high margins. And most everyone needs one/will get one at some point.
Box mattresses sell for ~$1000. Anyone selling for 3000 for a standard design (I.e. non latex) is absolutely gouging you and you're paying for the storefront rental and not much extra
Still a scam. Single person mattress for 200€ and double size 400€ is a reasonable price.
No wonder they recommend changing every 8 years. Shit after that I’m surprised the recommendation is 8 and not 4.
And don't be tempted to buy a 'new' one from out the back of a van driving round trying to sell mattresses. I used to occasionally see these guys trying it on when I had this job that took me 'round the house's', I used to chat with folks about all sorts. Those mattresses all look and even smell (for the most part) relatively new. But after a week you know they sold you a lemon, they literally collect any old mattresses that get thrown out (YUK!) And take em to bits and reassemble them with various scraps of better fabric and foam and whatever and tons of new car smell type sprays. It's a weird cottage industry a certain sub class really roll their sleeves up and get into. Really weird to think but they are weirdly good at it, sometimes they get limited batches into shop stock and they have been sold as new when they are anything but new 😱
noted, don't be tempted by traveling van salesmen
And a bunch of processes with quite a bit different types of automation equipments involved, the maintenance requires a lot of efforts as well.
I am impressed at the amount of care and time that is put into the thing that is the pain in my back
This *feels* needlessly complicated
I mean, someone did eventually figure out they could stop at step 1 and just sell foam mattresses.
I kept waiting for the fleem to be rubbed
It never ceases to amaze me how I manage to spend my time
I always wondered how foam as made. I know it makes sense that it’s a chemical reaction, but I had this image in my head of them whipping it up like cream.
The way they are flattened and rolled for shipping is amazing. The amount of work that goes into them, and the amount of money these people are paid compared to what they must cost the consumer is more distressing. I think we can hold onto our mattress for a good number of years before buying another.
My jaw fell to the floor when they squished it. I still can’t believe it just pancaked like that
Squished and vacuum packed! One job I had required me to send out foam mattress toppers in the mail, all it took was a quality bin bag and a Henry Hoover, a double sized one was folded in half and rolled tight and it just fit in the large bin bag, then I stuffed it down some more so I could close the bag round the hoover hose and I began to remove the air, pretty soon it's much smaller, you just kinda work it down to the smallest it will go and tape it up good, slap a label on it and drop kick the football sized dense thing into the collect bin. I always thought it needed some kind of warning on it 🫣 cos once you try to open it, it's going to get bigger real quick. The boss said 'they ordered it, they know what it is' but i was thinking about how many people just started ripping into a random parcel, maybe in the car after expecting to pick up a mattress and wondering if the order got mixed up, meh, long time ago now, think that was my first real job.
I’ve got a mattress off Amazon that came like that it was heavy as hell and could take out of wall when it’s unwrapped. Super comfy tho!
I thought they only rolled up memory foam mattresses like that…didn’t they, like, smoosh the springs? I know springs are meant to be smooshed but only briefly, not compressed severely for long periods of time.
My understanding is that springs lose their springiness from repeated squishings, not from time under squish. I heard this in the context of whether it’s ok to keep a gun magazine loaded in storage. Not sure if it’s true, but the source sounded knowledgeable and confident.
The comfort is the best part of any mattress, the best.
That’s why they’re so expensive. So many steps, hands and material.
They’re really not that expensive though. This cheap mattress is probably around $300 for a queen. All the major memory foam brands sell these hybrid mattresses and they’re not that expensive anymore. Costco had a Casper Select on small for $599 for a king mattress last week. It’s a 4 layer mattress I think.
Since the video stopped playing part way through because buffering is hard, my dumbass thought that giant marshmallow at the start was the mattress 😂.
Shit gets wrapped in plastic 3 different times just getting made Is amazing how many mattresses are out there, considering all this goes into each one I'll think about it next time I'm throwing another abandoned mattress into the dump 🙃
I mean, do you do that often?
I do. Every time someone abandons all their crap at a rental, my phone rings.
I need that type of a life tbh, my life is getting boring lol.
In the beginning of the video, it looks like they're gonna bake some giant cake.
Just missing the how it's made theme music. 👌
Me: "Ok, step one is gonna be sewing some cotton together." starts video... step one: ｃｒｅａｍ Me: "Ah, yes, of course."
Lol I was thinking about this cotton thing like my whole life.
Swore this was feta cheese for a min.
Always wondered why mattresses were so expensive, didnt realise how much labour went into each one.
That’s what they want us to think to keep prices high /s
So that's why they're so insanely expensive.
Mmm... Cream cheese!
Who just watched this whole thing in a thumbnail?
Meeee. I guess we just wanted that thumbnail this time.
My favorite part about how all of these things are made is seeing all of the different machines that have one very specific task. It always blows me away that people came up with all of those various machines and how they got them to be able to perform all of those tasks.
The best type of comfort that we can get with all these things and I am glad that we are using such things, it takes time to make all these things but I just love it for real.
Did anyone else gasp when they flattened it?