US 5,020,176 · Granted 1991-06-04
The Smart Water Bed Patent That Keeps Your Mattress at Perfect Firmness
Imagine a water bed that automatically adjusts itself to stay exactly as firm or soft as you like, without you having to tinker with it every night. This patent describes a system that uses sensors and a pump to monitor the pressure in the water chambers and either add water or release it to maintain your preferred comfort level.
The plain-English version
What it protects
The claim covers an automated control system that monitors pressure in fluid-filled cylinders beneath a sleep surface and maintains a user-set firmness level. What's protected here is the combination of pressure sensing, automatic pumping when pressure drops below the target, automatic venting when pressure rises above it, and manual override buttons that let the user pump or vent on demand to adjust comfort in real time.
Why it matters
Water beds were a major furniture category in the 1980s and early 1990s, and one of their biggest complaints was that they required constant manual adjustment to stay comfortable. This patent solves that friction point by automating the tedious task of maintaining even pressure, making water beds more user-friendly and reducing the maintenance burden that turned many people off the category.
Real-world use
Every time a water bed user wakes up after months of use and finds the mattress still feels exactly as firm as they set it, they're experiencing the automation this patent locks down.
Original USPTO abstract
A system for automatically controlling the pressure maintained in a plurality of fluid-filled cylinders supporting a sleep surface in order to maintain a desired degree of firmness/softness. In one mode, the system permits the user to set the desired level of firmness and then the system acts to maintain that level under the conditions encountered in use, either venting if an above-setting pressure is sensed or pumping to fill if a below-setting pressure is detected. In another mode, the user is enabled to manually activate either the pump or the vent in order to vary the firmness to his choice.
Patent details
- Publication number
- US 5,020,176
- Filing date
- 1989-10-20
- Grant date
- 1991-06-04
- Assignee
- Angel Echevarria Co., Inc.
- Inventor(s)
- DOTSON; DEREK P.
- CPC class
- A47C27/083
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