About ventilation on our mattress

Hi Matt.

Thank you for reaching out to us, great question.

Covering flexi slats with 12mm MDF sheets is a great way to create a uniform, supportive surface for a pocket spring mattress, as wide slat gaps can cause pocket springs to push through and compromise the mattress structure and warranty.

The best slatted mattress base will have the following specifications:

• 2 inch thick solid wooden slats
• No more than 7cm gaps between the slats
• Slats that are fixed into position either by screws or clips
• Solid slats rather than sprung slats

Sprung slatted bedframes are quite adequate for double-sided mattresses where there is sufficient amount of wadding to buffer the pocket springs.  The use of a mattress pad (or old duvet) should be paramount to protect the wadding/upholstery from the slats.  On the flip side - One sided mattresses usually have a thin layer of insulator between the spring unit and the fabric on the underside of your mattress - and it is in this situation where an uneven distribution of the spring unit can cause problems with the mattress.

Your use of MDF is a good move as Pocket sprung mattresses love and work best with a flat surface. If it was the store salesman/woman who informed you of the potential void guarantee I would question why the guarantee would be VOID if used on this type of base.  Also, ask them if it is the insufficient wadding on the non-sleep side that will cause problems with the mattress.

I must admit that we cannot give an indisputable answer to the ventilation concern.  Our own thoughts are to do all you can - just in Case - and therefore feel that the inclusion of some vent holes in your  MDF would not do any harm.  We believe that many mattresses self-aerate just because of the bellow-like action caused when you get in and out of bed. The minimum standard of a mattress protector should enable body moisture to be dissipated before ingression into the mattress.

The vents applied to many side panels are in our view more for the aesthetics rather than for any "major" function.  We also draw on the (low - middle end) divan base construction, whereby, more often than not the surface is nothing more than fabric covered hardboard with no ventilation whatsoever.  As we said at the start, with the lack of any scientific fact or published data, we can only speculate on whether ventilation is absolutely necessary or not.

I hope this was of some help and if you require further information please do not hesitate to call the office on 0161 437 4419 and speak with one of our friendly advisors.

Kind Regards Julie