Replacing the Sofa bed with a Love Seat

Question

After realizing how unusable our sofa bed was, we decided to replace it with something else. The mattress was so pathetic that we ended up putting an air mattress on top of it to make it usable. After thinking about it for a while, I discovered that we have enough floor space between the sofa and the dinette (with the slides out) to put a queen sized air mattress on the floor. Amazon sells an air mattress with a built in air platform for $114.00. The air platform makes the bed about 19 inches high, which is normal height for a bed. They are way more comfy!

I read about the horror stories of people trying to get their sofas out of their coaches but decided to try it anyway. Our Coach entry door is 23 1/2 inches wide but the door has an arm on it to prevent it from opening all the way so that it won't hit the slide when it is out. The arm is easily disconnected. Also there is a grab handle in the doorway but I didn't even need to take it off even though I could have. This makes the door about 22 inches wide with the grab handle.

The old sofa bed, besides being a horrible bed, was ugly too.

ronvbt · Answer

The Loveseat we decide to replace the sofa bed with is this one. It's a recliner.

I found that the old sofa could be taken apart fairly easily by unscrewing the bed mechanism (frame). After removing the bed frame, I was able to get to the screws that held the sofa in place on the side. The sofa was held down to the slide out floor by three screws on each side. After getting the sofa loose, I discovered that the sofa back would slide up and off the bottom section.

ronvbt · Answer

Here is the slide out space prepped for the new Loveseat.

The advantage to using a reclining love seat is that most love seat backs come off making installation much easier...especially getting it through a 23 1/2 inch wide door (or 22 inch without removing the grab bar).

Here is ours in place and screwed down.

We lost an inch or so of isle space with the slides in but I think it is worth it.

ronvbt · Answer

Here is the bottom of a typical reclining Loveseat.

Not the best photo but it is easy to mount these chairs since there is a huge rectangular metal frame that contacts the floor area making mounting options numerous.

When you lift the foot rest up, it is easy to get under the chair to work.

ronvbt · Answer

One thing I decided to do was to remove the locking clip on the backs. If you have ever fought with these clips, you will agree that they make removing the backs very difficult to impossible if you can't get around to the back of the chair. Just unscrew the mounting channel and remove the lock clip, then screw the mounting channel back on. I don't think there is any danger of the back flying off by itself.

hitchup · Answer

Like most of us, you've found it just takes a tape measure and some patience to find the residential furniture combination that will fit. Job looks great.

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Replacing the Sofa bed with a Love Seat

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