The making of

This journey started with the fact that me and my girlfriend sometimes sleep in a car if both of us would like to have a drink. We often use a big van for this which we can borrow.

After a couple of months going from yes to no to yes to no multiple times, we ordered the Tesla Model 3. End of last year, we picked up the car in the harbor of Amsterdam.

Driving the Tesla for a few weeks we noticed that the trunk of a Model 3 is much bigger than we thought. If the rear backrest was put down and the drive- and passenger seats moved all the way forward over 210cm (±6 feet 10) of space was available. 

I started looking online for mattress for a Tesla Model 3 a found several options. One of the options I found was the Dreamcase. A company making mattresses for all kind of cars. Besides the fact that I think the price was way to high, I was not happy with the fact that the Tesla bed would not be flat. If I would have ordered the mattress, you would feel the transition from the trunk to the passenger seats, as this has a height difference of ±1,5cm (±0,6 inches) located around the hip, where a lot a body weight is concentrated.

After some more research I found an inflate-able mattress on Amazone. This option would still have the same problem in the middle, besides the fact that I do not like to sleep on an air mattress. Therefore the search for a better option continued.

I did some research on Pinterest in how to make a bed for a camper van and come up with some ideas and design criteria’s.

My design criteria’s:

• easy to transport: all items must fit in the trunk to still be able to sit in the car with 5 people while transporting the bed as well
• option to sleep in the car with the two of us, so making the bed as wide as possible
• flat bed from head to toe, so no gaps or edges you can feel while sleeping
• as cheap as possible
• easy operations, so not much handling needed to build up the bed

At first I started to make a frame for the trunk from chipboard which fitted in the trunk with the rear back rest still up.

I made two other parts for near the rear passengers seats. To connect all the pieces, I made a connection point which removed the gap and would keep the frame in place.

Beside the angle between the frames I was happy with the first result.

But due to the angle between the frames I was not satisfied. I then found out that you could easily remove the rear bench of a Tesla Model 3.

As I did not want the rear back to be damaged by all the different metal parts and the weight of the people sleeping on the bed, I needed to find a way to support the bed frame without putting weight on the rear back rest. With chipboard, I made a support for the frame.

This resulted in a much flatter bed frame with not much weight on the rear back rest.

This version was already way better than my first design as you could sleep flat if you parked the Tesla flat. Now it was time for a mattress. Between the wheelbase (so wider than the chipboard) you have 95cm (±37,4 inch). As I’m quit tall: 1,90m (±6 feet and 3 inches) and a like to sleep on my back, the total length of the mattress needed to be at least my length. We found a mattress that was 1,9m long and 95cm wide. 

All the parts fitted in the trunk. As the mattress is made out of two blocks of 95cm x 95cm with a zipper in the middle to connect them. It is foldable so it fits in the trunk as well.

Between the rear door handles, the Model 3 is 1,3m (±4,25 feet) wide so much wider than the 95cm width mattress. I solved this with buying some additional foam, more about this later.

We tried this set-up and we slept quit well. Although it looks like there is not much space between the parcel-shelf and mattress, it was enough for us. You could easily sleep on your side without hitting the parcel-shelf. As the mattress we used now has a thickness of 15cm (±6 inches), you could increase this space by using a thinner mattress.

Although this design was perfect just for sleeping, the disadvantage was that the bed-frame needed to be moved backward in order to move the driver- and passengers seat backwards to be able to drive the car. As this was time consuming and it did not work that well, an other design was needed.

I decided to use Google SketchUp to make the design digitally. After multiple digital designs, I tried out a new version.

Beside the fact that this design was much lighter due to the use of spruce, it gave me a couple of other advantages. I could connect the vertical part that protected the rear seat so it could not move.

An other advantage was that I could connect the top and bottom part of the bed-frame without a difficult solution. The top part slides easily in between the bottom part.

But the reason for this design was to be able to drive the car without first changing the bed. This was solved by placing spruce planks that could easily be moved in and out.

Now the bed-frame is finished I am very happy with the result. When the seats are in driving position, there are a few centimeters between the seat and the frame. As mentioned before, I'm quit tall, so this works for people with a very aft position of the seat as well. The only problem is that if the seat is placed in the most aft position and the angle of backrest is also quit backwards it will barley fit and the mattress doesn't fit any more. This is already happening with the mattress I have, but for people with a length up to 1,95m (±6 feet and 5 inches) it would not be a problem.

Now the bed-frame is finished, it was time to make the bed wider where possible. I bought two pieces of foam, also 15cm thick, so they would have the same thickness as the mattress. I had to remove some foam to make it fit the car. Not really happy with the finishing of this, but already read some ways to get a smooth finish.

Now with the mattress and foam in place, it is time for the cover, some pillows and a blanket!

This version of the frame and bed does not fit completely in the trunk. With a few modifications, it will be possible to do so. But if we would bring this bed, we will not bring the rear bench, so there is no benefit to do so.

At the moment I'm working on covers for the windows to have some privacy and darkness in the car.

In 2 weeks we hope the border of Norway will be open for Dutch people (now closed due to Corona) so we can test our Tesla-van during a 4,5 week long holiday!

Please let me know if you have any questions or remarks!