Inflating an Air Mattress Bed – How Long Does it Take?

There are several ways of inflating an air mattress bed. You can inflate an air mattress either with an electric driven air pump or with a manual air pump. Of course you also inflate it without using any equipment but it would take virtually forever considering the effort it would take and the length of time you can sustain that effort.Electric air pumps and manual air pumps for air mattress beds have its own advantage and disadvantages depending on the application. Electric air pumps may not always be the best choice if factors regarding the usage of your air mattress are considered.Consider for example if you are in camping spree and you bring along your air mattress bed or air mattress mat. Camping almost always guarantees that there are no electric power in the vicinity, unless of course if you’re camping in your backyard. The best air pump to consider in this situation is a manual air pump for your mattress.Types of manual air mattress pumps:1. Hand operated2. Foot operatedBoth of these types require you to ‘push and pull’ or ‘push and release’ depending on the design. Some air pumps are designed are able to push air into the air mattress in both ways, so it would be a better choice since every time you push, your mattress will inflate and every time you pull, your mattress will also inflate.Electric air pumps for air mattresses:If your air mattress is permanently situated in your house or if you have a camping mattress and use it only when you are near your car, then an electric driven air mattress pump can come in very handy and convenient.Some electric air pumps come with a rechargeable battery so that when there is an electric failure, you can still use it to inflate your air mattress bed. These models can also be plugged to the cigarette lighter of you car, a very good option when you frequent outdoors using your air mattress bed.How long it takes to inflate an air mattress bed depends on several factors. One of which is the size of the air mattress bed or mat. The other is the capacity of the electric air pump as to how many cubic feet of air it can generate per minute. Check the electric air pump specification for this value. The higher the value, the faster it would take the air mattress to inflate.For example if you have a twin sized mattress 39″ X 74″ with a height of 8″, you can calculate the amount of time it will take to inflate the air mattress by multiplying those figures then dividing it by 144 to calculate the volume of the air mattress in cubic feet. If your electric air pump can inflate your air mattress with 18 cu. ft. per minute, simply divide the volume of the mattress with the capacity of the air pump. In this example, it would be ((39X74X8) / 144)/18 = 8.9 minutes to fill that air mattress size. Air mattress mats can be inflated a lot faster because its height can be less than 2 inches. Other electric air pumps can inflate air mattresses in 27 cu. ft. per minute which gives a faster inflation time.The actual time it would inflate a mattress using an electric pump is a lot faster since air mattresses are not all hollow inside. There are air compartments inside designed to give the utmost comfort in your sleep so the actual air volume needed to inflate the mattress is minus the volume of the materials inside. Usually air mattresses can be inflated in a minute or two.When buying air pumps for your mattress, choose the one which best fit your needs.