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mattress covers

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bugaphobic

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Posted 5 years ago
Tue Apr 29 2008 20:07:23
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So I want to buy mattress covers for my bed. I am going with Protect-a-bed. I see on their website that they have like.....Elite, Premium, Super...what's the difference? Do I need to buy 2? (One for the mattress, one for the boxspring. Or does it come in a set?) Do you buy the exact same one for the boxspring?? (Like say you get Premium, do you just buy 2 Premium & put 1 on your mattress & 1 on your boxspring?) Thanks!

Oh....what about the pillow protectors, are they just as good for bb's? What does everyone use for pillows?
bugbasher

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Posted 5 years ago
Tue Apr 29 2008 20:13:20
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Bugaphobic,
They sell separate boxspring encasements for your boxspring.I have not used the pillow protectors,so I don't know about them.As for the difference in models,you have to ask the seller.They should be able to help you.Good luck
Itchybutdealing

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Posted 5 years ago
Tue Apr 29 2008 20:13:32
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If you can believe it. Right now we are not using pillows at all! We threw out our old ones. I have new ones ready to go when the all clear is (if ever) sounded. I bought the covers for the new ones and plan to tape over the zipper. Don't know about the types of covers though sorry. I just bought mine from National Allergy.
paulaw0919

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Posted 5 years ago
Tue Apr 29 2008 20:38:53
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Bugaphobic, I went to protect a beds website. If you go to the main page, on the left side, there is a box that states "bug lock" Click on the box because it will give you the options for the covers that are proven to be bed bug proof. I PM'd you on this as well...
bugaphobic

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Posted 5 years ago
Wed Apr 30 2008 9:29:22
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Oh wow....I just realized that the protect-a-bed mattress covers that I was looking at were the regular ones.....not the Allergen/BedBug ones!!! And how convenient that the BedBug ones run about $40 more!!! (Way to capitalize!) So its the BedBug ones that everyone has or are the Premium, Elite regular ones the exact same thing??
paulaw0919

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Posted 5 years ago
Wed Apr 30 2008 9:37:42
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Make sure you go with the ones that have "bug lock" on the package. The zipper end is specifically designed for bed bugs.
bugaphobic

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Posted 5 years ago
Wed Apr 30 2008 10:14:59
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Thanks!
MixedFeelings

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Posted 5 years ago
Wed Apr 30 2008 13:08:09
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Pillows - we threw away our original ones (they were old anyways) and bought new (cheap) ones which we promptly encased. We will keep using these until the ordeal is over.

We will buy new, nicer pillows again once I am confident the BBs are ALL GONE!

MF
bugaphobic

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Posted 5 years ago
Wed Apr 30 2008 13:20:01
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MixedFeelings-
What brand did you use to cover your pillows??
MixedFeelings

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Posted 5 years ago
Wed Apr 30 2008 16:56:56
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Hi Bugaphobic,

We used National Allergy. We also put 2 pillowcases over each pillow encasement - 1 pillowcase pulled down one direction, the other pillowcase pulled down the other direction. I do this as an attempt to keep BBs off the actual encasement since the encasements are not washed as often as the pillowcases. So far, as far as I can tell, this method seems to have worked (but our infestation is light to begin with).

BTW, we do sterilize our pillow encasements from time to time. Because we put the encasements on our pillows when the pillows were brand new and never exposed to BBs, we presume no BBs are in them (the mattress is a different story of course). To sterilize the pillow encasements, we remove them from the pillows, put the naked pillows directly into plastic bags, hot-dry the pillow encasements, then reapply them to the pillows.

Wow, did I say "pillow" and "encasements" enough here?? lol

Hope this helps,

MF
bugaphobic

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Posted 5 years ago
Thu May 8 2008 6:57:55
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I was looking at protect-a-bed bb proof encasements & I was wondering.....it says there are 3 zippered sides, isn't it worse to have all those zippers? So would you tape up all 3 sides of the zippers?? Wouldn't that have more room for error?? (Tape eventually coming off, etc?)
paulaw0919

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Posted 5 years ago
Thu May 8 2008 7:37:01
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They mean that the cover zips around three sides of the mattress. It's one long zipper.
Bugologist

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Posted 5 years ago
Thu May 8 2008 8:12:57
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I guess the question here is why are you taping the zippers? The zippers are scientifically tested to not allow bed bugs to escape when they are zipped closed and the Protect-A-Bed design protects the zipper end stop very well. As long as you buy the right size encasement, taping the zipper is a pointless effort. The bugs can't escape.
paulaw0919

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Posted 5 years ago
Thu May 8 2008 8:27:39
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If you Protect a Bed encasements, there is no need to duct tape the zipper. I feel secure w/o the duct tape on those covers. I purchased new pillows, cheap ones for about 5-6 dollars at walmart and put NA covers on them. Those I did put duct tape around both ends.
bugaphobic

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Posted 5 years ago
Thu May 8 2008 10:49:53
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Bugologist-
I thought I had read that pretty much everyone was taping the zippers? I could be wrong on that?
Battle of the Bugs

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Posted 5 years ago
Fri May 9 2008 0:50:19
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I've researched several suppliers/brands and will share:

Price range: Cheapest I've found.

Have mattress and pillow covers, lifetime guarantee on durability. Claim allergen and bedbug proof. I could buy that, I mean if they're waterproof... however, I was skeptical about the low price and not go with this.
http://www.bedwettingdirect.com/category_s/21.htm

Price Range: medium.
Both these are bed bug specific products

Seen many recommendations, popular brand. Many choices:
http://www.natlallergy.com/search.asp?ss=bed+bugs&eid=INTBB&sid=INTBB

I ended up purchasing this one.
http://www.bedbugcover.com/sofcovercollection.aspx
It is little less expensive than national allergy - I chose the Kleencover kind, the only difference from its higher priced counterpart was that it could take less washes but that didn't matter because I'm never taking it off! But the other reason was they had 9" thick encasements and I only have a futon mattress barely 7" thick, everyone else makes these encasements that can fit cars in them, I have one for my twin mattress it the casing is lose skin on a new liposuction patient. Annoying with all those folds when you want to do inspection. I digress. Disclaimer: do not take as testimony as I've only been using this cover for a couple of weeks. With the futon isolated, legs vaselined, mattress covered, I have so far not noticed any bites even though I've found bbs on wall.

Price Range: Are you insane?
For $100! I could get a new mattress!
Sorry, that was my reaction when I went to the site. I think this is the Allerzip/protect-A-bed most of you are talking about. They have been named in successful studies I suppose, that's why they can charge that much.
http://www.northshorecare.com/allerzip.html
bc in pittsburgh

newbite
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Posted 4 years ago
Sun Jul 13 2008 18:04:18
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i have cheap vinyl mattress encasements on my boxspring and mattress and i am going to put on new protect a bed aller zip covers this week. should i remove the old vinyl encasements first and risk setting free those damn bbs or can i put the new protect a bed right over the cheap ones?
kjdrga

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Posted 4 years ago
Wed Jul 16 2008 11:01:42
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My PCO sells Protect-a-Bed at a discounted rate so it may be worth asking your PCO's (if you have one) if they do as well. I had a futon with that had a 5" thickness and he was able to find me the perfect fit for it, I didn't see the size on their website.
Nobugsonme

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Posted 4 years ago
Wed Jul 16 2008 11:54:28
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BattleoftheBugs,

Bed Wetting Direct encasements did NOT fare well in Cooper's studies. One of the National Allergy Covers (Elegance) did better than others. You'll find the study linked here from the encasements page: http://bedbugger.com/encasements

I personally went through 3 cheap vinyl encasements before deciding I would spend more. But that was back in the day, before there was actual test data available.

Bugphobic,

You do NOT need to tape Protect-a-Bed AllerZip encasements because of the BugLock Zipper.

bcinpittsburgh,

I'd encase over what you have unless a PCO is going to treat the mattress before you re-encase.