Upholstery and Fabrics - Removing squish from old sofa

I just purchased a vintage sofa that has what I call squish across the bottom front of it. The sofa front bottom has a spring support.

Question.. can I put in a piece of hard wood along the bottom front of it when I upholster it so it will not squish down but stay sold and firm?

Certainly additional reinforcement can be done. You won't know how to approach the problem until you tear into the sofa. If you are a handy dandy DIYer and have the tools, you can get the job done.

Springs are likely hand-tied coils. Eight-way hand-tied springs were once a hallmark of quality. Each coil spring is placed in the seat by hand and tied into place with twine using a series of interlocking knots. 'S' springs are also hand-tied. It could be that this is where the problem lies. Again, you will not know until you tear into the couch.

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Coil Spring

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'S' Spring

Photo Credit: Jack Carr @ upholster.com

You should find the following Upholstery Primer very helpful. http://www.upholster.com/howto/upholstery-primer.html

thanks that's what I thought

Thanks so much for all the information, you rock

The squish to which you are referring is called a "wire edge". I have removed the wire and placed a board in there many times. I screw the board in several places to make it secure. You may have to change the way the springs were tied to do this.

The one thing to keep in mind, that front edge, whether it be a hard edge or a wire edge needs to be higher than the rest of the springs. You can make it higher by attaching edgeroll across the front - when you take the couch apart you will see the edge roll attached to the wire. If it's not higher even when you attach edge roll, then it's not high enough.