Mattress Forum

I've been reading your other posts, wow you seem to know this stuff cold. And it seems like you found a bed that you love; LUCKY!

I see you got 4" Blended Talalay core 28 ild with 3" Natural Talalay 22 ild on either side; that seems not far off from what I have, altho mine is essentially 1-sided since its sleepez and therefore adjustable. I have 6" medium and 6" soft over that - altho sleepez foams are a little firmer than others (their soft is like 23, their med is like 31), so I guess my mattress would feel a bit firmer than yours. Also, my mattress is on a wooden platform, whereas yours seems to be the adjustable reverie platform; I can't tell, is that a soft or hard surface? Do you see any problems in having latex mattress directly on wood?

By the way, a while back when I was complaining that my medium layers felt too firm a bunch of people warned me not to go softer - glad to see someone knowledgable finally advocating for soft! Also, people were advising me to add the wool topper and/or cuddlebed to make it softer, I don't think it feels any softer when I add them, glad to hear you confirming that. I'm wondering if I should pull everything off the top and start again with just the latex mattress, no toppers. If you have any thoughts on how I might make the bed feel softer while keeping proper support, with the layers I have or with new, pls let me know. I did move the mem foam to the top of the bed last nite and I didn't love it - had bad experience with tempurpedic in the past - but i will try it a few more nights to see if I adjust.

Finally, you mentioned that there were 5-10 beds that you liked and would have probably been happy with; did you ever post that list? I'd be interested in seeing it.

Thx

Steve

On to your mattress ... I know the firmness and thickness of the Sleepez layers, could you confirm how thick the other layers are and which one is the poly you were saying you "buried". I'm assuming it's the one labelled as "conventional latex"? If you know if it is lower density, HD, or HR that would help a little too although depending on how thick this is probably not that important. Also what is the density and type of the memory foam if you know.

New adventures :)

Phoenix

• 3" soft talalay (foambymail?)
• 1.5" soft convoluted latex (foambymail?) 
• 3" soft talalay (sleepez)
• 3" med talalay (sleepez)
• 3" med dunlop (sleepez)

The convoluted foam is hi quality latex; I was trying to reproduce the FloBeds construction. But my wife said she could feel the "bumps" when I had it on top so I moved it down a layer.

As I said originally the mattress case was designed to hold 3 3" layers so I wonder if I should remove a layer?

The other layers are toppers I've tried at various times.

• cuddlebed (~2") - from costco - I think this makes the mattress firmer, not softer
• wool topper (~1") - I also think this makes the mattress firmer but like it say over the memory foam
• 1" memory foam - definitely makes things softer but I dont like this as a top layer, I don't like sinking in deep 
• Feather bed - comfortable for a while but I end up sinking way in and again I don't like this feeling

The config I am using now (the one that seems to work best for me) is the wool pad over the mem foam over the mattress. I wonder if a 1" piece of soft talalay might work better than the wool pad tho?

Any other thoughts?

Steve

I read through your original thread to get a better sense of where you've been. The goal as I understand it is (from a previous post) ...

"I would also say that, to me, latex just doesn't feel as comfortable as a really nice spring and foam bed. I would love to be able to recreate that cushy pillowtop feeling in a mattress that would last and provide proper support."

This is really helpful.

So lets figure out what makes the pillowtop mattress so comfortable for you and then duplicate it as best we can with latex.

A pillowtop basically has a bunch of softer poly over a firmer innerspring (with some padding in the quilting). The thicker layers of soft poly probably feel better to you because you seem to be pressure sensitive and need a thicker layer of softness on top for your weight. Around 4" of comfort layer is in the range of "probable". This means we are going to need a top layer of around 4" of softer latex. Too much and you get support issues and sinking in issues and too little and you get pressure issues.

I also think the transition areas between layers will be important for you. I am one of those who is sensitive to transitions and found that a 2" layer of softer latex over a firmer core was an issue where 3" of the same density was not. Even though I am probably only "going through" the 2" a little and it's taking most of the pressure issues away, the last bit that I sink through bothers me (and my other half as well). This can be solved in 2 ways. Either a core layer that is closer to the comfort layer in ILD (gradual transition) or a thicker comfort layer that you don't go through which allows you to use a much firmer core layer for support ... or both.

In your case I would tend to the thicker comfort layer that you don't go through on top of a firmer support layer which would come closer to an innerspring pillowtop and I also saw in the previous thread that you described a more gradual transition layering scheme as "too squishy".

So we can test a few things just to see what happens and test all of this out. The only think I'm unsure of and need to make sure we take into account is the true ILD of the foambymail toppers. They so often send a different product than someone ordered that it would be easy to make a mistake based on believing that they really are what you ordered and make an "incorrect change". Having said that they could be exactly what you thought they were. Your feedback on this (comparing the FBM soft talalay to the sleepez soft talalay) would be helpful.

First I would put the firmest layer on the bottom. It may not be firm enough but it's the best we have so the medium dunlop would be it. If you can tell the difference ... put the firmest side of the Dunlop up. Next I would put the soft sleepez talalay on top of that (not the foambymail talalay cause we don't know exactly what it is) and finally I would put the 1.5" foambymail convoluted topper on top of that (and hope that it really is a soft talalay and doesn't just feel soft because it's thinner and convoluted). Those 3 layers inside the cover are where I would start (the cover will be loose). I am hoping that putting the 3" medium Dunlop on a firm base with nothing under it and only a "just enough" comfort layer over it will make it as firm as it can be (like the innersprings) even though overall this construction may be a little thin for you.

You probably want a mattress protector or pad on top of this and if you have a really thin one without wool or anything else that would be the best way to test this layering without what you feel being "interfered with" by a mattress pad but if you don't then the thinnest most pliable one you have would be the way to go. If it doesn't matter and it works for you then just sleeping on sheets over the cover itself would be great as it already has some wool in it.

Hopefully what you feel with this will give us some clues about where to go next. I have a few ideas but I'll wait for your feedback for a night or two.

Phoenix

1. The foambymail latex is actually 2", not 3", and I suspect its not as good quality as the sleepez foam. It also seems to have compressed some (middle seems higher than the sides) so I removed this from the bed.
2. The conv. foam makes the bed feel 'unstable' to me. It is good quality and nice and soft, but for some reason when its in the bed (top couple of layers) I dislike what it does. Unstable might not be the right word, but its something like that (exaggeration, feels like tectonic plates sliding around )...
3. I didn't mention that we have an allergy cover that goes over the mattress in addition to the fitted sheet.

So in playing around today I decided to get back to basics and put the bed back to mostly the original sleepez parts; top to bottom:

• mem foam
• soft talalay
• medium talalay
• medium dunlop 

This felt pretty good with just the mattress cover but I think that by the time the allergy cover and sheet go on the mem foam is a little too deep to work right and the bed feels significantly firmer. Of course I havent slept on this yet so I can't say for sure. My guess is I will find this to be too firm (since I did previously) but I want to start over and this seems like a good place to start.

I don't want to do just the medium + soft + convo because I really don't like the feeling of the convo foam on top. I guess I could try the mem foam on top - essentially what I just set up minus 1 layer. Or should I just try this for a few nights?

Thanks again!

Steve

PS - Did I see somewhere that you are in the Seattle area? I live in Redmond/Bellevue area...

The advantage of the convoluted upside down is that it is closer to what I would think you need for a comfort layer. With just 1" of memory foam and the soft latex, you may feel the firmer layer underneath as the memory foam won't stop the sinking in ... and as you mentioned it may also feel harder with what's on top of it even though you would eventually sink through it anyway ... but either place would be a good beginning. The feeling you have with the convo on top may just be because you have too many relatively soft progressive layers and you get that "squishy" or "sliding" feeling overall. If it's the bumps, then upside down may help.

If the feeling you are describing is what I think it is, then it's usually caused by deeper layers in a mattress. Adding a topper like the convo could still lead to this but what would be happening is the deeper layers would be responding differently and creating the feeling. It would be easy to think it was the topper (because that's when it was happening) rather than the thickness on top of the support layers changing which part of the support layers was supporting you and how they were "reacting". They would be less compressed and if they were not firm enough you would get this feeling. Whatever it is though ... it would be well worth testing.

Yes ... when I'm in the US ... I'm in Gig Harbor near Tacoma. I'm currently in Canada though ... sigh.

Phoenix

Every change in layering needs to take into account the probable effect on all the different layers in the mattress.

Phoenix.

In general terms ... you can create a construction that works for side sleeping including as you relax more and also make it work for back sleeping. Stomach / side is a little more difficult to do without zoning. Latex (and even some polyfoam) has a wide progressive range of resistance (connected to sag factor) which means it has a range of sleeping positions it can support but each layer plays a different role in each position. To do this you have to have a sense of how far into each layer each position "bottoms out". Beyond this range you would likely need zoning.

I would probably need to know other combinations you have tried and what happenned and a bit more about the springs and poly above them as well to be more specific but it looks to me in general terms like you need thinner overall layer(s) of soft on top ... possibly a thinner layer of firm below that (depending on the springs and what was already on them) or perhaps just a single softer layer directly on the mattress foam and springs.

Phoenix

If you look at the 7" layer of 1.5 density 43 ILD with nothing on top you will see that it provides more pressure relief for certain parts of the body than much softer layered constructions. This is becasue of it's lower sag factor (allows more sinking in) than some of the softer higher sag factor foams. A lot of thought can go into understanding what is happening with the different constructions illustrated here and understanding "why" there are so many counterintuitive differences in pressure relief. This chart is for back sleeping as well which is "easier" than the greater differences in profile with side sleeping. If someone was using ILD alone to make their mattress with these materials, they would almost certainly have some "issues". Sag factor, and resiliency, and layer thickness plays a major role in mattress construction.

Phoenix