bedding in different cultures - any validity?

[phoenix]

Hi mitop,

Was not as impressed with Original Mattress Factory nor their selection

That’s unfortunate because they certainly do have some good quality/value mattresses available.

but did rather like Restwell mattresses, which seemed to be higher quality and better selection.

I would be cautious here and make sure you find out the foam densities in their mattresses because some of them use lower quality foams than I would suggest considering (see the guidelines here).

[quote]One of my big issues is when I ask for densities, both OMF and Restwell told me me 1.8 lbs. I trained as an engineer, so I pressed the salesperson is that lbs per cubic foot or lbs per cubic inch?

“It’s pounds per square inch,” he assured me, but when I performed the calculation, 1.2 lbs per square inch that he related would be ~144 lbs per square foot…and that is also not a density, it’s a unit of pressure! (Force per unit area) Sorry that I am confused about what are the “default” units for mattress measurement. If you could clarify this for me, that would help.[/quote]

While foam density could be expressed as any unit weight per unit volume measurement … in North America the standard is lbs / ft3 (the weight of a cubic foot of material).

ILD (indentation load compression used most commonly with latex) or IFD (indentation force compression used most commonly with polyfoam or memory foam) are measures of firmness which are measured by the force or weight it takes for a 50 sq in round compressor head to compress a layer of material (generally a 15" x 15" or 20" x 20" four inch thick piece of polyfoam or memory foam or a 6" thick latex core) by 25% of its original thickness (although in some cases the measurement is for different percentages such as 40%).

So far, in the mattress that we liked, I think that the polyfoam is 1.8 lb per (pending reply, square foot) on the top and bottom (again - have to confirm that this is a two-sided mattress, but I tried to make sure most of the ones I liked met this criteria) but there is a support polyfoam of 1.2 lbs per square (foot - again, pending reply) I think.

I would make sure you find out all the information in this article and I think you may discover that the comfort layers are 1.2 lb density (which is lower quality than I would consider if it is more than “about an inch or so”).

[quote]so I’m thinking that if the mattress price seemed to good to be true, it probably is.

I am confirming the heights of each layer, to make sure that everything adds up to the stated mattress height.[/quote]

I would confirm the height and the density of each layer. While it’s not always true that “you get what you pay for” because there are some particularly good value mattresses and some that are not good value at all … I would always make sure that you know the type and quality of every layer in any mattress you are considering.

[quote]Anyway, I also found this other article that you wrote:

www.themattressunderground.com/mattress-...attress-opinion.html

It’s an article from about 3 years ago with a gentleman who has a similar budget to me, and you told him that his options for a good mattress in his price range, are sadly, not very good.

You steered him towards some mattresses from walmart, and I’m wondering if I should direct my search there?[/quote]

I looked through the topic you linked and couldn’t see any mention of his budget or any comments about Walmart or about the options he had available. Did you link the correct thread?

There is more about buying from Walmart or other similar stores like Costco in post #4 here.

Post #3 and #4 here also includes some of the better online options I’m aware of for lower budget latex and latex hybrid mattresses and post #4 here includes some of the better online options I’m aware of for other types of mattresses in lower budget ranges.

Thanks for any input, Phoenix! (PS This is also my mom’s name in her native language, but when she came to the US her paperwork got messed up and now her name means Orchid. I wonder if you have a similar story for choosing your name?)

I have used “Phoenix” as my online username in many places since I was first online (back to the days of bulletin boards and phone modem access) and for me it represents the mythological bird that “rises up out of the ashes”

Phoenix