DIY latex mattress help ( budget )

[phoenix]

Hi gardenguy,

After contacting Sleep On Latex it was suggested omitting the medium firmness entirely and just going with 5 inches of 20 ILD, since their medium 30 ILD would be so close to the ILD of my base foam that it would not add to the comfort factor

That could make very good sense - they have an excellent point.

I suppose I was under the assumption, and maybe this is from looking at so many online mattress constructions, that a transition layer with an ild between the base and top layer would make the feel less abrupt. However, I suppose with latex being a completely different “animal” than poly foams, this isn’t necessarily the case always. Do you think a transition layer is less needed in latex Phoenix, or would you say that may be more beneficial in an all poly or memory foam bed?

There’s much more information about how all of the layers of a mattress work together in this post. I wouldn’t get too “caught up” in the labelling of certain layers of the need to have a certain number of layers within a mattress. Latex has the ability to firm up as you sink into it more deeply, as this is discussed in more detail in this post, and because of this higher compression modulus, especially with Dunlop latex, you can start out with an initial soft feel (softer layer above “bending into” this layer gradually) and then as more weight is applied the comfort can firm up and become more supportive/firmer, so in some cases a single piece of latex can act similarly to two layers of progressive ILDs laminated together. Without getting too far down the rabbit hole, I speak to this a bit in both the progressive and differential construction articles.

Would using a 3 inch -15 ild layer in the top and a 2 inch-20 ild layer below that(both in dunlop) make much of a difference in feel?

I’m not sure what you’re comparing this to. If you mean would the 5" 15/20 ILD combination feel different from the 5" 20 ILD? If that is the case, most people would be able to notice this difference and would say that the 15/20 combination would feel softer.

If I truly want a pillowy type feel on top (similar to 10 ild soft memory foam) should I be looking for Talalay instead of Dunlop to begin with? Or should I be looking for low ILD hr poly foams. *

In the very soft feels, Talalay at the 14/15 ILD range is usually the most popular. You can also look for convoluted latex layers which will be quite plush. There are some sources for latex componentry here.

I don’t have a listing of what latex distributor carries which particular softness currently (and I don’t have time to comb through that right now -sorry), but the softest you’ll tend to find in Dunlop would be in the 55 kg/M3 range. 65 kg/M3 is more common.

There are some newer generations of high performance polyfoams that are higher in density but can be made quite plush. Those would generally be the only ultra soft types of polyfoams I would consider.

Phoenix