Dreamfoam new Arctic Dreams mattress similar to Tuft and Needle?

Mattress Talk General Mattresses Questions
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Hi AJohnson,

I’m sorry your 10" Arctic Dreams isn’t working out for you as well as you had hoped. :frowning: But at least you had the foresight to purchase something with a good return/exchange policy.

You are correct that Energex does have some “similar” properties to memory foam, being quite plush and pressure-relieving, but it is more breathable and less temperature sensitive. In your situation, as the mattress “broke-in” and the foam lost some of its “false firmness”, at 2.5" of Energex this doesn’t seem to be enough for your particular needs for comfort layers, and you’re “feeling through” the Energex to the polyfoam core, which even with its convoluted top surface (to ease transitioning) is still uncomfortable for your personally. You may be correct that you might benefit from a bit more/substantial comfort/transition layers atop the support core of any future mattress choice.

I’ll be interested to learn what you eventually decide to do.

Phoenix

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[quote=“Phoenix” post=74923]Hi AJohnson,

I’m sorry your 10" Arctic Dreams isn’t working out for you as well as you had hoped. :frowning: But at least you had the foresight to purchase something with a good return/exchange policy.

[…]

I’ll be interested to learn what you eventually decide to do.

Phoenix[/quote]

Yes, my experience with the company and their incredibly helpful customer service reps has been excellent so far. I’m bummed that the mattress didn’t end up working for me, since it’s such a great price. Hopefully I can provide them my feedback and they can consider it for any possible future iterations of the mattress.

On a whim I tried some 2" memory foam topper of unknown density we had lying around on my Arctic Dreams 10" last night, but I think the resulting 5.25" total of low-support comfort layer ended up creating some hammocking, and my back didn’t feel too great when I woke up.

My last choices in this budget range appear to be Zinus and Addable. Although both have a top layer of memory foam followed by a layer of transition polyfoam for comfort layers, Zinus doesn’t provide info on the density or ILD of their transition layer (I emailed them, we’ll see).

Also the memory foam and core are both of higher quality/density materials in the Addable compared to Zinus. Addable also scores more points with me because they have a very long 181 day trial period, it’s made in the USA, and they provide layer densities and ILD’s right in their specs section.

My only concern is that the Addable’s 1.8lb polyfoam transition layer is rated at 20 ILD, which seems a little on the softer side? In comparison, the Arctic Dreams Energex layer that I went right through was rated at 28 ILD according to the sales rep I spoke to. I’m not sure whether they rated that at room temp or heated up to body temp though, and a single ILD number also says nothing about the rate of progressive firmness as the material becomes more compressed.

If the Addable doesn’t work out for me, I’m just going to say to heck with it all and build a mattress by putting some custom combination of latex toppers on top of a 6" foam core.

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Hi AJohnson,

I’m happy to hear that Dreamfoam has been helpful to you. And I don’t doubt that adding the extra memory foam on top of your current Arctic Dreams made it too soft for your preference.

Regarding Zinus, I would also read post #6 here about mattresses imported from Asia or China and which may have been compressed for long periods of time in either shipping or storage before being purchased and a forum search on Zinus (you can just click this) will bring up more information and feedback about some of their brands and mattresses, and being sourced in China would make this somewhat of a risky purchase IMO.

The Energex compresses at a different rate than the polyfoam in the Addable, and without getting into too much detail, ILD is not the most reliable indicator of how soft or firm a layer will feel. Compression modulus is even more important because very few people actually sink into a layer exactly 25% and compression modulus is the rate at which a foam gets firmer as you compress it more. And the polyfoam layer will firm up at a different rate than the Energex.

Trying to predict how a mattress will feel and perform using only one of many “specs” or variables that are involved can be somewhat risky or misleading and even the most experienced mattress designers that are familiar with and have a great deal of experience with all the many variables and specs that can affect the feel and performance of a mattress can often be surprised at what a mattress was “supposed” to feel like based on specs and what it “actually” feels like in real life so in practical terms the only reliable way to know how any specific combination of materials and specs will feel like for you would be based on your own actual testing or personal experience. Specs can be a very rough guideline that can help you “find the range” but there are far too many unknowns and variables to use them to find the “best” combination or materials or components that would be suitable for any specific person with any degree of certainty.

Like Dreamfoam, Addable is a site member here, which means I think highly of them, so if you do choose to select their mattress I’m sure they will provide you excellent service along the lines you’ve received from Dreamfoam.

Phoenix

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I didn’t even think about this. Having a mattress not expand properly or having its durability compromised by being compressed for too long is one my my biggest foam mattress paranoias, so this rules the Zinus right out. Thanks for the heads up.

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Hi AJohnson,

You’re welcome.

Phoenix