Hi sweetdreams,
There is sometimes a fine line between too little information (which is where most people start and carries the risk of buying an unsuitable mattress that has poor quality or value) and too much information (which carries the risk of “paralysis by analysis” and giving in to the temptation to make comfort specs more exact or important than they need to be or more important than personal testing). The middle ground is always the “best” place to stay. As soon as you start feeling that information is becoming too complex or overwhelming … then you are probably crossing the line into “too much information” and I would go by the knowledge and experience of the people you are working with.
Step 1 of the process in post #1 here is to gather some basic information about mattress materials so you are armed with some good basic information and can recognize when a retailer or manufacturer is providing you with good information or they are focused more on marketing information.
Step 2 of the process is to know what to eliminate and what to focus on. I would suggest eliminating any mainstream mattress or any mattress where you can’t find the quality information you need.
Step 3 is to research retailers before you look at mattresses. They are the link between you and the manufacturers who make the mattresses and if you talk to them before you visit them then you can confirm that they will provide you with the information you need about the mattresses they sell so you don’t have to track down the specs of every mattress you look at (and probably get overwhelmed and frustrated doing what they need to do). If they can’t or won’t provide this … I would look elsewhere. The goal of this step is to find the people who already know what you would otherwise have to learn … or find out.
Step 4 is where you test mattresses at the retailers that will provide you with the information you need and choose the “finalist” at each one. This is also where you would include online options if it seems to be justified.
Step 5 is to make your final choice between the “finalists”.
None of these steps involves you tracking down or translating mattress specs … this is the job of the retailer or manufacturer you are working with. Your “job” is to test mattresses in your budget range for PPP (or in any budget if you want to test higher cost and quality materials). Their job is to help you make sure that the “finalists” that you are considering use the highest possible quality materials in the price range you are looking at and providing you with the information you need to make meaningful comparisons.
The thickness and softness of a layer and the mattress as a whole go hand in hand and affect each other and the overall softness and firmness of a mattress but in general terms this would work well IMO yes.
I understand. The thickness and softness of the top layer will have a big effect on how the mattress feels for different people (depending on ther weight and height and body shape). with soft layers this thin … an adult will “go through” the comfort layer and feel more of the firmness of the layers below it. If you were to make the top 2" even softer for exammple … many people would “feel” that the mattress was even firmer because they would feel more of the firmness of the deeper layers.
No … I don’t know who carries toppers in the area and it may take some calling around on the phone to ask. I would also consider ordering a latex topper online if they aren’t available locally at a reasonable cost once you have a general idea of the firmness you want. Some of the online options that are available in Canada are in post #21 here and several of these carry latex toppers.
They normally just sit on top with the mattress protector and sheets over them. They don’t tend to shift to any significant degree.
The top inch of polyfoam could well be lower density (don’t forget that density and firmness are not related) but I normally suggest that around an inch of soft polyfoam is acceptable as far as not knowing the density because it’s generally soft anyway and only there for hand feel and further softening won’t have a significant effect on the mattress with quilting of top layers this thin. 1.8 lb polyfoam is at the bottom of what I would consider acceptable density for a support layer in anything except the lowest price ranges. ILD information is not that important when you are testing a mattress because it only has to do with comfort and support (which you will feel with testing) not quality.
The EcoPur 4400 doesn’t have a pillowtop I’m guessing you mean the content of the tri zone layer. If the 2" of latex is in the center only, it would seem logical that the top and bottom third of the layer was the rest of the trizone and had 2" of polyfoam in each section so there wasn’t a big hump in the middle of the mattress. Regardless though … I would want to know the specifics before I considered it. It’s the job of the person selling the mattress to find this out for their customers so it is an “easy” job rather than requiring customers to communicate directly with the factory.
Soy is not really a factor in how “green” a foam is or have much to do with how it feels or performs or how “safe” it is so I would tend to treat them all as equal to regular polyfoam. For the most part they will all be under 20% and they are more about greenwashing than anything else.
If you talk with them and then list all the layers of any mattress you are considering on the forum … I’d be happy to share my thoughts about a particular mattress. They are a wholesale manufacturer that only sells through retailers and while I’ve talked with them and would consider them to be well worth a call to describe a mattress you were looking for to see if they had a retailer near you that sold something similar … I would need more information about any particular mattress to provide any meaningful feedback about any of their mattresses.
According to the specifications on their site … the Bio Plush has the following layers (from top to bottom and assuming the order of the layers is listed top to bottom in each section) …
1 1/2" ultra firm foam tack 'n jump quilting: This is polyfoam with density missing.
1/2" ultra dynamic foam: Foam density missing.
40 OZ high resilient poly: This would probably be 2.5 lb HR polyfoam … which is high quality.
3" natural latex foam: This is a good quality material but there is too much questionable “polyfoam” over it.
2" supersoft foam: More polyfoam that needs density information
2 1/2 oz decking: This is the fabric layer (it’s oz not inches) under the top foam eurotop.
7" 1.8 lb Ultra comfort soybean foam: This is also polyfoam and the density is on the low end of acceptable for a base layer.
3" foam support stabilizer: This is typically very firm foam which acts as a stabilizer layer at the bottom. Density information missing.
Overall there would be way too much missing information for me to consider this I personally wouldn’t go to the trouble of finding out the missing information unless there was a retailer nearby where you could test this mattress as well and they confirmed they would fill in the missing information if you liked it.
So just to make sure I have this right from top to bottom …
Bamboo quilt: This is also a good ticking.
3" 1.9 lb this is HD polyfoam and is better quality than you would normally find in the comfort layers of mainstream mattresses. The firmness rating of “medium” is not part of its quality but part of the “comfort” of the mattress. This density polyfoam would be much less likely to soften and impress than the typical 1.5 lb polyfoam or lower that is typically used in comfort layers but it’s not the same quality as latex or HR polyfoam.
3/4" 2.5 lb HR polyfoam: This is a good quality HR polyfoam and used to help create firm support.
1/2" cotton felt insulator pad: Good quality
Continuous coil. Details missing but generally found in lower cost mattresses.
These specs seem reasonable to me for a good “budget” mattress that didn’t use premium foams (latex, HR polyfoam, good quality memory foam). Continuous coils are generally the lowest cost type of coil but the foam layers are better quality which is the part that would be most important to me (besides PPP of course) because its the weak link of the mattress.
Continuous coils provide good support because they are connected to each other but they need good quality comfort layers over them because they are usually less conforming than other higher quality coils. An innerspring is not normally the weak link of a mattress though.
As far as changing the layers in terms of how it feels and performs or layer thickness … that is preference and would be part of your testing for PPP and not a quality issue.
Phoenix