Help me find a mattress based on my research so far.

Greetings,

I have attempted to educate myself through this site and sleeplikethedead. I have also tried a 10-15 beds in store and found my three favorite to be

  • sealy - inspiration
  • terperpedic - weightless
    [li]icomfort - savant soft[/li[

Regardless, I know there are many more options out there besides those you would find at major sealy, tempurpedic, icomfort, etc…

I’m aware of some other retailers in my area I could try through this link:https://forum.mattressunderground.com/t/best-manufacturer-for-a-firm-latex-mattress-under-2-5k.

Some quick facts about me
height: 5.8
weight: 215 fat athletic
age: 28
side sleeper 80%
back sleeper 20%
Budget: 2000
Aesthetics: don’t matter
dealine: within the next month
Size: King or king cal (as it will sleep my wife and my dog)
I use a body pillow
Current bed memory foam - medium firmness, firmer then I would like, main reason for we need a new bed is its to small.
I have mainly sampled memory foam beds.

what I want, based on research and testing, to is to “sink in”, especially in the shoulder, a lot but NOT “sink down”, especially in the in the hip region and stomach region

The two main points of pressure that bother me that sleep are: Shoulder and stomach. Shoulder because i don’t sink in and down enough and stomach because i tend to sink down to much causing a pressure on the stomach.

Beyond mattress recommendations, I notice a general trend on this site to promote latex beds. Why is that?
Please help me understand what kind of frame or foundation I may or may not need.

I’m sure lots of the advice I could be given has been covered else where, but I’m having trouble putting it all together. Any help would be great,

Thanks

Hi kvothe,

The first place I would start your research is the tutorial post here which has all the basic information you will need all in one place along with the steps and guidelines that can help you make the best possible choice. It will also help you learn how and why to avoid the worst ones including the major brands that normally use lower quality materials or are not good value compared to many other manufacturers that are available to you that make mattresses that use better quality materials in the same or lower price ranges than the major brand equivalents.

You have listed some good criteria and I would use the testing guidelines in the tutorial post to find a mattress that is the best “match” for you. There are too many variables, unknowns, and preferences involved in a mattress choice for anyone else to make a recommendation for a mattress based on “theory at a distance” that can possibly be more accurate than your own personal testing and experience. Nobody else can feel what you feel on a mattress (see mattress firmness/comfort levels in post #2 here).

Outside of testing a mattress for PPP (Posture and alignment, Pressure relief, and Personal preferences), the most important part of a mattress purchase is making sure you know all the specifics of what is inside it (see this article) so you can identify any weak links and make more meaningful quality/value comparisons with other mattresses.

[quote]Beyond mattress recommendations, I notice a general trend on this site to promote latex beds. Why is that?
Please help me understand what kind of frame or foundation I may or may not need.[/quote]

I don’t recommend or promote any specific type of material and every material has higher and lower quality versions so I would “recommend” that each person choose the mattress and the materials that they prefer in the highest quality version that is available to them in their budget range (regardless of whether it’s memory foam, latex, polyfoam, or any other material or component in their mattress). Having said that … latex is a very high quality material that has many benefits and once they’ve learned about it and tested it in person (and it’s often not available in mainstream stores) many of the members on this site have chosen it because they preferred it over other materials that were available. There is more about the pros and cons of latex in this article.

Phoenix

Thanks Phoenix

I’m leaning towards http://www.novosbed.com/product/harmony-memory-foam-mattress/
or maybe this one: http://www.brooklynbedding.com/memory-foam-mattresses/cool-luxe-memory-foam

It feels impossible to tell why one over another without trying them, which I cannot do. Phoenix seems to pefer brooklyn as a compnay over novosbed. It would be nice to specifically why, it might explain why brooklyn is almost 50% more then another.

Some basic things that still confuses me are:

Is bed frame" the same thing as a “bed platform”
Do i need a foundation?

My understanding is that for a memory foam foundation you just need a sturdy flat service with some ventilation. If that’s the case why wouldn’t just having a platform work? Why do we need a foundation at all? maybe incorrectly I current believe the foundation is just cosmetic, and just raises the memory foam bed up.

Right now it seems if I can find a bed platform with sufficient support (more or less a flat board with some vents) that a foundation wouldn’t add anything but height, is that correct?

Currently, with my bed, I just the memory foam bed ontop of.

:

Hi kvothe,

I’m not sure where you got the idea that I dislike Novosbed because it’s certainly not the case and they are one of the manufacturers listed among the better online memory foam options I’m aware of that are linked in the tutorial post. You can see some of my thoughts about them there.

There are many reasons why one mattress costs more than another one and there is more about this in post #14 here and post #2 here.

While you can’t test either one beforehand of course … both of them use a commonly available mattress as a reference point for comfort and support that you can test locally and use to gauge the comfort and support of each mattress. The Harmony is comparable to the Sealy Optimum Inspiration and the Cool Luxe is comparable to the Tempurpedic Cloud Luxe. Both of them also have a free return option in case your actual experience indicates that the mattress isn’t as suitable a choice as you hoped for which also reduces the risk of an online purchase. They will also provide you with some good guidance when you talk with them about a purchase.

Once you are down to “final choices” between good and good then which one would be best for you would depend on the parts of your personal value equation that are most important to you.

Generally you will need three things for your sleeping system. Once of them is a bedframe which will generally be steel (like this example) or a wooden bedframe. On top of the bedframe you will need a support system which provides even support for the mattress (the mattress would have no support on the bedframe alone). This could be a series of slats or a solid surface on a wooden bedframe or a foundation (on a steel bedframe or a wooden bedframe that only has a few slats that are too far apart to support a mattress). On top of this you have the mattress. Some products combine the function of both a bedframe and foundation including the wire grid platform / bedframe you attached to your post. Another example would be a wooden platform bed which is a bedframe but also has a solid or slatted surface that is suitable to support the mattress. There is more about foundations and other types of support systems for a mattress and which types are generally suitable for different types of mattresses in the foundation post here and the two links in the second paragraph.

Phoenix

Apologies, I edited my post concerning novo as it seemed wrongly put. There was a post where you seemed to express some doubts about them. But I probable mis-understood as I upon further readings i didn’t see any common misgivings.

Hi kvothe,

There was a time that Novosbed was sourcing their materials from China but they quickly realized that this wasn’t the best option in terms of the quality of the materials they wanted to use and the post you read may have been about that time. They have long since changed to US suppliers that supply better quality materials.

Phoenix

Thanks again Phoenix,

The support from Novosbed seemed to suggest their beds sink a bit to much for a wire frame, Amazon.com here,[/url] to work. I didn’t clarify if they thought the same was true for a slatted…

meanwhile (Phoenix) suggests here that…

So at the moment i’ll assume that I can get away with it as long as the platform is …

  1. sturdy
  2. solid
  3. has some ventiliation

The problem is that I cannot seem to find this combination after an hour of looking online. I’m I missing something or is this a unicorn? The goal here is to just save the 200 dollars. I’m not that hard up for cash so if thats the case its not a huge problem.

Though i havent looked for a slated plateform yet. Ill try that next.

Sorry for all my ninja edits!

Hi kvothe,

The wire grid platform you attached to your previous post is similar to (or the same as) some of the ones listed in the foundation post and would generally be suitable for a memory foam mattress and as long as you confirm that it meets the warranty criteria of the mattress you purchase it would be fine and you wouldn’t need anything else.

You can read a little more about them in post #10 here.

Phoenix

So all things considered I think it makes sense to just get a metal fire frame and the foundation from the manufacturers website. I did some price checking and “just frame solution” really saves much in the way of money and most require assembly and are less “sturdy”.

Hi kvothe,

I’m not quite clear on what you mean or are considering as a support system for your mattress. If you have or are buying a wire grid platform bedframe similar to the one in the picture you attached then you won’t need a separate foundation.

Phoenix

Novo’s support said that frame wouldn’t work. I suppose they might be wrong.

Hi kvothe,

The first rule for choosing a foundation or support system for your mattress is to make sure that it meets the warranty criteria of the manufacturer so that would rule out the one you have. The down side of the wire grid types of foundations, and especially the ones that have larger gaps in between the wires such as yours, is that the mattress can sink or sag into the gaps between the wires over time and that they have much less support surface than a slat or solid surface foundation.

Phoenix