Memory Foam Mattress - confusion over name - shop vs online

guinevere

accidentally found myself on this page!! But as I'm here - thought I'd mention that I bought my mattress from IKEA about ten years ago & it's wonderful! Even my daughter told me it's the most comfortable mattress ever - & that's high praise indeed! Also bought the mattress pad - which has doubled in price since but is still good value! The pad adds just enough softness to a firm mattress. All the mattresses come with 10 yr guarantee as I recall... I hate shopping in IKEA, but...!!!

Tim_Deegan

guinevere wrote: »

accidentally found myself on this page!! But as I'm here - thought I'd mention that I bought my mattress from IKEA about ten years ago & it's wonderful! Even my daughter told me it's the most comfortable mattress ever - & that's high praise indeed! Also bought the mattress pad - which has doubled in price since but is still good value! The pad adds just enough softness to a firm mattress. All the mattresses come with 10 yr guarantee as I recall... I hate shopping in IKEA, but...!!!

Please, please, please don't recommend Ikea mattresses......I recently visited Ikea for the first time. I had heard many mixed reviews about Ikea, so I decided to go with a completely open mind.

Some things appeared quite good quality, some things were like old MFI reborn (they look like they would fall apart in a stiff breeze), and some things looked like really good ideas. Then I found their mattresses, and was disgusted at the low quality.

Now I know that some of you will probably start saying that I'm only slagging Ikea mattresses off because I sell beds and mattresses, and they are in competition. But like I said, I went there with a completely open mind, and I am giving you all my honest opinion as someone who does know the subject.

guinevere

Tim_Deegan wrote: »

Please, please, please don't recommend Ikea mattresses..... Then I found their mattresses, and was disgusted at the low quality.

Now I know that some of you will probably start saying that I'm only slagging Ikea mattresses off because I sell beds and mattresses, and they are in competition. But like I said, I went there with a completely open mind, and I am giving you all my honest opinion as someone who does know the subject.

As I said, i've had mine for ten years+ & have the most comfy bed ever!! My mattress(es) are in excellent condition with no sign of aging! However, perhaps the quality or manufacturer has changed since then...

Iom-rf

leejo wrote: »

Does anyone know if the memory foam 'toppers' are a good idea. I have a bad hip and can't lie on my side. My matress is fairly new and I just wondered if this would give some relief.
Thanks

Yes they're good, bought one last year from QVC for £80 (around that), its very good, its not as warm like the other all memory foam mattresses either.

boots_babe

I've very recently bought a memory foam mattress. After lots and lots of research and help from these boards, I finally chose one from https://www.memory-mattress.co.uk.

They are not allowed to state this on their site, but they sell the Flexcell matresses which did pretty well in the Which survey. I was so worried about getting the wrong one, but we had a 2 week free trial period, and also got 2 free memory pillows and a free Coolmax cover.

We are SO pleased with it. It is extremely comfy, and since getting it I've hardly had ANY neck/back pain, whereas previously I had it almost every day. It cost us £320 which is an absolute bargain.

Even the pillows are excellent - I already had a Tempur traditional pillow, but these Flexcell ones are way better. HTH.

alanobrien

Tim_Deegan wrote: »

I'm sorry, but all true 'memory foam' is visco elastic. Latex foam provides good support, but not to the level of visco elastic memory foam.

That, as any informed engineer would tell you is absolute nonsense. Tempur invented the principle for a mattress from NASA technology based on variable density latex not Visco elastic.

It is the variable density that provides the support.
Visco elasatic was produced partly to get around Tempur's patent but mainly because it was cheaper to produce than latex.

Why some manufacturers still choose to manufacture spring based support systems that clearly provide point loads on the body thus stressing it rather than a linear load as would a foam matrix is beyond me.

If sprung systems are so good why did NASA use a fully foam latex based support system in the shuttle seats ? I leave that for you to decide.

Tim_Deegan

alanobrien wrote: »

That, as any informed engineer would tell you is absolute nonsense. Tempur invented the principle for a mattress from NASA technology based on variable density latex not Visco elastic.

It is the variable density that provides the support.
Visco elasatic was produced partly to get around Tempur's patent but mainly because it was cheaper to produce than latex.

Why some manufacturers still choose to manufacture spring based support systems that clearly provide point loads on the body thus stressing it rather than a linear load as would a foam matrix is beyond me.

If sprung systems are so good why did NASA use a fully foam latex based support system in the shuttle seats ? I leave that for you to decide.

I don't want to get into an argument about this, but I would love to know where you get your information from? Here is a quote direct from Tempur's web site:

"TEMPUR® Material
The TEMPUR Material is a visco-elastic, temperature sensitive open cell material which has unique pressure relieving qualities. Unlike
ordinary polyurethane which features irregular cell shapes that simply compress under weight and degenerate over a short period of time, the TEMPUR Pressure Relieving Material is composed of billions of visco-elastic spherical shaped, open cells. The cells respond to body temperature and weight then shift and reorganise their position to mould to the exact contours of the patient’s body. The TEMPUR Pressure Relieving Material becomes softer in warmer areas and remains firmer in cooler areas, where less body contact is being made.


Tempur Combi
This 15cm depth mattress consists of an upper layer of 7cm visco-elastic temperature sensitive TEMPUR Material laminated to an 8cm high resilient polyurethane foam base. The airflow system between the TEMPUR layer and the foam base provides additional in-depth resilience and greater ventilation throughout the mattress.


Tempur Combi-HD
This 20cm depth mattress consists of an upper layer of 2cm TEMPUR-HD™ (High Density) laminated to 7cm TEMPUR visco-elastic temperature sensitive material, which is then laminated to 11cm high resilient polyurethane foam.The airflow system between the TEMPUR layer and the foam base provides additional in-depth resilience throughout the matress.



Tempur's patent for visco elastic memory foam expired, and there are now many manufacturers worldwide. Some of these manufacturers produce a better product than Tempur, which is probably why Tempur came out bottom in the Which Magazine report."


As for the reason why the pocket spring/memory foam option is supposed to give the best support, well if you look at the different properties of both pocket springs and reflex foam, then it is common sense:

If you push down on a block of reflex foam (which is really just high density sponge), then you will notice that the immediate area around the applied pressure will also compress (not as much as open coil springs do though). If you push down on pocket springs then only the springs that have pressure applied to them will compress. For this reason pocket springs have better contouring properties.

Pocket springs are however quite fagile compaired to reflex foam, but if the mattress is turned on a regular basis, and you don't let the kids jump on it, then it should last just as long.


As for why NASA didn't use pocket springs.........well as any informed engineer would tell you NASA were interested in the moulding properties of visco elastic memory foam, they didn't want seats that the astronauts could bounce up and down on.

alanobrien

Tim_Deegan wrote: »

I don't want to get into an argument about this, but I would love to know where you get your information from?

The original patent......they have sensibly "value engineered" the design since the original product and remarkably still manage to get away with charging the earth for it.

"As for why NASA didn't use pocket springs.........well as any informed engineer would tell you NASA were interested in the moulding properties of visco elastic memory foam, they didn't want seats that the astronauts could bounce up and down on."

and thats just plain funny

Tim_Deegan

alanobrien wrote: »

The original patent......they have sensibly "value engineered" the design since the original product and remarkably still manage to get away with charging the earth for it.

"As for why NASA didn't use pocket springs.........well as any informed engineer would tell you NASA were interested in the moulding properties of visco elastic memory foam, they didn't want seats that the astronauts could bounce up and down on."

and thats just plain funny

To be honest I don't know if Tempur had a patent for varaible density latex foam, but I presume from the fact that you found the patent that they did.

The fact is that Tempur don't use latex foam in their mattresses, they use visco elastic memory foam, which they did develop for NASA.

I presume the variable density latex may have been developed for NASA, then was replaced by visco elastic memory foam due to it's superior properties.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought that Dunlop held most of the patents for latex foam.

dz1

Tim_Deegan wrote: »

Tempur's patent for visco elastic memory foam expired, and there are now many manufacturers worldwide. Some of these manufacturers produce a better product than Tempur, which is probably why Tempur came out bottom in the Which Magazine report.

What you failed to mention about that Which report is that the Tempur mattress beat ALL of the pocket sprung mattresses tested in the critical area of performance (body support, lower back support and pressure minimisation).

Another thing is that they used a very flawed durability test for testing the Tempur. If it wasn't for that flawed test, the Tempur would have scored much higher and would have been close to or at the very top of the leaderboard.

Tim_Deegan wrote: »

As for the reason why the pocket spring/memory foam option is supposed to give the best support...

It doesn't give the best support as can be seen in the Which report.

The highest scores in the Which report for performance (body support, lower back support and pressure minimisation) were given to reflex foam/memory foam mattresses. These top scoring mattresses scored higher than all of the pocket sprung mattresses tested for support and pressure minimisation.

Tim_Deegan wrote: »

Pocket springs are however quite fagile compaired to reflex foam, but if the mattress is turned on a regular basis, and you don't let the kids jump on it, then it should last just as long.

At least you got the first part right. Springs can bend and lose their shape over time. They don't last as long as foam.