I have no problems with the way a new innerspring mattress sleeps.. I am just irritated that they turn into a pile of garbage in a couple years. Do I have any options other than purchasing a junker from a "warehouse" store? |
the ones with the slats built right in the mattresses are a pretty firm set up to be sure. really I like their Natural and Organic lines the best, in any event there is no PU foam in either one. The natural ones still use some boric acid in cotton batting though just FYI, but they are good mattresses. |
Leo3, I'm the guy who bought from Gardner Mattress. It's an old fashion New England company which still seems to pride itself on making a quality product. I'm sure there are other similar businesses around the country. I almost bought their "Ivory Plush" model which is the traditional hand tied spring mattress with a layer of latex on top. I don't think they use any PU foam. However, after I did a store test of their 100% latex mattresses, I was sold on latex. Sometimes I wish I had gone with the spring/latex model since I've had trouble getting the latex firmness where I want it. I ended up with "too firm" latex from Gardner (after 1 comfort exchange) which I chose to correct by adding a 3 inch "medium" topper from FoamSweetFoam. Seems fine now, so far. Yeh, I guess shipping costs to other areas outside of New England would be steep. I paid $69. for shipping to southern New Hampshire. But, the owner gave me a big enough discount in Salem, MA to more than offset the extra shipping costs. They DO have an outlet in NH also. |
I love the idea of pocket coils, but have always been wary of them due to Simmons reputation for making ones that migrate easily and/or break down too quickly. If there are better ones, or good ones, who makes them? If there were good ones, I might try them some day under my latex... |
im not saying that they cannot be better than other mass produced springs but it is literally impossible to mass produce a pocket coil in the actual proper design. there are always gaps between the coils and there are two ways to prevent shifting , you have to hand tie the springs together in the middle rather than using glues to hold the pockets together, however hand tieing is the only way to completely eliminate this. I was also just looking at a Vi-Spring in person, and they do a honeycomb nested pocket coil...it was quite special to see because it does not look like a normal pocketed spring whatsoever, there is literally NO gap between the coils, pretty impressive. They are starting around 4k for a queen set....but holy moly was it ever comfortable, probably wont hold its shape as well as an all latex build because there is so much fibre fill that they will compact and really need more maintenance. This would not be easy to do because they are quite heavy. one thing is for sure..if you build the coil correctly this design is inherently much better than an open coil, in most cases though I would agree with you that a pocket coil is not always a better thing. |
Ahhh, finally a topic I know something about! The answer to your question is, not much. Boric acid is pretty toxic if you happen to be an invertebrate, but to birds and mammals it is as close to harmless as you're going to find - that's why it's so popular among the anti-insecticide crowd. It can be toxic if you swallow large quantities (like most other salts) and it's a skin and lung irritant in pure powder form (like most other powders). But I doubt there is any residue at all in a mattress - it's highly water soluble so it would rinse out easily - and even if there were a residue I would not be the slightest bit concerned. My refusal to spray my home means that I live with all sorts of insect life, but I have no hesitation about putting boric acid near the cats' bowls during ant infestations. Linda |