Keeping two Neoairs together

[Jeffs Eleven]

My wife and I sleep right next to each other, but the gap between our pads causes problems. I used to tie them together with string where the hips are and where the shoulders are. It worked pretty well, but the strings were fiddly, to say the least. They would end up in knots every time I took them off.

Finally I figured I'd give velcro a chance. I put about 6" of the loop side on both Neos adjacent to the other. I did this near the shoulders, near the chest, and down by the hips. Then I put them next to each other and use a 12" section of the hook to hold them together. It keeps them tight together. When fully inflated, the gap is unnoticable.

I turned one pad over because otherwise one of the air valves would stick up between our heads.

[EndoftheTrail]

Jeff:

I could be wrong, but I thought the grey side is the reflective side which should be used face down toward the ground?

[Ken Thompson]

+1 with Benjamin's question. One valve at a head and one at a foot end would work,no?

[Jeffs Eleven]

Hmmm… I didn't really realize that the reflective stuff worked that much. I thought it was all the internal baffling that gave the insulation. Wouldn't it just reflect my body heat back up, same effect? I like to have the valves on the head end so they can be inflated more easily. I don't have to spin or flip my pad around, I just roll off of it and blow it up.

[Brett Rasmussen]

"I didn't really realize that the reflective stuff worked that much."

Call me an unbeliever, but I don't think it makes a difference.

[Steven Adeff]

considering heat is just radiating energy, much like light, unless the ground is warmer than you are I would think reflecting the ground energy from your body would be a *bad* thing. According to their website both the top and the bottom are made of Nylon, and neither side is black (an energy absorber, for simplicity) or white (an energy reflector), so I don't think either side is going to be doing much more than the other in terms of heat rejection or absorption.

I get the feeling the "bottom" side may be slightly thicker or the exact nylon polymer configuration may be designed in such a way as to be more rugged in light of it being on the ground.

[EndoftheTrail]

Per Thermarest website, "Unrivaled Warmth: Our patent-pending reflective barrier returns warmth to your body and reduces heat loss to the ground, keeping you three times warmer than any other uninsulated air mattress.".

Which begs the question which side is that "reflective barrier"? My hunch is still that the grey area faces down, to reflect the cold from the ground.

[Greg Mihalik]

"My hunch is still that the grey area faces down, to reflect the cold from the ground."

You cannot "reflect" cold. You can only reflect radiation. In this case heat from a warm body flowing away.

A radiant barrier facing the ground, if the air temp is cooler than the ground, would help keep the ground warm.

[Steven Adeff]

you can't reflect "cold". If that is what they say, then the top layer is doing the reflecting of energy and the bottom layer is doing an insulation of energy across it.

[Barry P]

You probably have a lighter method than me. I didn’t modify our neoairs. I straddle them on a GG Thinlight. That provided enough grip to hold them together (for us).

Another item I use sometimes is a 12”x12” slice of cupboard grip liner. It takes up less pack room than the Thinlight but weighs a little more. There may be lighter versions out there.

-Barry

[Jeffs Eleven]

So do you guys deduce that there is a 'top' and 'bottom' to the pad? I always assumed that it was the same construction, just different colors. Both the yellow and gray feel the same, and they both have the semi-reflective quality (mylar?). My guess is that they are the same, but I don't know…

[EndoftheTrail]

I always thought reflective works both ways — like the thermos bottle with its reflective, mirror-like material that keeps hot drinks hot and cold drinks cold??

Time to give Thermarest a call…

[Michael Ray]

Watch this video for insight on the construction.

[BlackHatGuy]

Thermarest says sleep on the yellow, gray to the ground.

[Dan @ Durston Gear]

My understanding is that the reflective layer in inside the mattress, so which side is up shouldn't matter in terms of warmth. The grey side might be designed to be the bottom for other reasons like durablity?

How did you attach the velcro strips to the NeoAir? Glue? I like your method but I'm hesitant to permanently alter ours.

[Jeffs Eleven]

I just used the sticky-back velcro. It has held so far, but I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up coming off before too long. Then I will try seam grip or something. I thought about hot glue, but I don't know how hot is too hot.

Both sides feel about the same thickness to me, but I could just be feeling what I want to feel.

I turn the one upside-down so that I can keep the valve towards my head for easy late night filling. It sucks when you have to flip head to toe, or mess up your whole bed turning the pad around, just to put some more air in it.

EDIT_ I emailed Thermarest today, but haven't heard back as of 8:30pm
pacific

[Franco Darioli]

Wouldn't something like this be simpler?
( I would use a ribbon type fabric)

Franco

[. .]

You can't reflect cold. Only heat radiates. Thus, a radiant barrier prevents a certain amount of heat loss on it's migration path towards the colder mass.

As for the NeoAir marketing science, they've wised up a bit:

This was their original graphic depiction of how the concept behaves:

Then they revised it to this:

Currently, the Cascade Designs website seems to have abandoned the creative graphic physics education alltogether.

To return to the original subject matter: We have often paired 2 short pads together perpendicular to our bodies and placed packs or foam sections under our feet. This has proven rather effective, even without straps.

[Jeffs Eleven]

Franco- I did this for a while. I found without a knot in between the pads, one would ride up over the other. so I made a little loop in the string and fed the string through. I worked fine. I just got tired of having a birds nest to sort out every time pulled the string out to use it. I didn't want to carry around a spool to wind up the string, and having to tie and untie knots all the time was a pain in my lazy American butt:)

The velcro works beautifully, no knots (intended, or otherwise) light, and deployed in seconds.

I have to see in the long term how well the sticky stays on the pad, but that should be easy to control.

Aaron- The perpendicular idea is interesting… Why, for the love of The Big Bang, don't they make a 25" X 47"?!?!! Then, in perpendicular setup, two pads would be 47" wide and 50" long- that would be an amazing pad configuration.

[Jeffs Eleven]

After coming upon this I’d like to say that the velcro lasted for years with just the sticky back for adhesion.

Now we use an exped hyperlite duo instead but the velcro to my knowledge is still the simplest, lightest, and easy to use connector I’ve seen or heard of for pads.

[Author]

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