Posts Tagged ‘comforter’
How much fill power is enough to keep me warm?
When considering the purchase of a quality down feather comforter the application should be considered. If you need the bedding for use in your home, it may not be necessary to get more than a 650 fill power.
If you intention is to use comforters for backpacking, where the weight and warmth are both important, you would consider a 700 fill power or more to keep it on the light side. Backpackers try to keep their packs as light as practicable and every ounce of weight saved would add up.
Comparing high and low fill power for warmth.
Fill power is a measure of the quality of down used as a standard in the industry. A way to tell the difference in high fill power versus low fill power is that to get the same warmth from say a goose down comforter, the high fill power down will weigh less and the low fill power down will weight more.
Conversely, another way to tell would be to take something made of down that both weigh the same and compare how warm it keeps you. The higher fill power would keep you warmer when compared to the lower fill power comforter.
Raw down needs to be washed clean
When down and feathers are purchased from farmers they are raw, which means they are unwashed. The processor will wash the down before a goose down pillow or comforter manufacturer can use it.
Many consumers are allergic to dust mites, or bacteria that are found in down and feathers in their raw state. Some manufacturers warrant their down against allergy causing organisms, which warranty will result in higher price.
The merits of down
Now that winter is fast approaching and when you crawl into bed your sheets are icy cold, the natural solution is to add more blankets and snuggle in. But then, in the middle of the night, you’re much too hot and you end up throwing off the blankets, and the air is freezing! This frustrating dance between hot and cold could all be avoided with a look into down comforters.
There is a variety of down for comforters: goose, duck, synthetics and others being fairly common. Goose down is considered by many to be the most comfortable as well as the most insulating. But it’s lightweight and breathable, so you’ll never be too hot. Goose down comes in bigger, thicker clumps than duck down, and it doesn’t have an unpleasant smell like other forms of down can have.