名前:Masaki T 経歴:大手アウトドアショップで寝袋・マットのコーナーを中心に約4年間の接客経験に加え、独自の調査・研究を重ね、寝袋・マットの情報を中心としたこのサイトを運営して10年以上。無積雪登山・雪山登山・クライミング・アイスクライミング・自転車旅行・車中泊旅行・ファミリーキャンプなど幅広くアウトドアを経験。(詳細プロフィール)
書き込まれたコメント:Please consider providing an R-value in addition to your temperature ratings. Not providing an R-value in addition to your temp rating suggests Nemo is not being transparent with the pad’s actual insulating power.
返信:We don’t market R-values for our sleeping pads here at NEMO and I’d be happy to explain why. There are many different ways to test for R-value and all will provide very different results. Many companies in the industry test their sleeping pads using the method that will provide the best results, and we aren’t OK with this. There is not currently a standardized test method in the industry. We took 4 leading pads in the industry and tested them at an independent 3rd party lab, using ASTM D1518, which is probably the most common method of measuring R-value in sleeping pads. The differences in marketed R-value ranged from 12-50% higher than lab tested R-values. This is an enormous difference when customers make buying decisions based on as little as 0.1 difference in R-value. NEMO strives to give the customer as much information as possible, with clarity, when making a purchasing decision. We are currently leading a committee within the Outdoor Industry to adopt a single standard for sleeping pad insulation ratings so that pads can be accurately compared based on this information.
NEMO does complete lab testing, including R-value testing on all of our pads. Instead of publishing an R-value rating, we decided to publish a minimum comfort rating. This rating is based on a combination of lab testing, including R-value testing, and extensive user feedback from our employees, test team, and ambassadors. This information is used to come up with the lowest temperature range where the majority of people will sleep comfortably on the pad. We think that although unconventional, this temperature rating makes a lot more sense to pair with a sleeping bag that also uses a temperature rating to gauge its warmth. Let us know if you have any other questions!
Science of Heat To ensure we stay on the cutting edge of thermal science and engineering, we work with a neighboring company called Thermetrics, an engineering group that, in their words, leads the industry in “thermal comfort testing solutions that deliver advanced performance, innovative design and leading-edge features.” They build the R-value testers we use to design, test and modify our sleeping pads. These devices take two large plates and place the pad in between. One plate is kept at a steady temperature with an electrical current. A pad that offers a lot of insulation will require less energy to keep the plate at a steady temperature. The less energy used to maintain the warmth of the plate, the higher the R-value the pad receives.
When designing our award-winning sleeping pads, we thoroughly test our products in the field and in our Seattle factory with the Thermetrics machines. This equipment gives us crucial insights while designing gear, allowing us to consider and test the most minute details of our products and make design decisions that lead to better performing gear.
So, as we just said, R-value is, theoretically, a good way to compare insulation. What? Theoretically? It sounds like double speak. Sorry. But here’s why we say “theoretically.” Like so many measurements used by various industries (and customers!), the usefulness of the number is based upon whether it can be readily compared across brands. Our mats are independently tested by EMPA, the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research. In other words, the R-value we state on our mats does not originate from the Exped offices. Rather, it is arrived at by a standard R-value test conducted by a neutral party. Being a Swiss company, we are naturally big fans of tests like this and would love to see standardized tests used by all mat manufacturers. We’re not there yet, but the topic is being discussed within the outdoor industry, and that’s a start. But certainly, within the Exped line, you can compare mats accurately.