Will my neoair large be warm enough with my Golite Ultra 20 down to 30 degrees? I haven't tried it yet, but am wondering how warm the pad will be since I will be laying directly on it? Do I need a ccf to supplement this system?

Edited by ianders on 04/29/2012 09:13:40 MDT.

I consider myself to be a very warm sleeper. I find the regular NeoAir to be not as warm as I would like when temps are near freezing. My All Season is certainly warmer. I would add a ccf to supplement. My $0.02.

My experience mirrors Ken's. At 30F I begin to notice a chill from below with an original neoair.

You will not need any more pad than you would if you would be using a conventional down sleeping bag. The pad is just as warm laying directly on top of it, or with a fully compressed layer of down on top of it.

At 30º F, the NeoAir is suspect. A 2.5R value leaves many feeling some chill from the ground. Lots of conditions are in effect though (i.e. ground temperature, which a sleeping pad insulates you from, is not the same as the ambient air temperature).

+1 to what Stephan says.

Here in the Southeast, I am fine using my original NeoAir on its own down to mid to low 20's (F). (Of course though, we all know that YMMV...everyone is different, and this is what works for me.) Around mid 20's is where I will throw a 1/8" GG ThinLight pad on top of the NeoAir and be fine down into the low teens for sure. However, as Stephan suggests, these are ambient temps rather than ground temps. For areas farther north where the ground is more likely to be colder/frozen, this would probably not be the case.

If I didn't already carry a ccf pad in my pack as my frame support, then I would probably get an All Season to use though, which would eliminate my need to layer a ccf pad on top...

He is also correct about the down compressing beneath you in a sleeping bag. The insulation in the bottom of a sleeping bag provides no additional warmth because it gets compressed the second you lay back on it. Just try it, throw your bag on the frozen ground and then hop in.

However, this is where the Klymit Enertia pad fills in. Since the Enertia pad is a series of tubes rather than a flat sleeping area, the sleeping bag can potentially loft somewhat between the tubes, and provide a bit of insulation. Although I have no experience with these pads, so I dunno...

I sleep like a baby @ 30 degrees w/ my neo and Palisade quilt :) bringing a 1/8" pad probably isn't a bad idea though, you can use it as a sit pad and only adds 2.5 ounces to your kit

Agree with Stephan, Chad, and Mike. Just used an unenhanced NeoAir to high 20s with JRB quilt. But do some backyard testing before you go into the backcountry.

I spent a night on 8' of snow when I wasn't planning to last weekend and slept just fine on a neoair with two sections of Xlite (my sitpad) underneath my shoulders. Got down to about 35º and was warm all night with a custom 20º quilt from Goose Feet. I also used an emergency blanket as groundcloth, which may have marginally assisted.