Inflating your self inflating mat

[MrsMellowDrummer]

Does anybody else struggle a bit with this?

We have alpkit dozers, which are terrifically comfy - I love them.
I never manage to get them to self inflate properly though... What always seems to happen is that I unroll them, open the valves, leave the tent for a nice cup of tea, come back half an hour later, and nothing has happened to them. Have experimented with for instance, giving them a quick puff of air to get them started, leaving them for hours on end, etc etc, but I always seem to end up blowing them up myself.

It's not the end of the world - they're worth the effort in terms of comfort, but I do just wish they'd magically inflate. I suspect the problem might be that we store them in between trips rolled up and under the bed, whereas you're advised to store them fully inflated I think.

Any ingenious solutions?

Nothing ingenious from me. We have the same mats and although they blow themselves and unfurl a little bit we always have to finish them off orally.

Errm... That sounds rather risqué

How odd! Are they not inflating at alll by themselves? Do you really go to town flattening them when you've finished with them? ( wondering if it's a strange vaccum thing).
We store ours rolled up atm but have also stored them inflated in the past . Ours are like FYP's... They mostly get there themselves but we have have to finish them off orally.
We have fat airics

It's gotta be how you store them, we keep them flat when not in use bloody pain in the arse that they are, too long for under the beds and all they take is another good blow and they're ready to go

Ours are always stored rolled up and once I have pitched the tent the first thing I do is unroll the mats and open the valves. A little later I always give them an extra puff and they are sorted. We have a vango 7.5cm double and 2 high gears for the kids.

We have alpkit dozers and have come to the conclusion that they need to be stored inflated.

Normally we have to blow them up loads but halfway through our 2 week holiday last year we moved sites and they inflated themselves like magic at the new site!

They have now been stored upright for weeks and I'll know tommorrow if it's worked....

yy they need to be stored inflated with the valve open. Does it not say on the instructions that come with the alpkits? Certainly does with our thermarests and I always notice a big difference in inflation time and effort if they have spent any length of time compressed and rolled up.