[Cob] cob sweat lodge

[Amanda Peck]

What I've read about sweat lodges is that you build a fire outside the lodge 
and heat rocks in it.  Then you bring the rocks inside the lightweight 
blanket-covered frame, dump them in water.

You wouldn't care to make an oven this way, because while it will heat 
rapidly, it will also cool rapidly, neither of which the cob (or other 
earthen) oven will do.

Cob ovens, on the other hand take a lot of fire inside the oven to heat them 
up, and you adjust your cooking schedule, what to put in when as it cools 
down very slowly--if it's big enough, over a 24 hour period.  If you try 
this with a smaller fire, the heat won't soak into the clay, and it will 
cool down a whole lot faster.

So you don't necessarily want all that thermal mass for a sweat lodge.  You 
may well not want to have the combination of people and fire--and 
smoke!--inside a mostly closed area, and my guess is that it would take lots 
more rocks than you'd care to deal with to heat up the cob.  And it would 
have to be as large as the hornos I saw in Mexico--7-10 foot diameter half 
sphere on the inside, to accomodate people semi-comfortably.

However, Rob Roy has a book on his cordwood sauna--he loves it.  It avoids 
the open fire and all that smoke in the building by using a small stove with 
a chimney and maybe outside air intake.  My copy isn't handy right now.

Which means it CAN be done.


.............

Jennifer wonders:

Hello All,
I searched the archives and saw that in the past a member was planning and 
in the process of building a cob sweat lodge - in like 1997.  But it does 
not appear that person has been active on this list for sometime and their 
email no longer works.

So I am wondering if anyone else out there has attempted a cob sweat lodge?  
If so I would love to chat with you about pros/cons snafu's you ran into 
etc.  Or if anyone has any ideas/thoughts on the matter please contact me.