Building Your Own Infrared Sauna

Infrared saunas are getting fairly popular, both for their convenience and for their health benefits. However, they're not cheap. That's why building your own infrared sauna is an option that can help you get the benefits of an IR sauna without laying out a lot of cash. You don't even have to buy a kit. If you're just a little bit handy, you'll be able to create a sauna you can enjoy for a long time to come.

Before you get started building an infrared sauna, it's important to be sure you have the skills to do the job. You'll need some basic knowledge of carpentry, if you don't have a small enough room, and you'll have to know a little bit about electrical wiring. It's not a good idea to build a sauna yourself if you don't have these pieces of knowledge.

The first way you can set up an infrared sauna is using an existing small room. By placing two 500 Watt, 9 Amp infrared heaters in a small room, around 5'x10', you can get the feel of an infrared sauna. Be sure that your heaters don't have an overly high wattage if you use this methods (not more than 600 Watts.)

Place the heaters on either side of the room, around five to six feet apart. Make sure that you have a 20 Amp outlet available, or use an extension cord to split the load between a pair of 15 Amp outlets to avoid overloading the circuit. Make sure that any extension cords you use can handle your heaters' power requirements.

When preheating this kind of sauna, turn heaters towards a door or wall to improve the speed at which the heat accumulates. Don't put them too close to doors, walls or other objects, though. Otherwise, there's some danger of fire. This kind of do-it-yourself sauna can take as long as an hour to heat up.

Once the room is heated, you can use it just like an ordinary sauna. If you're using a bathroom, be sure to account for the moisture usually present. However, you can use any small room. In addition to the heaters, you can also use a radiant 250 Watt infrared lamp, suspended from the ceiling. This can heat the room more quickly.