Almost Heaven Oasis Sauna: Assembly
I first flipped on the 30A (and 20A) breaker in our garage, followed by the non-fused disconnect switch attached to our deck fascia, then turned the dial on the Harvia 6kw KIP heater that came with our Almost Heaven Oasis 3-person sauna to the reassuring (according to the manual) clunk as I passed "1." Immediately, I felt heat. After a whole lot of work... We. Had. Heat.
Since first having the conversation about did we want a sauna back in July, this project required two not insignificant steps:
- Roughing in and trenching the electrical conduit through the garage and backyard to the final location of the sauna
- Tearing up 1/3 of our backyard, grading it, building a retaining wall, building forms and pouring about two-and-a-half metric tons of concrete, then filling it all in with pea gravel
Entirely ourselves. Well, our buddy Tony came and hauled a pallet's worth of concrete to our job site, also not insignificant. Both of which steps made building the sauna seem like child's play. It came with instructions, after all.
We're stoked with how it turned out.
Backing up a while (to one of the listing photos below, in fact), this corner of our yard was a dark hole...
It isn't anymore. Now it's our space.
So yeah, the sauna assembly itself was straightforward. What I had to do before we really began putting it together was complete the electrical rough-in. This required tying in the two circuits from the stubout to the 120v outlet that I'd install on the back of the sauna and to the 240v heater circuit. For the outlet circuit, I snaked it around the concrete pavers to where it would come up through the cedar lip.
Once routed, I filled the gaps back in with gravel and tossed the heater circuit flex conduit under where the sauna floor would be built. Then it was time to ensure the base was level and at last put it together.
For the drain hole (and vent holes on the back) we stapled some screen material to keep out the (yep) spiders.
While we built, K made a fire and brought us coffees.
Once the floor was built, I was able to drill the holes for the electrical conduit and pull them through. This was the final piece of the puzzle that began before I even stuck our trenching shovel in the ground and whose ultimate goal was to make the electrical infrastructure all but disappear.
Following the instructions (yay for those!), with the floor screwed to the two footings it was time to stand up the back and front.
With those in place, I could at long last see how my measurements for the stubout would align with sauna. Reassuringly and not 100% surprisingly, it lined up perfectly.
Then it was an incredibly straightforward process of placing two staves and nailing one of the pair in place to build the walls. It went fast. I'd check level every couple of pairs and, using a rubber mallet, tap the stave just right.
As we wrapped around the top and down the left side, the only tricky part was filling the final gap. Spoiler: ours isn't perfect. My plan is to let the sauna get some use (i.e. heat the wood up, let it cool down, let it experience some weather all with the effect of expanding and contracting) before pulling out a few of the staves to retrofit the last few and get them properly tight. It's good enough for now. We had a few stacks of leftover staves.
The bands, roofing, and edging pieces were a piece of cake. Then it was time to finish the rough-in at the stubout, install the JB and outlet on the back, and wire up the heater.
At that point, I could move inside to install the benches and, the most important piece... the heater!
This was incredibly awkward due to my wanting to keep the electrical hidden, so I had exact lengths of cables and had to do the final hookup on my back next to the heater that was only about 7" off the sauna floor. In the end, awkwardness aside, I'm proud of the hookup. It's about as sight unseen as it can possibly be.
Then K carefully placed the included rocks, which are what retain the heat and provide the ability for us to toss a ladle of water on to experience löyly. I noticed a cool prism effect from the open glass door.
With the stones in place, we – at long last – fired it up for real. Well, not for real for real. We basked in the warmth and let it get up to about 110º before both deciding we didn't want to sweat at that moment. There'll be plenty of time for that.
