Extra-Wide Barrel Sauna - 6 Person

We purchased a Redwood Outdoors Sauna because this is the only company that had a Seattle showroom where we could see and feel the product before purchasing. The layout of the extra wide barrel is good - the L shape of the benches makes for a cozy and more social sauna experience. It’s also great to have both high and low benches so people can choose their heat level. Now that it’s built and coated with various products, the sauna feels reasonably well built. So now on to the details. Putting the sauna together took us about 1 1/2 days (maybe 10 hrs with 3 people) Many of the pieces were either not labeled or were labeled incorrectly, which was frustrating and caused us to tear it apart and rebuild it several times before we felt it was right. We got the wood roofing - this kit again did not have the pieces labeled correctly. After installing the roofing, there was a dip in the middle of the top where water would pool - we ended up adding a piece of metal ridge peak to the top so that the roof would shed water. The wood kit looks a whole lot better than the cheesy shingles that come standard. The sauna comes as a kit from China, so we were not able to get the company to leave out the shingles that we didn’t need because we were using the wood roof. The store showroom provided few details on the electrical setup - in fact not a single floor model at the showroom was wired such that it could be turned on. The electrical setup is not beautiful, though our electrician was really skilled. There will be conduit running along the side of the barrel, a large controller box, and another waterproof outdoor box containing the wifi controller if you get that. The light that comes with the sauna is really crummy, and it is not possible to wire this 110V light into the Wifi box without a lot of extra junction boxes as it would not meet Seattle electrical code. We ended up purchasing some IP65 LED strip lights (Govee brand on Amazon) that the electrician was able to wire into the wifi box because they are low voltage. We put the wifi box on the outside front of the sauna and the controller box on the back of the sauna. Only problem with this controller box placement is that there is a very loud CLUNK sound whenever the sauna heater turns on. If we had known of this we would have put the controller somewhere else. Electrical work could add $5k or more to the cost of the unit depending on your situation. It took a giant amount of work to apply paraffin wax to the benches, and to put Osmo UV protective oil on the outside - purchase of these products also adds another few hundred dollars to the cost of the unit. The wood is tremendously thirsty. I appreciate the customization that was done to the layout of this kit sauna from China, but wish there were a bit more effort put in to marking pieces correctly, and perhaps to applying finish to the benches and barrel staves before delivery. I appreciate the layout of the wide barrel (at least Redwood Outdoors went to customizing, as opposed to purchasing stock models from Ali Baba), having a local showroom and local people to answer installation questions. There need to be pictures of units with the electrical setup showing, and it would be good if the benches could be paraffin oiled and the oustide UV coated before delivery. Now that the sauna is in place, and running it seems good. Gets hot in maybe 30 minutes, although right now it’s rather hot outside - may take longer in winter. Time will tell if it was worth the install hassle.

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The best thing we’ve ever bought

We love the Redwood Outdoors extra wide barrel sauna. Having an upper and lower bench to sit on gives yo

We love our Redwood Outdoors extra wide thermowood sauna. The instructions video was super helpful, my husband and I set it up in one day. We upgraded to the bigger heater as it gets very cold in the winter. We also used a blue hue light for night use. Looking forward to years of relaxing enjoyment!