Had an interesting visitor the other day come over to look at my boiler which is an Econoburn EBW-200 outdoor model. This guy is from a local Indian Band and they are looking for a way to heat up rocks for a sweat lodge. The traditional way to do this is by building a fire on the ground and throwing about 30-50 pounds of rocks into the fire once it gets big enough to heat them. After the rocks are heated they pull them out and place them in a metal pail and place it in the sweat lodge. Never done it so I can't say for sure what the end result is but I believe when they are done they come out more purple then red!
Long story short this guy thinks a wood boiler similar to mine would be a cleaner and quicker way to heat up the rocks. I told him that he would have to be careful loading the rocks so as not to damage the refractory but other than that can't see much of an issue as long as he's not doing it with my boiler! Can't see how a gasification boiler would matter as they would use the upper chamber, maybe just a simple barrel stove would do this job...or maybe a Greenwood.
Thoughts?
Long story short this guy thinks a wood boiler similar to mine would be a cleaner and quicker way to heat up the rocks. I told him that he would have to be careful loading the rocks so as not to damage the refractory but other than that can't see much of an issue as long as he's not doing it with my boiler! Can't see how a gasification boiler would matter as they would use the upper chamber, maybe just a simple barrel stove would do this job...or maybe a Greenwood.
Thoughts?