Heated Rock Masage equipment question

[turtle-lover]

When I took a Heated Rock class, the teacher mentioned many times that she would recomend buying a turkey roaster instead of one of the heaters that is made special for Hot Rock.
However, I've been noticing that my little room get SO warm and humid. I'm wondering if anyone else has had better luck with one of the special made warmers or if I'm just going to have to deal with it.
Thanks!!!!!

 

[60 Million Voted Me]

The Spa Pro heaters ARE turkey roasters - made by the major turkey roaster company, NESCO, same design, just a different brand name on them.

Are you having to cool the stones before placing them on the client? Maybe you just have it turned up to high?

I think the Amber heaters work cooler, but they're MUCH more expensive.

 

[Zallarion]

I use two electric skillets to heat my stones and my room is hot and humid. I sweat buckets during my hot stone massages so I keep a towel around my neck. I just figure sweating is good for me, detoxes, softens my skin.....

I use a turkey roaster to heat my towels when I do wraps and it's the same thing. Room gets hot....I sweat....the client thinks it's warm and toasty.

Just think of it as giving yourself a steam treatment while you work!



Angie

 

[Exemplify]

I have my stone heater on 90% of the time as I use hot stones in the majority of my sessions.

My current room is routinly 76 to 80 degrees and it doesnt matter what the season is. When I start my day it is generally a bit cooler, but doesnt go past about 80 degrees.

When I was upstairs in the same building, that room had TERRIBLE ventilation. It was cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter. My room got the brunt of the AC and the brunt of the heat. 82 to 85 degrees by the end of the day wasnt uncommon in the winter. Occationally clients would complain about the heat.

My current office has a front and back door, so I can get some cross ventilation. About a month ago, I bought a tower fan. I run it all the time. It sits in my office and blows into my treatment room. I also run a small fan by my office door. When I am between clients, I keep my office door open so the tower fan blows cool air from the hall way in the back of my office through my treatment room to the small fan which I turned to blow out of my treatment room door into the other hallway. I hope I explained it so you understand....

Doing this drops the temp down about 2 degrees in about 15 minutes. Now, 2 degrees doesnt sound like much, but it sure feels like a big difference. Once it drops that 2 degrees, it can drop 1 or 2 more, but then it levels off.

I tried to do this in my old office, but couldnt get the cross ventilation because I only had one door and being an interior room, my room was windowless.

And yes!! I do have a thermometer in my office!! lol

Whenever I get my own massage clinic with multiple treatment rooms, I will know how to lay out the place so I can vent the rooms between sessions. It will be cheaper than having individual thermostats in each room.

 

[E-Man]

What is the wateforum.xxxe on a turkey roaster? I'm assuming it's got to be 1000W at least, crock pots, frypans are all high wateforum.xxxe, and most of them will run on full then turn off when the appliance's thermostat kicks in. Some of that 1000W+ heat could be coming out the side of the appliances and into the room rather than heating stones.
The Amber heaters are 400-600W, which is what I meant by they run cooler.
If I am only using a few stones for spot work, I'll use a paraffin warmer, only 150W - with that you don't notice a difference in the room temp, paraffin heaters are usually very well insulated. But, the paraffin heater warms up slowly, so if your putting stones back in the unit, it can cool down too quickly. (Amber is a long term paraffin heater manufacturer, and I think they've used the same techniques for the stones heaters, since stones & paraffin heat to the same working temp)

For full treatments, I'm using an electric chafer these days - it is similar to a roaster, but the one I am using has a water bath around the hetaing element, it'is only 700W, and the water bath heats the insert with the stones - the insert is not heated by hot air, and less hot air seems to escape, the heat it perfect for using the stones on most people without cooling, and is easily adjustab;e down (or up) if need be. It only makes the room a bit warmer, it's been a pleasure to work with since I changed from a 1000W appliance that did make the room pretty warm, pretty quickly......

 

[victoria d]

Thanks for the tips everyone! I really don't use my rock unless I'm doing a full on Heated Rock Massage. So it's normaly not a problem. I'm not having to cool the stones before use. I follow what I learned in my class and check the temp of the water often before starting.
I think this sucker just gives off a ton of heat and humidity. I wondering about the other methods of heating mentioned here though. Anyone have more information on the Amber heater or the electric chafer?
Thanks again!!!!

 

[The Scout]

Here's a nice thread on the parrafin baths for the stones:
Hot Stone Product Recommendations?

One for the skillets:
heating massage stones

 

[LuvThosePurpleShoes]

Amber Stone Heaters if I could justify it, I'd love the one down the very bottom of that page, and you can get a lot of matching equipment, like paraffin baths etc
Chafers, I couldn't easliy find one online for the US, but this is similar to what I use Sunnex Chafer it looks like a roaster, but with the water bath under the insert, it doesn't throw our so much heat (those ones are 1000W, I've not found my brand online.....) They get called chafing dishes or chafers, if that's any help, and the most common ones just have little flames under them, the electric ones are harder to find. It also means you'll be able to use your hot stone equipment if you ever move into catering food

 

[Rossonero NorCal SFECU]

Wonderful! Thanks.. I guess I'd better start saving up!!!!

 

[Chili]

Hey, melb - thanks for mentioning the chafing dishes.

Here's one I found, does this look about right?

http://www.chaferdepot.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=269&HS=1

Here's something interesting: Buffet Burner
http://www.buffetburners.com/buffetburners/features/index.html
http://www.buffetburners.com/buffetburners/instructions/

And one last one: http://www.mr55.com/Rectangular/Electric/electric.html

Hope the links help.

 

[kity]

OK, starting from the last one, the mr55 link, that one is not good for stones, the insert doesn't come out, meaning you have to lift the whole thing up to empty it. This also means there is no water around the element, and all those venting holes on the side are allowing hot air to come out into the room - probably be hotter than a roaster to use!!!! It's more like what I've seen called a bain marie out here, the trays are twice as deep as the chafers (Bain marie ~6", chafer ~3")

The Buffet Burner - it's heating the air between the burner and the chafer, so some of that is bound to come out into the treatment room, though it's a low wateforum.xxxe. I didn't spot any price on there, so it might be a way for someone to go from a normal chafer that using burning fuel to convert to electricity cheaply or expensively (I do know of someone that uses a chafer with the usual burning fuel pots underneath - she only does a hot stone treatment every month or so, and she already had a chafer, so it was all very easy and cheap. She says it works well. something like this would be good if she had more treatment and wanted to stop using fuel)

The ChaferDepot one looks good, that's the same as the Sunnex one I posted a link to, water bath under insert, removeable insert (I do know someone using the Sunnex one and they have no complaints) The price is scary - that's a lot more than they are in Australia! One of the resorts out here is using a brand called Salgo, and they are about a third less than the Sunnex.

All of these being commercial catering equipment, you may be able to find them on eBay, or second hand, maybe not garage sales, like someone on here got a roaster for free for their stones

 

[nostrilburier]

The roaster that I use (GE purchased at Walmart) has an insert. The water doesn't go directly on the heating elements though. When I 1st started using it I mistakenly thought that the towels would heat better if I put them directly in the inner section and just left the insert out, but this caused the towels to have "hot" spots and not heat evenly. I now use the insert with water placed in-between the two trays and can actually set it to a lower temperature. It still makes my room hot though.

Angie

 

[kelvin S]

FYI... turned my roaster over to check the wateforum.xxxe..... 1450!!! No wonder!!! Like I said before.. guess I'll have to start saving up for an Amber heater. The darn turkey roaster was only $30.... ah well!

 

[China Man]

The wateforum.xxxe of the element is only one aspect.
Since you are using an appliance with a thermostat, It will only be running continuously when it is heating up and then occasionally when the temp drops.
A low wateforum.xxxe appliance will take longer to bring to temperature from cold and will actually use the element more frequently to maintain temperature.
Try positioning it in a corner where airflow is more restricted, and keep the lid on and vent closed except when removing stones.

 

[x3xiaoqi]

I have a deep dish rectangular frypan with a glass lid think it's about 1500 watts.
Heats up from cold in 5 minutes to working stone temperature.
Anyhow I just timed it after reaching temperature, really surprised me.
It was kicking in for 17seconds, yes 17 seconds and then staying off for 11 minutes, then on for 17 seconds.
This was sitting on a carpeted floor in a corner, with the lid on and not taking rocks out.
So keep that lid on and try keeping drafts off and insulating surfaces under and around

 

[maxmom]

I've been using hot stones in most of my massages for over 4 years now, and I use a Rival 12"X12" skillet that I get at Target. I also do not put any water in the skillet, so doing that might help with the humidity concern. I use 4 to 6 large stones during the massage and just rotate them back to the skillet. They warm up initially in about 10 min. on the warm setting. It only costs about $20.00 also.

 

[butterstixies]

I'm not sure this will be good for hot rocks, but Greatlakes mentioned this little roaset in another thread and I thought it might make sense to at least throw up a link here.

Hamilton Beach 32184 Buffet Roaster Oven