I just went to a funeral today where the casket was present during the service. It was my understanding that we didn’t go to the burial site because the body was being cremated later today.
So my question is…if the body is being cremated what happens to the coffin that was used during the service? Was it rented? Surely people don’t spend $10K on a coffin just for a hours use and then destroy it.
IIRC, it’s unlawful to re-use a coffin. So yes, I would imagine people pay some big bucks for a coffin that is destroyed.
My understanding here is totally from Six Feet Under, but assuming their info is correct, you cannot by law reuse the casket. It is cremated with the body.
Possibly stupid question: Was it an open-casket funeral?
No it was a closed casket.
My cousin does not have a lot of money so I find it hard to believe he would pay $10K for a coffin only to burn it up with a cremation.
Why not just cremate the body ahead of time and have the urn at the funeral and then we all go to the grave site?
That’s what they did at my grandmother’s funeral.
Would it be legal to use a casket just for show if there were a sealed urn inside it?
Hijack (more of a tangent, really):
They also apparently won’t sell you one unless you’re dead. Car builder George Barris tried to buy a coffin to use as the body for Grandpa’s car in The Munsters (the car was called “Dragula”, a dragster with a real coffin for a body), but nobody would sell him one. According to Barris, he ended up stealing one and leaving an envelope full of cash in its place.
It is possible to rent a casket if you need it for a viewing before cremation. See here. Click on the “caskets online” link at the bottom of the page.
Yes, the casket was most likely rented.
Warning, detailed description of the cremation process. The father of a friend while I was in high school was a mortician. He rented caskets all the time. And they do not burn coffins when someone is cremated. Most if not all caskets would not fit through the door of a cremation oven. The nude body is placed in a long stainless steel pan and roasted at a scorching 1200 degrees for about 3 hours. Most ovens use propane with an air injection system to create the high heat. Whatever is left is then run through a machine that crushes the bones into small pieces. You end up with about 12 pounds of bone fragments and ash. If the oven was on and there was an empty slot (it could do 3 at once) my friend and I would see how long it would take to melt various objects. Coins would take 5 to 10 seconds, rocks become molten in about 30 seconds and golf balls will explode in less than a minute.
Not to be disrespectful, but maybe if it was a closed casket funeral the body wasn’t even in the coffin? Maybe they have one show coffin they use in such cases.
I went to one funeral where the guy was going to be cremated and they simply put up a large photo of him. It was nice, IMO.
Um, YES the body is in the casket! Sheesh-sometimes, if it’s already been cremated, they put the urn on a stand.
My dad, a mortician, says the sound of the bone crusher is pretty disturbing.
And not all caskets are that expensive. You can get just a basic pine box that would serve the same purpose.
Story of my uncle’s funderal (a short two years ago), as told to me by my mother:
As mom, surviving uncles, and grandparents were meeting with the funeral director, the inevitable subject of caskets came up. Family expressed interest in renting a casket (uncle was going to be cremated after the funeral). Funeral Director tells them that it is Illegal to reuse caskets under Iowa law (from 1800s or so, when the law was enacted mainly as a disease-prevention measure), so renting was out. So they have to buy a casket. Funeral director starts showing various caskets, and makes sure to point out the various features of each. The one he was most proud of featured a seven year warranty. 
Why in the name of Og does a casket need a seven year warranty? It’s not like you’re going to dig the thing up to check it’s condition… And in our case, we were going to cremate the dang thing after a few hours of use… But it has a seven year warranty.
Jessica Mitford in * The American Way of Death * claims that unscrupulous funeral directors will sell coffins that they know are imappropriate for cremation if they can. She cites one story of a woman who was urged into buying a thick steel coffin for her husband. The crematorium operator is quoted as saying they had to peel back the top of the coffin like a can of sardines because the corpse was not being burned inside of it. Mitford says that big wooden coffins are simply broken up and thrown away.
Mitford also says coffin rental is legal. Apparently, they just have to dispose of the internal padding. After all, most corpses aren’t really a sanitation issue.
On another note, I’ve often wondered if EPA regulations control emissions created when coffins are actually burned. Some of them are made from plastic-type materials, as I understand. Seems like that could put come nasty chemicals in the air.
Is this universally true? I’d always toyed with the idea of getting mine way before I needed it and using it to sleep in. Get comfortable and all that.
Are you telling me I’m going to have to buy a bed?
Please, do NOT get the idea that the entire funeral business is crooked and greedy.
I’ve wondered that too. When I was younger and angst filled, I wanted a coffin to sleep in. I asked my mom to get me one. She said no. The idea has still been in the back of my head.
Btw. Dave Navarro formerly of Janes Addiction and Red Hot Chili Peppers has a coffin in his bedroom. Wonder how he got one.
There is an active society within the Catholic Church (sorry, can’t remember the name) which encourages people to plan for dealing with their own death, including planning the service, choosing music, and even building their own coffin, which they then store until needed.
They tend to go for simple wood coffins, ranging from the traditional ‘plain pine box’ to other woods like oak, maple, etc. I suppose one made out of cedar would be real useful for storing clothes in the meantime. 
Well, I wouldn’t want to sleep in a coffin or a casket-think about it-if that lid closes on you, that could be damn dangerous! LOL
I suppose though, that you could have a bed custom built to resemble a coffin.
I worked at a funeral home here in Michigan, and yes, they did have rental caskets for those who were to be cremated. IIRC, it had a removable inside so that the outer part of the casket was re-used and the body went to its place in the box that was removed.
Note: A coffin has five sides. At least that’s what the funeral director told me.