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Wow, what a winter.
First time builder here, my son and I put together a 40x40 for our first adventure and all went pretty well besides mother nature only willing to help out here and there. lol
Like most of you we had our slush adventures ( and still continue to on the top with the rain / sleet ) had our share of cold floods to build ice early and then our hot washes for the few skates we managed to squeeze in.
Looking over the upcoming weather forecasts for our Western New York area still doesnt look overly promising even though its already going to be Feb 1st.....geesh, told all our friends that they should pay us to put a rink in every year if this is the kind of mild winter we get when I do, lmao.
I will say though that even though to this point the work has far outweighed the skating time, we will be doing it again, great bonding time with the son and the skating time he/we have had has been awesome.
Anyhow, just wanted to wish all the rest of my fellow crazys here hopefully a few good weeks of skating eventually.....good luck and enjoy.
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by David Niles on -
Ok so now the calendar says its February......really? All I have to say is..grumble grumble grumble. Makes me wonder if were even going to get back on it this year. :(
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Permalink Reply by David Niles on
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Alright, its frozen again but....the slush that froze has ridges and HUGE bumps everywhere, time to do some scraping, more scraping and hot water, probably just get it back in shape for the upcoming thaw this week. Always next year I guess.
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Permalink Reply by James Temple on -
Yep David, that is exactly what I have been doing the last 24 hours. I need to run my rink rake over mine one more time then I think it will be ready to skate on, but now the sun is out beating on it and its in the upper 20's. In about 2 hours it will be in the shade and I'll have to do it then. Told the kids they probably have 2, maybe three more days to skate then I think we'll lose it for the year. I set up my 500 watt shop lights so we can skate in the dark and maximize our limited time left to skate.
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Permalink Reply by David Niles on
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Aaaaa what us crazies do for our rinks and kids eh James? lol
I had put some halogens in the trees already in the fall so already had some night skating going, mine should be "skatable" tonight but definitely not where my son can do any practice hockey moves, just still too many slight hills,valleys and bumps. Definitely night and day compared to what mother nature left me with but only so much gas in the old mans tank. :( ( had 6:15 am game this morning too )
Good luck and enjoy whats left.
James Temple said:Yep David, that is exactly what I have been doing the last 24 hours. I need to run my rink rake over mine one more time then I think it will be ready to skate on, but now the sun is out beating on it and its in the upper 20's. In about 2 hours it will be in the shade and I'll have to do it then. Told the kids they probably have 2, maybe three more days to skate then I think we'll lose it for the year. I set up my 500 watt shop lights so we can skate in the dark and maximize our limited time left to skate.
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Permalink Reply by Mark Cunningham on -
Well...I think I'm going to give up the hope of skating on the rink for this year...Jan 22nd we got on the rink for our 1st and only skate of the year...a whole 3 hours before it warmed up to +4 by noon...it's been a frustrating/disappointing winter in Southwestern Ontario for those around here that pursued their own *backyard ice rink* dream.
Tempertures have been up/down...UP...UP...up..down...UP!!
Here's what the next 10 days around here will look like:
The *ice* in the rink has all but all returned to water...so on Sunday I'll drop the submergable pumb and start the draining process and call the 2011/12 skating season *a wash*
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Permalink Reply by DAVID OUTZEN on
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Sorry to hear that the weather was so warm up in Ontario this winter. Crazy that you only got one good skate on it. My goal is to extend my rink into March but its becoming much more labor-intensive. On Wednesday it was 58 degrees. Then yesterday (Thursday) we got about 8 inches of snow which turned my rink into a slush bucket. Spent the whole day shoveling it because I knew that it was supposed to get cold last night. Sure enough it got down to about 15 degrees so my ice is good again this morning. Only problem is that they are predicting temperatures in the 60's on Saturday! Never ending battle but worth it for a few more skates!
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Permalink Reply by David Niles on
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Yes sirs, its a done deal, couple days here and there will still be cold but ice is lost, just a floating berg at this point. Next year will be here soon enough, time to start planning the bigger and better version and hope mother nature actually joins in this time. :)
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Permalink Reply by Bob Grimm on
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the work did outweigh the reward this year, started prepping last spring, cut down tree, hand dug out the stump, moved 75 feet of sidewalk, roto tilled the entire back yard and leveled it out. all for a bigger rink. still have to do a little more leveling. will do it all again next year. I think it was said in usa hockey magizine that all the work is worth those brief moments of pure magic. and thats absolutly true. awful year here in batavia ny, mother nature was surly laughing at us obsessed backyard rink makers. hopefully the joke will be on her next year.... starting the planning now for next year.
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