OLDS — Olds Fire Department Deputy Chief Brian Powell received praise from the town for creating an invention for the town’s new outdoor rink in Centennial Park – a makeshift ice resurfacer.
It doesn’t look like the resurfacer fans are used to seeing at hockey games in the Sportsplex.
The equipment consists of a water tank and sprayer mounted on an all-terrain wildland fire skid pulled by a tractor.
During a town council policies and priorities meeting, operations director Scott Grieco praised Powell for creating it and a company he works with, No Surrender Fire Services, for making equipment available for the project.
“This is a much anticipated amenity which has been recently put together by our operational staff and contractors,” Grieco said.
“This unit has been extremely beneficial. The town's never had an outdoor ice rink, so we’re trying to navigate the best way to flood that rink and utilize that facility.
“Special kudos go out to the parks staff who have recently put the ice in with some help from the weather recently; as well as Sportsplex staff. And a special honourable mention to Brian Powell and No Surrender.”
During an interview with the Albertan, Powell said he created the little ice resurfacer about a month ago after town officials asked the fire department to look after flooding the rink, created in January.
Powell said the fire department was happy to do so, but flooding and grooming rinks is very time-consuming, so he looked for a way to cut down that time and the manpower requirement.
The answer was the little ice resurfacer.
Because it’s the fire-fighting off-season, Powell asked his boss at No Surrender Fire Services if he could make and modify an all-terrain fire skid they use to pull equipment and water in the bush in order to create the resurfacer.
“Basically I stripped it down and got rid of the pump. We put a nozzle off the back,” he said, adding a scraper was added at the front as well.
He estimated it took him about six hours and about $500 worth of materials to create it in his shop.
“The fire department used it first,” Powell said. “We did some base floods with it and really liked how (it worked).”
The key, he said, is to use hot water from the nearby Sportsplex.
“You get a better flood. It just really melts in nicer. You can use less water and really get a nice, smooth flood with hot water,” he said.
However, the little resurfacer now spends much of its time in the fire hall because simply shovelling snow off and flooding the rink with a fire hose is much faster.
“You can put a thousand gallons with a hose or it’s six trips with the cart, so it’s faster with the hose,” he said.
However, Powell said, the little ice resurfacer gives the ice a finer, smoother finish.
“It’s not a long-term solution for the town but it was a win,” he said.
“It doesn’t have all the bells and whistles and the super sharp blades on it that these (conventional) ice resurfacers have.
“The reason why those things are so much money is because you can really dial them down. But for outdoor ice it’s perfect.”
So if it’s perfect it doesn’t need any more changes?
“Well, we’ll see. You never know. Perfection is a tough thing to find, right," he said with a short laugh.
Powell said No Surrender’s decision to allow the skid cart to be used in this way was just one example of how that company is a “good corporate citizen.” All he asked was that their donation be acknowledged.
Once the boards were up in late January, flooding the ice for its first skaters was a big undertaking, Powell said.
Town staff, including ice rink manager Michael Keohane, parks supervisor Bobbi Joe Russell as well as Olds firefighters and members of the Olds Grizzlys Junior A Hockey Club helped clear snow and flood more than 20,000 gallons of water to prepare the rink’s base.
“When that first ice went in, we were flooding after 10 p.m. every night for a week with the fire trucks to get that base built. It’s a lot of hours,” he said.
