What an amazing synthetic hockey rink project this was. We converted a backyard asphalt tennis court into one of the nicest looking synthetic ice rinks in the world. This rink was completely tricked out with blue lines, centre red line, faceoff dots, goal creases and goalines. This family is not only hockey crazy but they also play lacrosse – so at their request we added an additional crease outside the hockey goal crease for lacrosse. This was a first in the world that we are aware of.

This project used our SmartRink Profast1500, the same one that we used in Gladstone, MO, and Tenjin Hikari Square, Japan. This “hybrid” connection system uses a very unique perimeter male and female continuous ridge that is extremely tight fitting. As a result it requires a fair degree of “persuasion” to assemble. We accomplished the task using 3 pound hammers and some solid plastic blocks placed over the joint.

These panels are called “hybrid” though because we can use the above mentioned connection systems as well as the H-Tongue connection system for the areas with solid line markings. This means SmartRink synthetic ice line markings are positively and solidly connected to the panels on either side of the lines – a massive advantage over our competitors who prefer to “loose lay” their lines inside surounding panels.

This rink measured 115ft x 51ft and the almost 6,000 square feet took our crew of 4 the better part of 1.5 days to lay down. There was a lot of downtime from crew having to cart panels into the work space as there was fencing around the entire perimeter.

Then the molded board system was installed over the synthetic ice. There is always the issue of expansion and contraction of the synthetic ice so we had to calculate seasonal temperature variations and determine exactly how the boards should be positioned. We were able to utilize the existing fence posts from the tennis court to secure half of the boards and then we used a new asphalt anchoring system for the other half. The anchors holes were drilled with a hammer drill and then filled with a quick drying mortar before the anchors were inserted. The anchors had a threaded sleeve for the 4 inch hex bolts and they worked like a charm.

The boards and netting took another day and a half but well within four days the rink was completed and ready for the first skate. This video shows the first game played on the surface. Since this was fall and breezy there was some debris on the surface from the overhead trees but otherwise the synthetic ice surface was a huge hit!

Learn how to invest in your own backyard synthetic ice rink!