Dropping the Liner

When do you drop the liner?

Here's the conditions to look for:
1. Calm winds
2. Favorable forecast
3. Cold weather happening soon

Calm winds are self explanatory. You can drop the liner with an infrequent wind, but it's annoying. The wind will catch and blow that liner without much trouble and make things difficult. Wind is perhaps the most likely to affect your liner drop experience.

A clear forecast is a good place to start, but it's possible to drop the liner ahead of some rain or snow and let nature help fill your rink. How much snow? Well, I'd say less than an inch won't bother anything. There's always the risk, though, of getting more snow than was expected and now you'll have snow ice rather than the best kind of ice: clear ice.

What needs to be explained about the "cold weather happening soon" condition is what "soon" means. It doesn't have to be tomorrow, next week might be soon enough. If you're filling from a well, you might even prefer to fill slowly over several days rather than fill all at once. Your water will come out of the ground at around 55-60 degrees and has to cool to below 32F for ice to form. It doesn't matter if the water loses that 30 degrees slowly over several days or quickly over one, it's got to do it.

On the other hand, you don't want a lake for any longer than you have to have it. While we did notice on the Backyard Rink Yahoo! group that rinks that were liquid didn't seem to have any problems, we don't want to encourage them by having a lake for too long. Animals will remember where the bodies of water are and visit frequently. A week or two won't be bad.

So, when you're planning on dropping your liner look for calm winds, favorable weather, and cold weather forecasted soon.