skating surface question

[StevePasz]

So what is everyone's favorite surface to play hockey on?

roll-on? ice court? sport court?

Any other?

Thanks,
Steve

[quick_dry]

roll-on + concrete
urethane + wood
orb court
ice court
sport court

in that order

[ACCCT2]

1. Roll-On over polished-smooth concrete (like the Odeum's in Villa Park, Illinois)...

2. Anything relatively ambiantly-located, evenly-smooth and permanent (no 'tile'), in the fresh outdoors & under the sun -- what I affectionately call "Ghetto-Hockey", the purest essence, as well as most enjoyable form of the game -- certain places come immediately to mind: "Dead Road" in Central Park in New York City (with the spectacular park & cityscape all around); the Palace Square at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, Russia (surrounded by magestic Imperial buildings of the Tsars); on the Champs de Mars in Paris, France ('neath the Tour Eiffel, across La Seine (river) from the Place du Trocadero and in the presence of Napoleon at the Ecole Militaire nearby) are just a few examples that are sweetly representative of this type of natural "open-air" arena...

3. With a few exceptions (like the KPCC in Hong Kong) anything else I'm not really interested in -- especially the indoor hanger-like structures like (unfortunately) what most indoor 'inline' hockey facilities are constructed as (most remind me of abandoned tennis barns put to slighty better use, but no better ambiance)...

[patb16]

for just skating surfaces, i'd say:

wood w/roll on (nothing is smoother)
concrete w/roll on
ice court
sport courtfor hockey:

ice court (the puck just moves the best and you get good skating grip as well as speed)
sport court
concrete w/roll on
wood w/roll on

[StevePasz]

I am looking for a surface to play hockey on but also may have to include traditional roller skating on it.

I have played on rollon over concrete and loved it but stopping on it was kind of hard,
The urathan over wood I do not care much for.

and sport court was nice, puck slide on it very nice.


I am leaning towards the roll on over polished concrete.

Thanks,
steve

[skooled]

If you do it well, it will be great. if not then it is pretty hard on the body. if you can't get it done properly, look at getting a good tile system

[TULaw]

I think Ice Court makes a surface for roller skating rinks that also is a good hockey floor, you might want to look into that.

[patb16]

I think Ice Court makes a surface for roller skating rinks that also is a good hockey floor, you might want to look into that.

Ice Court does make a surface for roller skating and yes it is a very good hockey floor. The puck moves exteremely well. I think its called skate court.

[quick_dry]

you're building a rink?

If so, I'd say roll-on + concrete is the way to go, but you'll probably need to go and get quotes for surfaces and weigh that up against the sites you can choose from.

Roll-on + concrete on a well prepared slab is an awesome surface for hockey, and for general skating. But i imagine a slab that hasn't been so well made is cheaper and might suit a tiled floor better.

[skooled]

your right QD, everyone I have talked to says that for a leased building, you will almost always have to go with a tile system

[33]

Ice Court does make a surface for roller skating and yes it is a very good hockey floor. The puck moves exteremely well. I think its called skate court.

it is called skate court and it is the best floor i have ever played on.

[MajorTomFoolery]

Skate/ice court is difficult to clean, though. I mean IT WILL NEVER BE CLEAN. Many rinks with the stuff will leave dirt and dust caked on your bearings.

[DannyG]

Skate/ice court is difficult to clean, though...

above highly correct...however...if you clean it right, and daily, then the dust that electrostatically adheres to the surface of the court material can indeed be kept (relatively) clean...

You will grind up NO dust on either your wheels or bearings on my rink...It takes me a hour each day to clean my 5,000 square foot surface (small floor, 75 by 70), but it is well worth it.

incidentally, my floor is the Mateflex(tm) brand...I highly recommend it. My concrete undersurface absolutely sucks, and the Mateflex playing surface is excellent in spite of it.

place I used to work had sportcourt over concrete...BUT...concrete leveled by lazer-driven, computer processor controlled trowels, down to tolerance of (get this) 1/100th of an inch...this floor was smoother than glass or ice, literally, with no imperfections anywhere...but then, this facility was built specifically for inline hockey...too bad it is amost completely an indoor soccer facility now...

[quick_dry]

ugh, what waste of perfect concrete just begging for a decent surface... and they put sportcourt on it.

good to hear you're one of the few rink people who actually do a proper floor clean, it makes such a difference.

[MajorTomFoolery]

What kind of equipment do you use to clean the floor? The rink we're at, they use a dust mop, and occasionally this little scooter thing, but they do absolutely nothing for the floor.
When it first came out, you could shoot a puck around the entire outside edge of the rink and back (88 x 180). Whatever happened to those days?..

[DannyG]

The dry mop picks up debris and loose dust...then the trick is to literally devise a system that will wet and scrape off the dust that has electrostatically adhered to the surface.

About 20 years ago a colleague of mine remarked that you should clean your gym floor (wood) at least weekly with wet towels wrapped around a dry mop. Sounded like the stupist thing in the world to me at the time...Now I have found that the wet towels do a good job of scrubbing the floor surface.

I use a set of towels to size that will fold over the mop head and can be clamped into place with the mop handle...this is the same 2'-3' dry mop style of tool that I also use to dry-sweep the floor. I have two such mops, one for dry and one for wet. works really well...I detach the towel, re-soak it and flip it on the mop head every 16 foot swath of floor scrubbing, which for my two-foot wide mop head is twice-down-and-back the width of the floor.

As you alluded to above, does this clean the floor perfectly? nope, but it does a very good job...in fact, when you skate onto the floor, the dust from your wheels rolling on the apron area outside the rink will initially leave dust trails...how 'bout that as a measurement of clean? Your wheels will track dust onto the floor, rather than pick it up off the floor...

A fair amount of labor, but then I can't afford the $6,000-26,000 machine that does the same thing, plus vacuum up the water...oh, well...at least I'm getting exercise.

[MajorTomFoolery]

Good. I'll try to coerce our rink into doing that...

[quick_dry]

DannyG: this might sound dumb... but what if you took some flexible plastic tube and a big 3L coke bottle (or similar) as a water tank and plumbed the tube with holes to drip water down onto the leading edge of the towels? you might be able to go further than 16ft before needing to get mroe water.

Those cleaning machines are awesome, Odeum had a set of them that went around each night cleaning and polishing the floor - was like watching a bunch of mini-zambonis.

[DannyG]

...as a water tank and plumbed the tube with holes to drip water down onto the leading edge of the towels? you might be able to go further than 16ft before needing to get more water..

That's a 16' wide swath, the length of the floor...not sure if I made that clear...but at any rate, the "longevity" of the process isn't lack of continued water content on the towel, but rather all the dust scrubbed off the floor onto the towelled mop head...the towel literally becomes black/gray after the four down-back runs.

Bowling alleys have a tool that has a towel-like fabric of great length strung between two rollers...the fabric cleans and dresses the lane surface with whatever it is that they surface it with. After each lane is swathed with this device, a crank advances the used/dirty fabric onto the "take up" roller, and a new section of the fabric unrolls from the "put-down" roller for the next lane sweep.


Those cleaning machines are awesome, Odeum had a set of them that went around each night cleaning and polishing the floor - was like watching a bunch of mini-zambonis.

yeah, that's on my wish list for the far-flung future...on the other hand, my doing this essentially by hand keeps me in direct contact with my playing surface on a daily basis...I come to, in effect, inspect every inch of my floor every day. I have come across a bunch of little things that I can fix before the public comes into contact with them, probably preventing some problems before they become problems, and overall enhancing the quality of the service I provide...so at the moment, I'm happy to invest the time...

[quick_dry]

just like to say it is awesome that you take such pride in keeping your rink in the best condition possible, I'm sure the players appreciate it.

[skooled]

DannyG, you are my hero!!!!!!!!