Apparatus for creating and maintaining an ice slab

Abstract

Apparatus for creating and maintaining an ice slab for skating purposes, or an ice chute for a toboggan slide, or for maintaining a layer of snow for skiing. The apparatus includes pluralities of small diameter flexible plastic tubes arranged in grids in portable mats with the tubes placed close to one another and arranged with each input or supply tube portion closely adjacent to an outlet or return tube portion providing an advantageous uniform temperature effect at a small distance above the tubes. A low temperature anti-freeze liquid is pumped through the tubes to provide the desired uniform cooling effect, and the portable mats each include a pair of sub-headers which can conveniently be coupled together with main headers to form a large grid the size of an ice skating rink, or a ski slope. For a rink these small flexible tubes may thereafter be covered with a thin layer of sand, or other protective material, and water is then introduced into the rink and is frozen by the low temperature refrigerant passing through the various tubes. By virtue of the small diameter of the tubes, ethylene glycol or other similar low temperature anti-freeze liquid (which would be very expensive with conventional systems) can economically be used to practice the invention disclosed herein. In the case of a ski slope, the small flexible tubes are covered with a thin layer of sand or dirt, and the circulation of the low temperature refrigerant serves to maintain, i.e. to "hold," a skiable layer of snow (either natural or manmade snow or a mixture of them) on the ski slope during thawing periods when the snow normally would melt away.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.