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My wife and I had a talk last week. As the summer holiday is approaching an end, she suggested that our first daughter to start taking skating lesson in the upcoming school year. I agree with her as our daughter said in numerous times that she wants to learn skating. It must be after when we went to watch “Disney on Ice.”
The lesson will be once a week, and each session will be one hour. But there is no doubt the more practice our daughter could get, the quicker she could master the skating technique.
Even though we have an indoor skating arena in our nearby community center, due to work constraint, it would be challenging in bringing her there for practice every day. I wonder if I could make a rink in our backyard so that she could have fun skating and practice more often. So I did some research online.
To make a backyard ice rink with snow and water, you’ll need to choose a flat surface in your yard, create a border to contain the ice, then fill the arena with a massive amount of water.
Below are my findings in more details. I hope this would be useful information to you.
Interesting Things in this Post
6 Easy Steps to Make a Backyard Ice Rink with Snow
1) Choose the Right Site.
You should find a flat surface area, which must not be septic or drain field. Although there is no 100% completely flat yard, but an ice rink with deep slope would be difficult and even dangerous to skate in. If there are holes in the ground, I would add some filling to even out the surface.
The size of the ice rink would depend on how big your yard is, the amount of effort and budget you want to put in. For young children, a rink size of 6m X 12m would be a good start. An ice rink installer stated that a rink size of about 14m X 27m well served for his 17 years old son while playing together with 3 of his friends, who are also big boys. The bigger the ice rink, the more fun a child would have. But this also means more maintenance work, and more expensive.
2) Shovel Off the Snow within the Ice Rink
You cannot make an ice rink on top of a high pile of snow. You need to remove them before proceeding to the next step. You can do so with a shovel. For people that want to save their back muscles, using a snow blower would be a wise choice.
Here’s a cordless electric snow blower you might want to check out. (affiliate link)
But keep in mind to leave one inch of lightly packed snow in the rink. It will act as a barrier between the ice and grass, which helps to protect the lawn.
3) Build Border with Packed Snow
The purpose of the border is to contain the ice within the rink. There are different materials to construct that. Some would use wood boards or PVC pipes, but for simplicity, I would just build it with snow.
A lady from an online forum stated that she has been making an ice rink for over 20 years, and she never uses plastic or boards. That’s because she does not want to handle the wet and muddy equipment when it comes to putting away in the springtime. All she has been using is only snow and water.
An ice thickness of 4 inches is good enough to hold an average adult so that I would build a snow bank of at least 10 inches around it. Higher snow border could also protect the rink from direct sunlight. Of course, a part of the edge should be lower for entrance, but high enough to contain the ice.
Loose snow will melt quickly, so the snow borders must be well packed. You just need to apply enough pressure pressing against it or stomping on it. Make sure there is no crack or holes in the border, and the snow bank is thick enough. When you pour water into the rink, it would inevitably melt some of the snow.
4) Place a Sheet of Liner
Although some people do not use a liner, I do prefer using one. It works as an additional layer between the ground and the ice. It prevents the water from soaking through the grass.
Here are some tips for choosing an ice rink liner (affiliate link):
- Pick one that is white. It helps to reflect UV rays and keep the ice cold.
- Never go with a blue tarp or anything that has dark colors. This would ruin your grass.
- Do not use a woven tarp. It is heavy and hard to work with. Also, the woven fabric does not hold water very well.
- Choose one that made of solid water-holding poly material.
Before you fill the rink, remove any debris such as sticks or leaves on the liner, and make sure there isn’t any animals hiding under it. You definitely would not want to freeze any unwanted things or creatures into the ice.
If you find a hole in the liner, you should patch it with a patch tape. But make sure to find one that is waterproof.
5) Fill up the Rink
Before you do so, you need to check the weather forecast. A solid freeze would require the temperature to be less than 20°F (-6.6°C), and remain so for the next three consecutive days.
Do NOT Layer when watering
Then you could start filling the rink with water. Depending on how big you want to ice rink to be, it could take 6 to 14 hours to fill it. You should fill out the water all at once instead of layering. The simple reason is layering would damage the liner, potentially creating holes and tears.
Where to Get the Water?
I watched many videos in creating a backyard ice rink, all of them used the water source from their outdoor spigot. Since I always winterize it, this leaves me wonder would reopening the valve burst the pipe.
I tried to dig up more details and found an online forum where there had been a similar discussion. [1]https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/using-the-outdoor-hose-in-the-winter.462548/. In there, most members expressed it is okay to use an outdoor hose in the winter.
They suggested to close turn off the internal valve after each use, but leaving the outdoor spigot open so that it could drain out the remaining water. Also, don’t forget to detach the water hose from the outdoor faucet.
On the other hand, for the same lady mentioned earlier which has over 20 years in making an ice rink, she shared that she hook the hose to the water source in her laundry room inside the house.
Since I do not want to risk in bursting the pipe, I prefer to get the water source from inside the house rather than reopening the outdoor faucet.
However, each piping system could vary between houses, you should check with a plumber or your home inspector before proceeding.
6) Make the Ice Surface Smooth
Depending on the weather, but it could take 3 to 4 days for a backyard ice rink to freeze.
Once it is solidly frozen, you could start smoothening the surface. When you examine it carefully, there could be some bumps or cracks. All you need to do is pour a small amount of hot water on it, then scrap it level with an ice rink scrapper.
As soon as it freezes again, a child could start skating on it!
Make sure you remove any snows or debris on it regularly. Even though you might think snow is cold, but it would work as a heat insulation, which could turn the ice surface into a messy snow slush.
How to Put Away a Backyard Ice Rink?
To avoid winterkill, when the ice rink starts melting in springtime, you should put it away asap.
Since we are building the border with snow, it would be relatively easy to do. All you need is to take off the snow banks, and then the natural heat would do the rest.
To further speed up the process of ice melting and drain of the water, you could also apply Milorganite to the ice rink. It is an organic nitrogen fertilizer. Due to its chemical composition, it has some ice-melting ability. Also, this natural product is black in color so that it can absorb heat from the sun.
Then just wash off the liner with water. Once it is completely dry, you could store it away to be used again when the next winter comes.
(By the way, after you wash off the liner, you might need to winterize your outdoor faucet again. The spring temperature in the area I’m living in fluctuate a lot. Even though some days are really nice and warm, but it could suddenly snow heavily.)
How Much Water and Money Will a Backyard Ice Rink Cost?
This is a question I guess most parents, including myself, would want to know. The answer is it depends on how big you want the rink to be.
I don’t want to sound too vague and leave you hanging, so I found an online calculator where it could give an estimation of the figures. [2]http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2012/08/06/updated-backyard-rink-calculators/
For example, I’m thinking of making a small ice rink:
- in size 22 feet X 22 feet
- with an ice thickness of 4 inches
Then according to their calculation, it would take need approximately 1207 gallons of water, which is about 24 bathtubs. Assume a rate of $10 per 1000 gallon of water. Then it would cost $12.07, which isn’t too bad at all.
But of course, this would depend on the water rate in your city.
Final Thought about Making a Backyard Rink
Just a few reminders off the top of my head:
- Do not use pool water or salt based chlorination system to fill up the ice rink because it will not freeze.
- Check with a plumber or home inspector to see what is the best way to get an outdoor water source during the winter.
- Check with your insurance agent to see if your home policy allows in making an ice rink in the yard
Since I haven’t built an ice rink before, I probably would start with something small first. There is a small area with cement tiles in my yard, and three of the sides already have wood borders, I guess I could try constructing one in that space.
I hope you’ll find this post helpful. However, if you are living in an area where there isn’t much snow during the winter, here’s an article of “Fun things to do in winter without snow” for your reference.
Disclaimer: This content of this website is for general information, and do not intend to provide any specific advice. Although I’m trying my best in providing accurate information, I cannot guarantee they are error-free. Information displayed on this website could be subjected to change. I’m not an expert on the topic. I’m only sharing this based on my personal experience, and the research I have done. So please use your judgment accordingly when reading this post. For any medical-related question, you should always consult with your family doctor. For product related question, you should consult with the actual manufacturer.
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Jacob is a father of two daughters. He loves spending quality time with them in the backyard. Playing sports, blowing bubbles, and planting are some the favorite activities Jacob and his daughters like to do together. He believes it is essential to spend quality time with them while they are still young.