Anyone try synthetic ice rink Before?

[jsnmeng]

Hello, i am Jason from Ipoh, a tropical climate state. Due to the high operation cost, many traditional ice rink is closed. Therefore, ice skating is an luxury sport for us. 1 time ice skating = 6 meals for me. It is an expensive sport.

From this situation, i would like to open a recreational synthetic ice rink. But there are a lot of synthetic ice pad brand at the market. Could i know which brand of synthetic ice pad is the most reliable and high gliding feeling? Anyone try the brand viking ice, xtraice, superglide or ez glide 350? I don't want the synthetic ice pad leave the shaving on cloth.

thanks.

[ibreakhearts66]

I've never skated on synthetic ice, but the subject has been discussed here previously.

Here's one thread you might want to look at. A couple posts in, you'll also find links to more threads on synthetic ice.
http://skatingforums.com/showthread.php?t=22571

Hope you find some helpful information!

[Skate@Delaware]

Hello, i am Jason from Ipoh, a tropical climate state. Due to the high operation cost, many traditional ice rink is closed. Therefore, ice skating is an luxury sport for us. 1 time ice skating = 6 meals for me. It is an expensive sport.

From this situation, i would like to open a recreational synthetic ice rink. But there are a lot of synthetic ice pad brand at the market. Could i know which brand of synthetic ice pad is the most reliable and high gliding feeling? Anyone try the brand viking ice, xtraice, superglide or ez glide 350? I don't want the synthetic ice pad leave the shaving on cloth.

thanks.
I'm not sure of the brand we used at my rink, but all of them leave behind shavings, some more than others. If you sweep & vacuum more often you will have less mess.

If you contact this rink http://www.sk8unlimited.net/ they use a more modern surface that is very slick and I'm sure they will tell you what brand it is. It feels like real ice compared to our surface.

Good luck!

[jsnmeng]

Thanks to ibreakhearts66 and Skate@Delaware.

Your helping is highly appreciated.

Happy skating!!!

[Query]

I don't know whether Skate@Delaware's rink is typical (maybe they could clean the "ice" more often). I tried it for maybe half an hour, long enough to need a new sharpening. Most of the people I spoke to there sharpen every hour or two of skating.

Assume the blades last roughly 20-40 sharpenings, depending. By my calculations, they probably spend more on sharpening and blades than on everything else, especially if they use high end $400-$500 blades. That might add $15-$20/session to the customer's costs, unless they use cheap blades. In other words, you won't get a lot of repeat customers.

It also seems a lot less fun than the real thing. I wasn't strong enough to do much of anything.

Falls are a lot tougher on the body, because there is more friction, though though the director at her rink claimed there were fewer falls among beginners. (Those things might affect injury rates and insurance.)

If someone else nearby builds the real thing, most of your customers will move. So you could build up a customer base, then abruptly lose it.

Most rinks have to rent skates for the general public(but use cheaper blades). And you may need to allocate someone to sharpen a lot. So it increase those operating expenses. I guess you have to trade that off against the higher costs of building and running a real ice rink.

E.g., one well run indoor rink near DC (a fairly high temperature urban area) might spend an average of about $700/month in electricity (I think). (That may be less than the cost of labor in running the rink.) But most of them are run badly - they don't maintain the equipment very well, and don't work out the costs of doing various things, so many spend twice that. More to the point, an indoor ice rink costs upwards of $1 million to build ($2 million if they get fancy), whereas a synthetic ice rink costs a lot less.

How about a roller rink, or an in-line skate park? At least you could have the real thing.

[Skate@Delaware]

I will admit our fake ice was not cleaned as often as it should have been (daily vs. the every 3 days it really received)...and our skaters were skating on $30 blades vs. their expensive blades. That does make a difference as far as sharpening...don't have to worry about wearing out your good blades! Query, you would have built up your legs in about a week of daily skating on that stuff!

I would love to see a nice indoor/outdoor inline skate park SOMEWHERE close by!!!! We have nothing like that here. Our rink did propose it for the off-season but it was shot down (PicSkates does have a rental program, all you need is a surface)-that's when horse-racing season is in full swing and they are too busy with that.

[jsnmeng]

But i would like ice skating more than roller skating. Because ice skating boots more fashionable outlook than roller boots for beginner level.. 80% people never play this stuff here. Haha... It is just my 2 cents. Because inline roller is seem like prefer by aggressive player. Inline roller is seem like not popular at my place. In marketing view, it is hard to attract the (15-25 years old) beginner play roller skating.

Is the recreational skate boots seem like hockey skate boots? Anyone know which type of skate boots is suitable for recreational skating?

Thanks.