Sugarbush bought high efficiency Snowlogic guns last year and consequently were able to max out on water at least once that i recall. Not that there werent issues with them, they're big and bulky to move and probably better fitted on towers, but given electricity costs now and where they are going in the future, it seems to be a wise investment. If they don't throw the snow far enough to your liking, the snow can always be moved. Better to be able to make the snow. These new guns are markedly, 90+%, more efficient in optimal temperatures than the old guns, so if you like snow, which i assume you all do, i cant see how you dont like these. Even if you dont give a rats ass about the environment, using less energy is a good thing.
-
Welcome to AlpineZone, the largest online community of skiers and snowboarders in the Northeast!
You may have to REGISTER before you can post. Registering is FREE, gets rid of the majority of advertisements, and lets you participate in giveaways and other AlpineZone events!
Holy Snow Guns
- Thread starter Tooth
- Start date
steamboat1
New member
HOLY SNOW GUNS BATMAN!!!
http://www.stowe.com/ski-ride/conditions/offseason-snowmaking-investments/
This year Stowe Mountain Resort continues to invest in its state-of-the-art snowmaking operations with an additional 4.7 million dollars in new equipment and upgrades that include; 325 HKD tower guns, 150 energy efficient land guns, 16 Super Pole Cat fan guns and seven miles of new snowmaking pipe. In addition to supplementing its already superlative snowmaking, this year’s improvements will allow Stowe to operate with greater energy efficiency and eliminate 100,000 gallons of diesel storage, use and emissions.
http://www.stowe.com/ski-ride/conditions/offseason-snowmaking-investments/
This year Stowe Mountain Resort continues to invest in its state-of-the-art snowmaking operations with an additional 4.7 million dollars in new equipment and upgrades that include; 325 HKD tower guns, 150 energy efficient land guns, 16 Super Pole Cat fan guns and seven miles of new snowmaking pipe. In addition to supplementing its already superlative snowmaking, this year’s improvements will allow Stowe to operate with greater energy efficiency and eliminate 100,000 gallons of diesel storage, use and emissions.
Last edited:
according to Adironrider, that's maintenance; not improvement. :lol:
Highway Star
Active member
- Joined
- Sep 27, 2005
- Messages
- 2,921
- Points
- 36
Bump. Has anyone seen these in action at Sugarloaf? Now it looks like Okemo is going to be installing the same trash. IIRC, Killington didn't really even use them at all on outer limits last year, and conditions were greatly improved.
http://okemo.com/press/newsroom/snowburst.asp
http://okemo.com/press/newsroom/snowburst.asp
skiahman
New member
Loafer here......Trash? HKD? Or Killington? Yes, Killington, trash. HKD, nope. Some of the best man made snow I've ever skied and I've been doing it for over 40 years.
ScottySkis
Well-known member
Hunter Mountain made great powder snow for many years now. They started the better snowmaking guns many years ago.
bobbutts
New member
What change did K made last year that worked better?
What's the best way to cover a wide, steep, open slope like OL?
ScottySkis
Well-known member
They do it Hunter West all the time, the air snow machine works the best.
jimmywilson69
Well-known member
They didn't use the HKDs HS mentioned. The throw on those guns was not sufficient to cover OL. They used some of their old ground mounted guns and stretched hoses. Coverage was nice.
In my opinion they should be using tower mounted fan guns on a slope like OL.
bobbutts
New member
So back to the old way, makes sense, I remember the trail being much better covered side to side the 90's compared to 2 years ago. I was there this spring and it seemed much less of a hump on the chairlift side, but no evidence of how it got to be like that.
Pat's Peak has Super Polecats on Hurricane and they throw a long way and make plenty of snow. I could picture a setup like that working well on OL too.
Highway Star
Active member
- Joined
- Sep 27, 2005
- Messages
- 2,921
- Points
- 36
Bwahahahahaha.....I'm guessing you have extremely low standards for snow surface quality! These SV10 snowguns save compressed air - sugarloaf has way, way less compressor capacity than Killington - that's all that they have going for them. Fact is, HKD low energy guns have terrible throw, a very small temperature sweet spot, are a pain to move around and typically produce low quality snow. Killington has had them for over 5 years, and they are used infrequently.
drjeff
Well-known member
Tower mounted super polecats set up in a direction that allows the prevailing wind to carry the snow across the trail will get you about 50 yards or so of dependable coverage once you've put enough product down. That's based on what i've seen Mount Snow do with the roughly 100 yard wide snowdance trail the last 5 or so years since they installed the Polecats on it.
Skiers left 1/2 of the trail usually has good coverage where as the right roughly 1/2 of the trail is is more up to what mother nature provides.
My guess is that a bunch of fan guns mounted on OL would get you some good base depths, with minimal amount of diesel burned in the snowcats over about 2/3rds or so of OL's width.
With any wide trail though, even though tower mounted guns have the advantage of extra "hang time" for the snow crystals to form and expand a bit before reaching the ground, there are just some times when you can't beat dragging some hoses a bit across the trail and setting up a "gun line" in a location that allows full width coverage. It's just that unless it's done when snow is being made to initially open up a trail, you've got to rope off a bunch of the width of the trail so that the equipment doesn't get beat up by guests skiing over it and then once the "far side" of the trail is covered, pull the gear back to the side where the pipes run and cover that side, which is a bit more of a time and labor intensive process.
steamboat1
New member
Stowe Mountain Resort’s continued investment in state-of-the-art snowmaking operations includes an additional $3.4 million in new equipment and upgrades for the 2013-14 winter season, which consist of 120 HKD tower guns, 4 Super Pole Cat fan guns and miles of new snowmaking pipe. Add that to the $4.7 million invested last summer for a two year total that includes 445 HKD tower guns, 150 energy efficient land guns, 20 Super Pole Cat fan guns and seven miles of new snowmaking pipe. These improvements allow Stowe to operate with greater energy efficiency, increases potential for more early season terrain, increases overall snow quality and allows mountain operations to resurface the mountain quickly.
C-Rex
New member
I'm just going to hope the Farmer's Almanac is correct about a cold, snowy winter this year and then this whole arguement is moot. 
Similar threads
