The "Sugarbush Thread"

[tumbler]

Yea...I was surprised they groomed out OG so quickly. Still had a ton of chunks/cookies on it today even after another groom last night. I didn't find it particularly enjoyable. Jester was nice. Snowball and Spring Fling were nice as well this morning. They're getting some nice production on Ripcord with the snow-making. Pretty impressive how much there is today compared to yesterday.

To echo djd's earlier comments though, I don't know how some of you have been dealing with just Spring Fling and Gate House up to now. Even with Jester and OG in the mix I can't convince myself to stay out too long.

Just picked up a new helmet at Alpine Options today. My current one I'm sure is quite packed out and not overly effective anymore. I was going to drop my skis off for tuning too, but current turnaround time was Sunday so I'll have to wait a bit until they get caught up a little.

I was looking at the Allyn's camera earlier and could see the conditions on OG were not that good by how tentative everyone was on the top section with not a lot of snow spray coming off the skis.

 

[Hawk]

I don't know. OG yesterday is the same as OG last year is the same as OG any year. I am glad to be skiing it but OG is OG until it snows.

 

[cdskier]

I've skied OG a lot over the years...it definitely is not always this chunky.

 

[Hawk]

Me too for years. I ski it pretty much every time I go up HG this time of year. The chunky part is because it only has one day of grooming on it and that is consitent with any trail. The amount of hard park ice is the same every year no matter if they groom it early or wait. It's just the nature of OG.

 

[cdskier]

Today was chunkier than yesterday...and it now had another night of grooming. I'm still going with the issue being they didn't let the piles drain out before grooming them. I've skied it other years after the first/second grooms and it was never this bad.

 

[Hawk]

OK I will have to take you word on that. I did not ski it today.

 

[Kingslug20]

You can get expedited ski tuning..for another 22 bucks...
Now your at almost 70.00 for a sharpen and wax....

 

[hovercraft]

The weather left them no choice to open trails before draining as they needed to get more terrain open. Hard start to the season in the east….

 

[nhskier1969]

Sounds like OG is in mid season form. Why don't they groom OG in the winter? Especially after a thaw/freeze

 

[Blurski]

With smaller amount of terrain to groom each night, do you think it would be beneficial or possible for them to send the entire high season grooming fleet out and just keep making passes, the augers on the cats are at least 6" long, just keep grinding & grinding to make as much sugar as you can. Yes it costs $, but figure they must be all staffed up in the snow gate area by now.
I will admit it I have no idea about grooming but have an extensive background in compacting fill material and small lifts, with slow and multiple passes gets you to the required compaction, just revearse engineering, let the machine do the work.

 

[tumbler]

The blade is what does all of the grooming, you got to have that in the snow with a curl of snow going. The tiller just cleans it up and makes it look pretty.

For grooming OG, that used to get groomed almost every night and Ripcord was rarely groomed- this goes back a number of years. Grooming Ripcord keeps traffic off DS which we all can agree that is a good thing.

 

[Blurski]

So the tiller does not grind up ice? Son of a bitch, I always thought that is what it's primary job was. I stand corrected and go home a little smarter today.

 

[Kingslug20]

It's probably my least skied trail...although last year after a dump it was pretty fun...ice and pow...

 

[cdskier]

The weather left them no choice to open trails before draining as they needed to get more terrain open. Hard start to the season in the east….

No choice? You can open HG with whales to start if it needs time to drain and you want to open the summit with more than just Jester. Only reason I could see that not being feasible is if the whales were really oddly formed for some reason. Certainly wouldn't be the first time they opened a trail early season with whales prior to grooming it out...

 

[Kingslug20]

Or they just want to open more trails...it's been a bit rough these days.

 

[Keelhauled]

So the tiller does not grind up ice? Son of a bitch, I always thought that is what it's primary job was. I stand corrected and go home a little smarter today.

It eats chunks of ice up perfectly well, but since it spins in the same direction of travel its natural tendency is to ride over the surface rather than dig in. You can mitigate it somewhat with hydraulic down pressure but only so much. The other problem is the more you till it the finer the particles become and they set up more solidly every night until you get a bit of natural. You can set the tiller to spin in reverse, but that's a guaranteed way to send a chunk of ice through the back window so it's used very carefully. I think park groomers are about the only ones who use that function.

 

[jaybird]

Organ Grinder was same as it ever was today.
Sigi - getting hammered.

Who was the guy skiing Birdland ?
Top to bottom .. Yikes!

 

[hovercraft]

No choice? You can open HG with whales to start if it needs time to drain and you want to open the summit with more than just Jester. Only reason I could see that not being feasible is if the whales were really oddly formed for some reason. Certainly wouldn't be the first time they opened a trail early season with whales prior to grooming it out...

You are right there is always a choice. I was coming from the fact that they probably felt pressure to get trails open sooner then later.

 

[Kingslug20]

Glad they did...

 

[thetrailboss]

You are right there is always a choice. I was coming from the fact that they probably felt pressure to get trails open sooner then later.

Maybe apples to oranges, but what are the thoughts of SB locals regarding the early season performance of Alterra's other eastern property, Stratton? I saw on Sunday that Stratton had over 100 acres open when compared to SB's 40 or so. Just curious for conversational purposes.