Another great day today as the crew finished fitting the ice mats and unrolled the mats into their resting places.   When I showed up around 4:30pm Matt Starr, Eugene Carroll, Wayne Brock and Bruce Joncas were busy unrolling each mat and adjusting the mats into place.   It’s OK to walk on the mats as long as you keep your feet on the tubes and off of the spacer bars.  If somebody steps on a spacer then the thin edge of the spacer will puncture the insulation below which makes a loud “pop” sound.   Then the guys all yell “Tape!” or “I did a Bruce!” and somebody else scrambles over to tape up the punctured insulation.

“Bruce!” as in “Bruce Joncas just put his foot in the wrong spot” for those of you keeping score.

Meanwhile Jim Hibbard put the finishing touches on the chiller, pumps and piping.   He needed to work hard all day today to get us in shape for tomorrow when Trane Oregon will visit to start up the chiller.

A key part of the preparation is to pump room-temperature glycol through the ice mats to fill the mats evenly and force all of the air out of the system.   The glycol is a neon-yellow color which gives an effect like 10,000 glow sticks laid out on the floor.   Don’t worry, tomorrow we will install another layer of white rink liner to hide the yellow.