Zambonis!

In the early 1940s, Frank Zamboni had an idea. Now, more than 50 years later, his name is synonymous with the machine he invented. In fact, ice resurfacers like the one he developed for his own rink in Southern California have had a tremendous impact on skating and ice sports throughout the world.

Frank Zamboni's belief in ongoing product improvement and innovation lives on today in the company he founded.

Iceland opened in 1940 as one of the largest rinks in the country, with 20,000 sq. ft. of iced surface -- that's enough room for 800 skaters. The original rink was an open-air facility. But the brothers soon learned that, with the intense Southern California sun and dry desert winds, the quality of their ice sheet was less than adequate, so they covered it with a domed roof. The challenge now was to maintain this much-improved indoor surface.

At the time, resurfacing the ice meant pulling a scraper behind a tractor, shaving the surface. Three or four workers would scoop away the shavings, spray water over the surface, squeegee it clean and allow the water to freeze -- a process that took more than an hour. For Frank, it was a puzzle to be solved: how could he make a good sheet of ice in a short period of time? It wasn't long before he began engineering a machine that would make the task of ice-resurfacing fast and efficient. And the concept of the Zamboni ice resurfacer was born...

Here are some interesting evolution of Zamboni pictures today.




THE ZAMBONI


The ZAMBONI is a highly specialized machine that cleans the ice between periods. In its travel across the ice, it scrapes the loose shavings off and lays down a layer of hot water. The water must be hot to melt the upper ice surfaces and weld a smooth sheet. It takes just minutes to freeze.

SHAVING
A blade (A) scrapes the surface of the ice.

COLLECTING
After a horizontal screw (B) gathers the shavings, a vertical screw (C) propels them into the snow tank.(D)

WASHING
Water is fed from a wash-water tank (E) to a squeegee-like conditioner (F), which smoothes the ice. Dirty water is vacuumed, filtered and returned to the tank.

RENEWING
Clean, hot water is spread on the ice by a towel (G) behind the conditioner.