Quote:
Mt Buller:
Effects of Snowmaking
There is no doubt that snowmaking is making a great change to the reliability and standard of skiing at Mount Buller. For example, Bourke Street was open for skiing 107 days during the 2001 ski season. We estimate that without snowmaking Bourke Street would have only been open for 27 days.

OK exceptionally low humidity - but shows in temp inversion situations it may be possible to make small amounts of snow for patching at a couple of degrees above freezing as temp inversions are usually accompanied by humidity inversions too.

if there was snow making could it have been turned on at cairngorm today

or am i just getting a bit to exited at the first snowfall of the season



Edited 1 times. Last edit at 17.23hrs Fri 27 Oct 06 by liaml.

Summit was in cloud all day so have a RH figure of 99% - which wasnt the case on the rest of the mountain all day so not sure about that.

These are the sort of windows where snow to last probably isnt possible, but ski areas do still make snow in such conditions as the melting process helps lower ground temps.

What sort of conditions prompt the Lecht to start their snowmaking?

holidays nearing!

> holidays nearing!

LOL, probably not a bad idea!

Has to be said that The Lecht have set themselves up to respond to colder conditions well - it's a shame they don't have more modern and extensive equipment though and that other areas don't follow their lead.

Just so that you know, The Lecht have invested in 8 more snow cannons for this winter. They are second hand and are similar to the ones they already have. I think the idea is to have a permanent set-up and use selected ones depending on the wind direction.

The only problem they have is water supply, so hopefully they'll manage to get that panned out and provide some good consistent skiing.

Freeskiing.co.uk

^ Nice one Lecht

You see this is the sort of proactive investment that I think should be considered elsewhere (and it appears Bob K at Cairngorm has taken some notice now thank goodness - see the thread on ownership of the Gorm).

You can actually pick up second hand equipment reasonably cheaply, I found a site a while back (can't remember the URL at the moment but I posted it somewhere in this thread) that was selling equipment for a few grand a cannon.

Well done The lecht I say and I hope they have a very successful season as a result - I guess if they're investing in this equipmwent they must think there's a commercial return for the money.

Fingers crosed the water supply will be sorted (they must have plans to get it sorted I'd guess if they're investing in the equipment).

Do you know if these cannon will be servicing the one run or more?



Edited 1 times. Last edit at 13.01hrs Thu 2 Nov 06 by roga.

With more cannons they can leave them in situ and put them on as required which significantly reduces workload, but it's still a mannual fan gun system, and old fan guns at that so it's worth considering that whatever the Lecht manage to do with them , a new system should be able to do more.

If they are able to supply water to 8 or more guns at one time they should be able to cover the Eagle in a Respectable timescale. The ability to get some main runs on stream gives them a greater chance of making a return on the cost of snowmaking. Fan guns need more favourable conditions than high pressure systems, but given the right conditions they are more efficient and can churn out large volumes of snow at a lower cost than high pressure air-water guns.

Temps on the Summit of CairnGorm have been hovering around -5°c since yesterday evening, though RH has been up at 97% as the summit has been about the cloud base - though a bit lower looked cloud free earlier on the Meto Webcam in Aviemore. Seems the old CML site has gone and taken the webcams with them?

Anyway perhaps if a decent snowmaking system was in place in the Top Basin at CairnGorm there could have been 24hrs of snowmaking - potentially enough to have one of the Top Basin lifts spinning. Granted it probably wouldn't last long term at this stage, but people are waiting for their first turns so a reasonable turnout could be expected in such a scenario, it would also be a good publicity option (esp if season tickets were still on sale at discounted price till end of Nov say) and the subsquent thaw would put a tend in ground temperatures.

Just a thought....

Alan

Has any information come to light yet about the potential water flow for snowmaking on Cairn Gorm?

Bob Kinnaird also mentioned that there is no room for further power supply expansion. Would that also be a significant limiting factor for operating during lift served days?

Anybody reading this who is thinking about a research project in snowmaking - Scottish Snowsports needs you!! Please make yourself known.

Paul



Edited 1 times. Last edit at 00.26hrs Thu 2 Nov 06 by pfairbrother.

I understand that the best time for snowmaking is at night when generally temperatures are lower, and humidity rates decline. Therefore, presumably outwith normal opening hours, elecrtical distribution capacity would not be an issue at Cairngorm. Also, what would be wrong with renting in a mobile gas-oil generator for the winter season ?

Paul, with regards to power unless there were 16 operating lifts there would be still be at least a little slack in the system for some day-time snow making. The funicular is on a seperate power feed from the rest of the mountain.

Any future re-development or lift modernisation may ultimately require new utilities, the cost would be high, but if you were laying a new power cable from Glenmore, it's the cost of digging the trench in the first place that costs the £££s so then would be the time to possibly put in a water main from Glenmore too. Loch Morlich and/or the Allt Mor would give a different order of water supply altogether, though as far as possible abstracting water on mountain would be better for power consumption reasons unless it was very cold and very dry.

amusing...

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